Thursday, November 27, 2014

Thanksgiving 2014 - Winter comes early to Lake Superior

After a quiet Thanksgiving Day today, we got out this afternoon to enjoy the last of a beautiful day of sunshine.  The temperature was down around 10˚ F or below so it was pretty chilly on my walk out on the pier to check out the ice situation.  To see this much ice in November, even at the end of November, is very strange.  

Both commercial fishing boats had been out today, so the ice in the channel was stirred up enough to create these ice circles in the marina channel.  I should have taken a video of this because they kind of jostle around, bump into each other, and form rounded circles.  Pretty cool.

 That layer of clouds out there is most likely lake effect snow.   We've had a dusting of lake effect for the last few days after an actual snowfall of a couple of inches.  The town plow came through again and we're all cleared off until the next batch of snow.

Looking to the east we can see that the ice is already building up in the bay and along the shore.  

On Tuesday my neighbor, David, took this picture of the ice caves along the Apostle Island National Lakeshore.  Looks like conditions are already forming for possible treks to the ice caves later this winter.  Usually he is on his standup paddle board, but this time I think he got this shot while on his snowshoes.  

I hope everyone had a good Thanksgiving!  

3 comments:

Unknown said...

My husband just pointed out your blog. We have a homesteader's log cabin up on Klaung Road, off the grid and solar powered. Last winter was the first time in 6 years we didn't visit (despite the ice caves) due to the cold and lack of running water and power. This year will likely be the same. We love Port Wing and would like to figure out a way to visit in winter when our cabin is not really habitable...love getting updates from you! Leslie

Mary Childs said...

Leslie - Come stay at our B&B! We'll give you a deal! :-) We have lots of space for snowshoeing on our property, but you probably do, too. So we can offer a warm room, shower, and breakfast! We are definitely ON the grid, however...

Unknown said...

We are not having our driveway plowed this year, and we took the solar batteries home (they froze and cracked last year), but it would be fun to go up there and snowshoe (we'd have to borrow your snowshoes to go fetch ours!) Will try to plan this! We are going on the Cayamo Music Cruise in the Caribbean in January....maybe after that!