Rain and warm weather mean the Parry Sound District’s snowmobile trails will take a bit longer to get ready.
Barry Wilkinson, the President of Parry Sound Snowmobile District 10 says the region has only had one club that started some grooming, which is the South Seguin club on the Seguin trail. He says that area is a little flatter and volunteers are able to get on some of their trails.
“The rest of the clubs are still limited by swamps and waterholes that haven’t frozen up yet. This snow doesn’t help really, cause it insulates the ground and we haven’t gotten frost down there yet so things a slowly starting right now,” he says.
Wilkinson reminds everyone that going on trails now is definitely not safe, adding with all the wind the region had over the weekend, the club is encountering a lot of trees down, so trails are closed and definitely not safe currently.
As for when residents should expect to get on their snowmobiles again, he says at this point it is all weather-dependent. Wilkinson says the area needs some colder weather, he adds “it looks like the first couple weeks in January are going to be a little better but right now with this rain and the warm weather that’s not helping us at all … but we just have to be patient and wait,”.
He says on the volunteer front, the club has been thriving. Through COVID Wilkinson says they have actually gained more people in their volunteer base, something they are really pleased with. Nevertheless, he says the club is always looking for more. If anyone wants to be involved, they can contact the office at Parry Sound Snowmobile District 10 and they’ll direct you to the club that’s involved and give you contact information.
Wilkinson repeated that this year will be a little slower, but reassured everyone that he and the volunteers are just as anxious as everybody else to get it going.