Today was amazing! The sun was out all day, the snow is all but gone, the lake is thawing… It’s amazing. I basically just wore my coat because it was slightly more comfortable than walking around in a short-sleeved shirt.

But the weather wasn’t even the best part. The MISSION was the best. Actually, I went on two missions today: Ice Breaking missions! I may post pictures later when I get them from Robert, but for now you’ll have to take my word for it: It was rediculously awesome!

I’ll back up a little. Stony Lake is definitely thawing, and as a result, there is a bit of water between the shore and the ice (about 20 feet as of this morning). So Robert and I got out a canoe and some paddles and headed out to check out the situation. I had never seen ice like this before (remember, I grew up in Texas (no freezing temperatures) and Colorado (no lakes), so frozen lakes are pretty new to me. The ice was thick (up to 4 inches), but it could hardly hold the weight of the seaguls that were walking on it, and every once in a while, they’d have to fly or get wet. The reason the ice was so weak (as well as I can deduce) was because it was all broken up into little crystals about 1/8 to 1/4 of an inch in diameter, and as long as the ice was deep. Here’s a cross-section of what it looked like:

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They kinda looked like the crystals from the Superman movies. Anyways, I can’t really describe the ice well in writing, so suffice it to say that it was sweet.

It was also fairly easy to plow through, depending on the thickness. So on our second mission, Robert and I headed for Miniwanca’s corner of the lake, because it was supposed to have the thickest ice. Sure enough, the ice wasn’t crystalized over there, and was probably mostly safe for walking on. We didn’t walk on it, but we did use our feet to shove the conoe along (which was now not breaking ice as much as it was gliding across it).

It was pretty fun to watch the people drive by and stare at two guys in a canoe in the middle of a frozen lake. One thing I did learn is that rowing through ice makes you appreciate the ease of rowing through water. I don’t think I’ll ever complain as much about having to canoe back up the channel from Lake Michigan.

Oh, and as a side note, it was so beautiful today that even out on the lake, I was sitting on my coat more often than I was wearing it. Thanks, God.

This entry was posted on Thursday, March 22nd, 2007 at 6:58 pm and is filed under Babblings. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.