Fresh tracks in the Fort a la Corne forest

On December 21^st a few members of the snowshoe club spent the day wandering around in the Fort A La Corne forest which is located just north east of Prince Albert, SK, our destination was the high banks of the North Saskatchewan River. It turned out to be a great day; the temperatures were around -15 with very little wind and fresh snow falling. The road into the forest is just a sandy trail with very few places to turn around and even fewer places to park our car which is low to the ground. Our only option was to shovel our way off of the road, the snowshoes worked great for this.

We got lucky in that the trail that we wanted to follow hadn’t been traveled by snowmobile yet this year so we had lots of fresh powdery snow to make tracks in.

For the most part the trail was easy to follow, even when it came to a beaver dam that has fallen into disrepair. But as we neared the river our trail got tougher to follow and eventually we ended up pushing bush. Luckily we were close enough to the river’s edge that the clearing could be seen through the trees. When we emerged from the dense forest, the views of the river valley were worth the effort. We stayed long enough to have a quick lunch of sandwiches and some hot tea before we strapped on our snowshoes and headed back.

In total we traveled 10km’s and had a great time reading and following the different animal tracks in the snow.

Making our way along a beaver dam

View of the North Saskatchewan River from high up on the north banks. Open water can be seen in areas where shallow rapids occur

Making tracks in fresh snow

Mark, Shaun, Zoe, and Valerie