yes, they'll travel upwind. we picked up about 6" of really wet snow and then it warmed up a bit and turned to rain. wandered across the street to the small school field and made one downwind run to the far side of the field that had more wind available. made a bunch of perpendicular runs for a change. one was great, the rest were "go a little bit," stop, take a step or two, go a little bit more... repeat.
a couple of runs were definitely upwind, but barely. one was much better, but i can't really say how many degrees i may have moved up. ski-skating up into the wind was pretty easy.
i was only going a couple of hundred feet on each run. but at least this time i wasn't walking back to a starting point. baby steps...
alleged conditions were 15mph-ish with 20-ish gusts. i was doing more plowing and submarining than skiing, but that's ok. engine was susan's 7.6 nasa on 7m lines and handles.
if the rain lets up i may very well head back over there again. maybe break out the snowskate for the first time...
tom