REGIONAL- The staff at Voyageurs National Park has been chomping at the bit to get to work on the park’s winter snowmobile trails and ice roads, and now with a bit more cooperative weather a main snowmobile thoroughfare could be officially open as early as this weekend.
“We don’t have any of our winter recreational trails established yet in the park,” Superintendent Bob DeGross told the Timberjay on Tuesday. “But I’m hoping that prior to this weekend, we should be able to get the green trail from Frank’s Bay up in the International Falls area down to Ash River staked, ideally, and then maybe even south of Ash River. My top priority with the crew is to get that green snowmobile trail in, because that provides our main mode of connection between all of the gateway communities.”
DeGross said it’s been hard to wait for adequate conditions to prep the park for winter recreation.
“This winter is frustrating in a variety of different ways, because usually we have all of this done typically around the middle of December, trying to open things up prior to New Years. The way the winter rolled in, it has prevented us from being able to do that. That rain and warm weather that we had over the Christmas weekend did not do us any favors at all.”
A complicating factor staff have discovered as they’ve been out on the ice the past two weeks is the presence of numerous ice ridges, including one ridge on the west end of Kabetogama Lake that has been deemed impassable. Ice measurements have been thinner as one nears the ridges, in some places less than two inches.
But DeGross has been encouraged by this week’s cold temperatures and was optimistic conditions would improve to the point that crews could do the necessary work to reduce those ridge hazards.
“Our plan is to get out there and as long as we find adequate ice thickness near the ice ridge, which I’m pretty confident that we will considering the cold conditions that we’ve had, then they’ll cut that ice ridge down in one specific area where they’ll have the trail established. Then it takes about a day for it to freeze over adequately and then we can drag through there.”
The cold also has the park on the brink of beginning work on its ice roads.
“Ideally, we want at least 12 inches of ice to be able to start plowing and establishing an ice road,” DeGross said. “They’ve been checking ice thicknesses. I’m pretty sure we’re probably close to decent ice thicknesses for establishment of the roads.”
DeGross said that snowmobilers should exercise caution when they’re out on the park’s trails.
“They’ll find that our portages are probably rough because we haven’t been able to get out there, so be mindful of that,” he said. “Be mindful of those ridges as you travel along. Just use extreme caution and be aware of your surroundings.”
Summer is coming
It’s been a record-setting year for people making summer plans for camping in Voyageurs National Park, according to information in recent community updates from the park.
Online camping reservations for the coming year were opened on Nov. 15, and the park logged 244 reservations in the first minute that the site was open. By the end of the day, 1,009 folks had reserved their preferred sites and dates, the largest number of first-day registrants since the system was initiated in 2019. Only 297 people took advantage of the first-day rollout of the system in 2019, and numbers have continued to increase every year since. This year’s total represents a five percent increase in first-day reservations over those for the 2023 season.
Another record was set for the most reservations as of Dec. 30, with 1,561 stays reserved for 2024, topping the previous high of 1,507 in 2022.
Other activities
As reported in the park’s community updates, rangers and maintenance crews completed their annual Thin Ice Rescue Training in November.
As of the park’s Jan. 10 trails update, there were no open snowmobile trails or ice roads anywhere in the park. Three Rainy lake area hiking trails were open, as were three Ash River area trails. The sledding hill and ice rink at the Kabetogama recreation area were both closed.
Winter events currently being planned include a boreal stargazing event and the Heart of the Continent Partnership conference taking place the week of Feb. 11. To facilitate dark sky programming this winter, the park hired a winter field fellow.
Beginning Friday, Jan. 5, the Rainy Lake and Kabetogama Visitor Centers reopened for the winter season. Rainy Lake will be open Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays from 10 a.m.-4 p.m., while Kabetogama will be open Fridays and Saturdays from 10 a.m.-4 p.m.
The park also has cross country skis and snowshoes available to rent for those who want to experience the park’s winter landscape. The cost is $10 per pair for adults and $5 for children 16 and under. Reservations can be made online at https://www.recreation.gov/ticket/facility/10090880. Rental fees go back into the program to help with the cost of equipment replacement.
Additional items of note from the updates include:
• Work on the new Kabetogama boat ramp has been completed.
• Close inspection of docks, chains and buoys pulled from Rainy Lake and Namakan Lake in preparation for the winter season revealed no evidence of zebra mussels, building on past positive monitoring results for the invasive aquatic species. The update noted that the findings support the positive effects of the vessel decontamination station at Kettle Falls.
• The park Resources team has been developing funding proposals for future projects, including a Cruiser Lake cold water fish habitat research study.
• The Kabetogama Visitor Center was painted and maintenance work conducted on some of the park’s seasonal housing units.