Old Rail-line west of Rocky to Nordegg

hadster

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If you are local to the area ,get ahold of me and we can maybe do some of this in winter depending in snow levels etc.
 

surreyboy

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so a couple of us are wanting to do this ride tomorrow...Jan-23-2015 & would like to know where a good place to stage would be ? were rolling out of Drayton Valley. any one else that wants to ride along , more than welcome on the short notice. thanks for any info on staging areas
 

medler

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Usually stage at horburg or the pipeline. You guys on sleds? Might be icy out there on those ravines where the bridges and tressles were
 

hadster

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Quad with wheels will have trouble on the ravine hills etc, sleds will to if its icy. RZR on tracks should do fine but could also spin or slide sideways on some hills / slopes, it could be a dangerous gamble on some of them. Stage at Horburg as Medler said, or if just a day ride i'd go to Saunders then you could go west to Nordegg or east toward Horburg. If your'e going all the way it will likely be a long day 6 - 10 hrs one way (not sure never done it in winter). There has also been fairly new logging happen west of Baker road that can confuse you as to where the trail is, i have heard they are logging right now in the Horburg area as well. Please give us an update to how things are out there if the logging has wrecked the trail or not. I hope someone in the group has been on it before or at very least has some GPS tracks of it, could be easy to take a wrong turn ,as it's not all on the original railbed. I have other plans but if you get into trouble ,i may be able to sneak away to help out my number is 403-845-0435. P.S. bring a chainsaw for fallen trees etc.
 

swiller

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was out there today.they are logging right at horberg.i would park at pipeline and go that way.or park at very first opening on right side and get right on the rail line.they logged on both sides at the beginning of the rail line just before horberg,nowhere really to stage for more than 2-3 vehicles.
 

MADKAWI

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This sounds like a cool trail. Where is Horburg in relation to Nordegg I know how to get there from Hinton.

What are these bridges like? Scetchy or doable n how wide are they?
 

tex78

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This sounds like a cool trail. Where is Horburg in relation to Nordegg I know how to get there from Hinton.

What are these bridges like? Scetchy or doable n how wide are they?
Horberg is 15 min west or rock by the pidernies gravel pit, it's the start persay of the rail line ( east of horberg is too much owned land)
 

AB RANGER 007

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MADKAWI, here is 2 JPGS from my Garmin MapSource Mappin Software.
 

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MADKAWI

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MADKAWI, here is 2 JPGS from my Garmin MapSource Mappin Software.

LOL okay I'm probably going to offend you here but the mapping program that I am using compared to that makes yours look like Atari versus PlayStation 4.... Lol

but at the end of the day what really matters is that you know how to get back to camp. The mapping programs I'm using with Google earth a really nice especially for snowmobiling because I can pick out areas that have huge Meadows and just got to figure a way to get to them via cutlines. I'll try to find a picture of the Maps I use.
 

MADKAWI

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This is the app. U can tilt the contour as well n gives u an idea what the shape of the land is. They have the terrain and topo maps too. But i never use those.you can zoom in on areas and tell if the trail goes into a rock face or if it's a trail that's passible. I love this app.






 

MADKAWI

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U can zoom right in and it looks much clearer on my phone. The distance finder is surprisingly accurate.you can do all sorts of things withbit that i haven't played with yet. Not bad for 1.16 cents lol
 

tex78

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I got my tracks.... Have to load maps from google in, then tracks onto it.... Buddy uses it, looks same as urs.. Have yet to try it yet
 

MADKAWI

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I got my tracks.... Have to load maps from google in, then tracks onto it.... Buddy uses it, looks same as urs.. Have yet to try it yet

ya about 10 years ago i was going through Alberta back road maps like crazy... Lol then a buddy had the program FUGAWI...where the fug a we...lol

anyway he would drive around then when we got back to the house he'd load up his gps tracks onto this program n it eas same idea but this is obviously much better because u can use the map at the time to zoom in or scroll over to see what's ahead... I use a weather forcaster as well let me know when we're goingbto get rained or snowed on... It's pretty accurate too.
 

AB RANGER 007

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LOL okay I'm probably going to offend you here but the mapping program that I am using compared to that makes yours look like Atari versus PlayStation 4.... Lol

but at the end of the day what really matters is that you know how to get back to camp. The mapping programs I'm using with Google earth a really nice especially for snowmobiling because I can pick out areas that have huge Meadows and just got to figure a way to get to them via cutlines. I'll try to find a picture of the Maps I use.

I hope these 2 JPGS fit in with your modern Google Earth Apps.

Bruce.
 

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whoDEANie

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ya about 10 years ago i was going through Alberta back road maps like crazy... Lol then a buddy had the program FUGAWI...where the fug a we...lol

anyway he would drive around then when we got back to the house he'd load up his gps tracks onto this program n it eas same idea but this is obviously much better because u can use the map at the time to zoom in or scroll over to see what's ahead... I use a weather forcaster as well let me know when we're goingbto get rained or snowed on... It's pretty accurate too.

I use Garmin Basecamp these days. It's free and allows me to superimpose all my tracks onto Google Earth and even commit them for private/public viewing. It definitely does not have the advantage of real time Google Earth integration like your phone app, but most of the places we ride don't have cell phone reception (intermittent at best, Rocky rail line included).
 

TylerG

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I use Garmin Basecamp these days. It's free and allows me to superimpose all my tracks onto Google Earth and even commit them for private/public viewing. It definitely does not have the advantage of real time Google Earth integration like your phone app, but most of the places we ride don't have cell phone reception (intermittent at best, Rocky rail line included).

Google has made "google earth pro" free now too, RedFlagDeals.com has the details!
 

MADKAWI

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Ya the reason i prefer google earth over the plain jane gps mapping is because u can tell if you're going into a cut block or into a rock face, a meadow etc etc...

it's really fun though to play around in the bush not having to judge where you're going by looking at the sun n stars.., lol
 

MADKAWI

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Google has made "google earth pro" free now too, RedFlagDeals.com has the details!

you don't actually need cell phone reception as long as you put the maps on before you get out of cell phone range when you first fire up the program and you're good to go. My new iPhone 6 Plus is definitely better than my old iPhone 4 was for this just because the phone has more capability, but even the old 4 was pretty good 90% of the time. The phone has GPS capability n Caches the maps or something I'm not quite sure how it works but I know you don't need cell phone service to make it all happen.
A lot of hard-core GPS guys will argue with me until they see what it's like and then they laugh get themselves an iPhone and Never look back but at the end of the day like I said before as long as you get out of the bush that's really all that matters.

for me though the real time thing is important because i alwsys look for cool little area's that aren't traveled.

plus at 1.16 for the app it's pretty affordable n everyone seems t have a smart phone these days.
 
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