Finally after waiting for what seems like an eternity, it appears winter has finally arrived to the east coast of Newfoundland! This storm was forecasted to douse us with over 20cm snow coupled with high winds.

The long awaited first blizzard of the season arrived around 3pm on Thursday and continued though the night with highest snowfall rates to occur around midnight.

I snapped a few mid-storm pics on my way out to the garage to finish installing the convertible top on my Argo 6x6 so it would be all ready for a potential post storm adventure.

By Friday morning the worst of the storm had passed although strong winds continued throughout the day.

Here in Torbay we received just over 30cm of snow!

Once again, my trusty Honda 9/28 Snowblower was put to work getting the driveway cleared with minimal effort and no fuss!

With the driveway cleared and being already suited up I decided to take advantage of fantastic snow conditions and head out for a quick shakedown run in project Argo as I recently installed the 13" winter tracks, windshield and convertible top.

Trail conditions were awesome. Getting out early meant I got to break many of the trails all around the airport. Snow was deep especially where drifted and quite soft which meant a lot of low range and running the throttle right on the governor to push the machine through the fresh powder.

My 32 year old beast performed awesome and ran well all day. A recent maintenance including fresh engine oil, bearings greased and drive chains lubricated are all key to keeping the machine reliable. For the story on re-purchasing and rebuilding our family '89 Argo 6x6 check out project Argo on the Projects in the Shed page.

My newly installed windshield wiper really came in handy for these mild very snowy conditions. I will probably be making a couple modifications so shorten the wiper arm & install a longer wiper blade to get better coverage at the top of the window.

Meanwhile out in Bay Roberts, Dad and his buddy Kevin had the same idea and hit the trails immediately after the storm to log some long awaited miles on their Yamaha Snowmobiles.

Leaving from the fish plant in Cupids they followed the trails towards Nine Island Pond. Earlier this year Kevin picked up a new (to him) Yamaha Venture Multipurpose and completed a major overhaul. This was their first shakedown run with the new sled and it ran very well! For some pics of the rebuild check out Randy's shed Projects 2021 on the Projects in the Shed page.

All in all they logged 45kms on the machines, not bad for the first run of the year!

Hopefully this is finally the start to our winter, it hasn't been cold so ponds and even trail puddles are not frozen very well, fingers crossed that conditions continue to improve before Ice Fishing season opens in February!

Cheers, MIKE

Copyright © 2011 Michael Smith