9225-R1_MSA_December2025_Newsletter

MSA Club News

April, at the club house. The kitchen is open at 5:30pm for purchase of food and drinks. During riding season our kitchen is open from 10am-4pm every weekend for food and drink purchases when it is fit to ride. Stop on in! COSTAL REGION December has arrived with cold mornings and plenty of excitement for the riding sea son ahead! On the trail-work side of things, our members have been hard at work getting everything open and ready for snow. Every Sunday, we’ve had a large crew out clearing trails and adding additional signage to help riders navigate our growing and ever-chang ing trail system. In addition, we have wood prepped for the warming hut (1 Mile Kamp) and a new “forest friend” to be on the lookout for! We had 8 members attend the Maine Snow mobile Show in October. We sold many raffle tickets and helped the MSA scholarship booth as well. Thank you all who volunteered your time. Your hard work does not go unnoticed. ALNA sc Alna, ME At the November meeting, we had 25 attendees and welcomed two new members, Cole and Nate Green. Cole came out the fol lowing Sunday to help the trail crew—thank you, Cole! We re-elected the officers: Pres ident – Jay Verney, Vice President - Kristina Verney - Treasurer - John Shorey, Assistant Treasurer - Tabatha Sawyer, Secretary - Sonya Verney, Trail Master - Sawyer Hull, Director – Estelle Carey and Alternate Director – Ken Carey. Thank you all for the work you do. We’re looking forward to another won derful Christmas Party meeting on Decem ber 4th. As always, we expect plenty of fun games, gifts, and good grub. We will attend the Damariscotta/Newcastle Parade of Lights and share a photo of our float in next month’s update. We always have a cheerful group of members in attendance, and I’m sure this year will be no different. We are all eager to get back on the sleds and see some familiar faces out there on the trails. Ride Right and Ride Safe. Club Reporters Tabatha Sawyer and Kristina Verney Sacopee Valley Snow Drifters (SVSD) had its third monthly club meeting on Tuesday, November 4, 2025 and nine members attended as we thankfully have twenty-three snowmo bile club members so far for the 2025/2026 season. What has SVSD accomplished so far this season? SVSD has purchased and trans ported ten forestry mats for $3,165 dollars; btw, that’s 20,000 pounds of mats, thank you to Jack Wadsworth. Replaced and repaired a fif ty-foot-long snowmobile trestle over Hancock Brook, thank you Edward LeBorgne & Richard Brunault. We failed to find-a-work-around on the Tower Trail, even with the assistance of the Maine Landowner Relations, we could not find a reroute... New trail-maps are being printed for our sixty-miles of snowmobile trails, thank you Jenilee Barsanti, Scott Day & Jack Wad sworth. New one-mile reroute with bridges and culverts have been completed, thank you Jack Wadsworth. New forestry mat bridges on Pendexter, Plantation and Elm Street have been completed, as well as 40 yards of bark mulch on the Barnes trails through the Oak Hill Maple sap-lines, thank you to David, Jacob, and Josh Mudgett. SVSD still has plenty of “Old-Busi ness” to solve and complete. SVSD trails don’t just happen, they require significant volunteer effort from loyal club members, involving landowner negotiation, trail construction and SACOPEE VALLEY SNOW DRIFTERS Porter, ME

include a pot luck dinner. We do have a lot of great cooks in our group! As 2026 begins, here’s wishing everyone a happy, healthy, prosperous, safe and snowy New Year!!

maintenance, ongoing grooming to ensure safe and enjoyable access, as most trails are on pri vate property and rely on riders to respect the use of those lands... Only you can help support your sport of snowmobiling. Thank you & Join-a-club John Lambert: Club Reporter

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CENTRAL REGION

ROME RUFF RIDERS Rome, ME

Cobbosseecontee sc West Gardiner, ME

We were able to start up again with our RTP grant-funded project to replace two bridges on our west side trail. A big push was made to complete before Thanksgiving. We are two days away with one bridge completed and the second nearly done so I am confident we can enjoy turkey day knowing we will be ready to go when the time comes. We had two very successful work days where volunteers stepped up to do some trail trimming. We also got out to do some bush hogging with Matt, our youngest member; thank you Matt for working on your days off. All of our equipment has gone through maintenance and drag batteries charged. We still need to convert our new SxS to tracks. Everyone is excited to try it. We also started an equipment swap, where we are selling some of our older grooming equipment in exchange for a newer, more versatile tracked ATV and 5x8 drag from JB Grooming. The regional C4 map will be available from participating clubs and at the Rome Town Hall. The map is centered on the Readfield-Bel grade-Manchester area and covers 25 different clubs. Our meetings are the second Tuesday of the month September to April, 7:00PM at the Rome Town Hall. All are welcome. LEXINGTON HIGHLANDERS sc Lexington, ME Greetings Fellow Snowmobilers!! The end of the year is certainly a busy time for everyone. Trail work moved back to Saturday morn ings in December after getting through hunting season. The Saturday morning Hunter’s Break fasts were quite successful. Don’t think anyone left hungry. Construction is progressing on the new sec tion of the pole barn. We want to say thank you to Hammond Lumber in Farmington for help with the supplies. A special thank you goes to the club members that gave up their time on the weekends to make this happen.

www.cobbosseeconteesnowmobileclub.com Like most clubs, trailwork has been top pri ority this fall. Thanks to our trail crew for the awesome job, repairing bridges, clearing trails, and everything else that pertains to trails. Our “Maine Bridge Masters” have been out and widened two of our bridges making easier accessibility for the side by side on tracks. Chet Meadow bridge has been stripped to the steel frame, rebuilt and redecked.

SACO PATHFINDERS sc Saco, ME Find us on Facebook

Hi Folks, Well, still not a lot to write about so far, except the trail team has been killing it since September. The two bush-hogs have been run ning every weekend and are really being put to use, widening all our trails. The dry summer and fall have really worked to our advantage. Our bridge experts have been busy replacing rotten boards and rebuilding the nearly 50 bridges on our trail system. As of this writing, our trails are almost ready to go.

On November 22 nd , we had the privilege of having the MSA snowmobiles/trailer on dis play during our MSA raffle ticket sale at our local transfer station. Being held on a Satur day when most townsfolk are coming to dis pose of their trash at the transfer station, it was the perfect place to sell tickets - a huge suc cess. Special thanks to Mike and Melissa for bringing a warming tent as it was a cold day. We are keeping our fingers crossed for a decent amount of rideable snow! As we rolled into November, it appears Old Man Winter finally sent Mother Nature his notice he is taking over the weather! On Nov. 5 The Lodge at Moosehead Lake posted a short video showing snow falling from the skies! Hopefully this will be a record winter snow fall we have not seen in a few years. Nov.9 it snowed in Saint Albans!!! Did not accumulate or last but it is a sure sign of winter snowfall has begun. We held our election of officers on Oct. 9. Elected by unanimous votes, Brady Snowman President, Josh Lord Trail Master, Mark Han son Treasurer, Bonnie Jepson Secretary. Direc tors Brady Snowman, Matt Charrier, Mark Hansen, Josh Lord, Bonnie Jepson, Dan Jep son, David Elliot, Leeni Fletcher, Alex Ducant, Daryl Bubar, Sylvia Bubar. Our shed expansion project finished up with the concrete slab poured. Working on getting the structure closed in. Discussion of looking into purchasing some type of a snow packing roller to pack trails before enough snow is accumulated to use the groomer. The decision to fabricate a packing sled from a large oil tank was agreed upon. Josh donated an old oil tank and did the cutting of the tank. Dan Jepson is in the process of fab ricating this snow packing sled. Again “Tom Sawyering” his wife into the project, who is trying to get this done as soon as possible! Matt is talking with Corinna club about tak ing over the Dixie Trail from the Saint Albans end to the railbed in Corinna. There is the pos sibility of potentially reopening Dudley Brook Trail next year. Trail signs have been replaced with better identification of location and direction. Our track truck is at Clark’s working on get ting it in tip-top shape. Parts came in and now working on steering/hydraulics. We always welcome new members, individ uals, families and businesses to support our club. Our meetings are held at 6:30p.m. on the second Thursday of each month from Oct until Sno-Devils sc Saint Albans, ME

Over the past several years, Maine has been hit with some severe weather in October and November, causing lots of damage to our trails, and forcing our crews to redo all the work they had done to that point. Thankfully, so far, this year has been quiet. We’re hoping by the time this issue goes to print, the winds failed to show up, the ground is rock hard, and the white gold has started to fall. Our club has been around for over 50 years now. Many people in the communities we serve know who we are and that we are not just about snowmobiling. Some of our trails remain open year-round for locals to enjoy, whether it be hiking, biking, walking the dog, etc. We are so proud to be able to support our community in this way. Another small service we provide is food baskets delivered to a local church at Thanksgiving and Christmas to help families in need. One of our longest serving members, Gordon Mehlman, has been taking charge of this service for many years now. We’re so glad to be able to assist those in need. Happy Holidays everyone! Cheers Doug Doherty, President It’s been a busy month for the club. After getting landowner’s permission, we rented an excavator from Windham Rental to work on a severe washout located on our “downtown” trail. Devon Nelson spent most of the day in the hot seat and did a fantastic job removing rocks and filling in to make the hill safe to ride again. Volunteers also repaired a bridge located on a trail behind Shea’s gas station. That was our third repair or bridge replacement this season. Several club members attended a town meeting to request permission to use town SEBAGO BRANCH DUCKERS Sebago, ME sebagobranchduckers@gmail.com Hello Everyone,

Our annual Christmas Party was well attended. How can anyone go wrong with good friends, good food and lots of laughs.

LHSC will be having a club ride in January. Watch for updates on our Facebook page for the date and time. We will also be hosting a Bon Fire on the January 17 th with hot chocolate and s’mores. Please “bundle up” and join us.

Our club meeting on January 31 st will also

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