Later New Year's Day

We've seen some improvement since this morning, mainly due to 2 factors:
1. We received a little new snow in the form of flurries, throughout the day
2. I built a new piece of grooming equipment this morning - a kind of scarifier I call the bed of nails or the Crust Buster. It is a drag consisting of 9 rows of 3 and a half inch nails, supported by a pair of old skis so it doesn't dig in too far. In the afternoon, I dragged the Crust Buster over a number of trails in the central and northern parts of the network. It did a fairly good job of breaking up the icy crust and levelling out the footprints and ski tracks that were molded into the crust before it froze. Then I took the roller and snow comb over the trails to pack and further level the surface. I even set some track on some trails in the central area. The result is a much improved ski experience ON THE TRAILS I HAVE GROOMED. Please note that I have not yet groomed any trails toward the south end, close to 5 Sideroad. I will try to get to those tomorrow.
We are expecting flurries to continue tonight and tomorrow, followed by a snowfall of 2 to 4 cm Saturday night. If the forecast is correct, then conditions will continue to improve.
There is one section of trail with significant bare spots on it; Mainline trail #1, in the north end between the junctions of #1a, and #3 has been washed out by water running across and along the trail. This is a perennial seepage area which will take some time to freeze and get covered with snow.

underside of the crust buster, snowing the nails and skis

Crust buster lying flat, in its working position