Skate ski from P5 up the Penguin Hill, west along Ridge Road and 1B to the intersection with 24, then back on the Champlain and Gatineau Parkways. The surface was well-crushed refrozen snow, acceptable for control but noisy, hard and abrasive. The best skiing and flattest surface was west of Trail 2. The Champlain Parkway would have been good too, but it had been trashed by snowmobiles. I saw an abandoned snowmobile above Black Lake, and then two other snowmobiles passed me at high speed coming up the hill. They must have been out to rescue the broken machine, because all three passed by again just after I returned to P5. They did a good job of destroying the skate lane, leaving deep ruts and popcorn-size chunks of frozen snow. What they were doing out on this section with no cabins to maintain was beyond me. They were not rescuing a skier in distress, as far as I could tell. It would be nice if the NCC left patrolling to skiers and kept the snowmobiles in the shed unless there is an emergency. Aside from the snowmobile damage, conditions were better than I expected and it was good to be out in the afternoon sun.