A truly great day: went up on ice and boilerplate came down on corn snow. Skated to the Wolf Ridge via FP, CP, Huron, and #1 - returned by the same route. Getting to Huron was a bit of a struggle with the frozen ruts and frozen meltwater. Spent some time at Huron watching thousands-and-thousands of Redpolls (maybe two or three hundred without exaggeration). After the Huron break, conditions had improved to a softened snow surface - these conditions continued all the way to the Wolf Ridge. Stopped briefly to admire the Golden Ragworts that were blooming at the entrance to #24, warmed by the rock cut. At the bench the portage had increased to about 20'. From the bench there was complete coverage up to the Wolf Ridge. I then turned around and skied back to just past Blanchet and went into the pond where I spent an hour of very pleasant spring skiing sitting on a warm bank. When I went back to #1 conditions were quite different: the icy sections had changed into very fast corn - the snowy sections were still good. From there it was a good, enjoyable two-skate back to Huron and finally to P10.

Ridge Road is now showing bare spots but nothing serious. The area around the bench is getting thin and most of that section will probably be bare by the end of tomorrow.

I bypassed #24 on the premise that there would be open creeks across it - a mistake, since two skaters I talked to said it was in great shape and was a delight. Tomorrow #24 is the recommended route and should be considered to be the bench bypass.

There is no reason why it would not be possible to ski to the tower tomorrow there’s lots of snow - I measured 30 cm of snow off-track at the bottom of the Wolf Ridge.

The classic skiers I met told me there is lots of snow on #40 and recommended highly going in from P12.

While gliding through the granular on the FP I mused whether those small spheres of ice are really “corn snow” or whether, possibly, they are the frozen tears of skiers who fear that all this could end soon.

An update on the red caution signs - they have mostly been removed - you’ll have to find the ice on your own.