was some 36 years before I purchased
my next sled. My brother had a 2002
Arctic Cat ZR800 that he had not used
in over 2 years and I bugged him
incessantly to sell it to me. He even-
tually did.
All of a sudden, winter was magi-
cal again.
I realise that this may sound com-
pletely daft to some, but hitting the
trails on my sled, even in -25c tem-
peratures, gave me an entirely new
passion to pursue all winter long.
And pursue it I have! I covered
some 2,000 kilometres on that old
Green Beast before selling it in No-
vember of 2017, when I purchased
a new machine; a 2017 Arctic Cat
ZR6000. I wanted the dependability
of a machine that wasn’t already 15
years old in order to go on multi-day
overland snowmobile adventures
without constantly worrying about
breakdowns and parts availability.
And that is exactly what I have
been doing for the past two winters.
Riding through the Gaspe region of
Quebec was last year’s big snowmo-
biling adventure. My friend John and
I spent 10 days riding in the deepest
snow I have ever seen. We both ride
what are referred to as ‘trail sleds’,
meant to perform at their peak on
the many thousands of kilometres of
groomed and maintained snowmo-
bile trails that crisscross this great
country each winter.
We spent 10 days riding some of
TRAVERSE 103
the best snowmobile trails that the re-
gion has to offer and I cannot wait to
go back! There is a mix of every kind
of riding, from deep-powder boon-
docking (off-trail riding) and moun-
tain riding to epic trail touring and
sightseeing, some of it in regions so
wild and remote that careful planning
is always a priority.
Most recently I just completed a
2,500 kilometre adventure through
Northern Ontario and Western Que-
bec. My riding buddy, John, and I
covered an average of 278 kilometres
per day, staying in motels each night
as we made our way across the prov-
ince of Ontario on the vast network of
OFSC (Ontario Federation of Snow-
mobile) Trails. Once again we were