Madonna Vasa Trail

Today we got out hiking for only the second time this winter. It was the first time on snowshoes! It's been a mild winter, with little snow. But we had a good time today. About 30 degrees F, snowing lightly, with about 1.5 feet of snow on the ground where we were.

We hiked part of the Madonna Vasa Trail, which I had never been on before. It's a XC ski trail that was created some years ago (1960s or 1970s?). It runs from one of the parking lots at Smugglers Notch Ski Area (Madonna Mountain) to the Underhill State Park. We hiked from Desjardin Road to Burnor Road.

Here's the crew today:

It wasn't snowing very hard in the photo above. By the time we stopped for lunch, it was snowing harder:

In case you're wondering, the styrofoam cups contain hot chocolate and peppermint schnapps. Do we look happy??

The Madonna Vasa Trail was inspired by the Vasaloppet in Sweden, called the Vasa for short. The Vasaloppet is an annual 90 km XC ski race that was started in 1922 and was in turn inspired by a legendary run by King Gustav Vasa in 1520.