A long history of grooming trails in the region.
Eastman SnoPALS is a regional snowmobile club formed in 1996 by the amalgamation of three smaller, local clubs from Pinawa, Agassiz (Seddon’s Corner) and Lac du Bonnet. This is how the acronym PALS originates.
The SnoPALS is presently comprised of members from Lac du Bonnet, Seven Sister Falls, Pinawa, Whitemouth and Elma. Many of our members reside outside the immediate area and ride our trails on day trips or from their cottages along the Winnipeg and Lee River systems.
The clubs objectives, as stated in the by-laws are:
- to promote safe, high-quality recreational snowmobiling;
- to develop and maintain snowmobile trails;
- to foster good relations with the non-snowmobiling public, and;
- to take collective action on matters concerning the membership.
The SnoPALS club maintains approximately 325 km of trails, stretching from Red Deer in the Brightstone hills in the north, Elma to the south, Seddon’s Corner to the west and Pinawa in the east. The trails connect with trails maintained by our neighbouring clubs and the Whiteshell Provincial Park trail network.
The SnoPALS club is safety-oriented with hundreds of kilometres of trails cleared, signed and groomed annually.
The trails range from a nice flowing ride through a pine forest in the Canadian Shield to a straight line over an old rail bed through swampy and sandy pastureland. Every season, the all-volunteer crew’s clear debris and fallen trees off of the trails to allow for signage and grooming once the snow falls. Many of our trail’s cross swamps, creeks and rivers and we must always have sufficient ice upon which to operate our grooming equipment safely. Snowmobiles can ride safely over approximately 6” of ice but our grooming equipment requires 18” of ice. There maybe times in the early season where some trails are opened but others remain closed due to poor ice conditions. We ask for your patience. We will always groom the trails as soon as we can safely.
The club has 5 warm-up shelters along their network for use by snowmobilers. They are open anytime to allow snowmobilers to stop and rest, build a fire and enjoy a quick meal on the trail.
Many services are available in various locations along our trail system which are marked on our maps and destination signs.
Eastman SnoPALS encourages riders to ride sober and ride safe.
Snoman and Eastman SnoPALS encourage snowmobile riders to respect landowner’s rights when riding.
Some of our trails cross private land where the Eastman SnoPals obtains permission from landowners to use private property to link between trails on public land. We can only maintain these relationships with land owners if snowmobilers respect the private land and STAY ON TRAILS.
The club has 2 Prinoth Husky groomer units;
The club stations all equipment in our groomer building in Seven Sisters from where we groom over 325 KM of trails in the club’s network. Utilizing 2 groomers we groom 7 different routes over 4 days. When available, our groomer operators would take a run once or twice a week. We are always looking for individuals with heavy equipment / grooming experience who would be interested in joining our team of GROOMING OPERATORS.
Everything done by Eastman SnoPALS would not be possible without the core group of dedicated volunteers that work on our trails for nothing more than the love of it and the desire to see safe groomed trails.
We meet monthly during the season at various locations including a ride-in meeting at our KINGS KOOKOUT shelter. We have an annual orientation day at our shop in Seven Sisters to give our members and guests an opportunity to see our equipment and go for a ride in one of our groomers.
We have developed a core of TRAIL GUARDIANS who choose a section of our trail system that they are familiar with and they coordinate the maintenance of that section of our trail. The duties would include assessing the safety of the trail to coordinating work parties to cut brush and dangerous trees and placing and maintaining our trail signs during the season.
We also have a group of SHELTER HOSTS who regularly ride to their shelter to ensure that all of the necessary supplies are on hand for the use of riders stopping to warm up or have a trail lunch.
We hope you enjoy our trail system as you pass through our communities and make use of our services and facilities.
Club membership and volunteer participation is always encouraged. If you would like to help our club with any of our activities, please drop us an email at Eastman_snopals@mtsmail.ca
MEMBER SERVICES
Our club mission statement
To facilitate safe, enjoyable snowmobiling by providing high quality trails; promoting snowmobiling as fun recreation; and fostering positive relations among snowmobile enthusiasts and the general public.
Our objectives for the key services we provide
- Govern and administer the club and its affairs.
- Develop and maintain well groomed, safe, accessible snowmobile trails in conjunction with land owners.
- Promote our trails and host community events to foster participation and camaraderie in snowmobiling.
- Attract and maintain club membership.
- Act and speak collectively regarding snowmobile issues on behalf of our membership.
This mission statement and objectives were developed during our strategic planning sessions. Club Member Services continues to be one of our major focus of attention going forward for our members and snowmobile riders in our area.
The services that snowmobilers can appreciate and value as a member of Eastman SnoPALS is very important. Providing groomed trails should not be the only service or function we provide. The relationships and social interactions we develop while riding are important and are the reason many people like to go snowmobiling.
Activities to Improve Member Services
- Hats, golf shirts and outerwear with the Club logo are displayed on our Merchandise page and are available at the MANITOBA MADE store in Lac du Bonnet.
- Our club maintains 2 snowmobiles, several large sleighs and a C class drag (less than 6 ft wide) which is pulled behind a snowmobile to help our volunteers get the trails ready each season. We have an on-going commitment to our volunteers to “green out” out our equipment so that we are operating good safe, reliable equipment
- Recycle Everywhere Containers are located at the shelters in all of our shelters and we encourage recycling.
- We provide all members with a 3-inch reflective helmet/machine sticker
- Portable outhouses are deployed each season at 3 of our shelters to ensure that we have safe, clean facilities for our riders.
- We provide current club information on our FACEBOOK page throughout the riding season. Please view or join our Facebook page.
Join our club
We offer 3 ways to purchase an individual or family memberships for your convenience, and now you can buy up to a 3-year membership.