Update on ice roads

 

An update from Leonard Boucha on ice roads

 

Ice roads being plowed

 

December 10/21

 On Friday the 3 ice boats made first trip into Town off the Lake, 4” ice. Picture taken Ministry Landing.

This is Terry Lunny on Friday picture was taken by his son Jeff, they skated out to their camp on Scotty’s also reporting 4” ice in their travels.

Not enough ice

for sled/quad yet.

Lake Froze

 December 05 the Lake Froze

Fall update 2021

 The Foot Bridge to Coney Island is in place.

Laurenson Lake froze over on 19 th. So we should be iced up by first week December?

French Portage is also froze.

One good thing about low lake levels is current will be minimal so Ice Roads should be pretty good.

Last of the ice

 The Bridge to Coney comes out today, and we will make our first trip to Town tomorrow April 21. There is still ice on our horizon to the South and small pans between here and town but navigable. The lake level has comets up another 1” with run off, but still low so be careful. When I took truck off ice March 17 Barepoint said we could not park out there as they were in a mini lockdown and the community was getting vaccinated over the coming weeks. Last week I was given permission to move truck over there when lake opened, yesterday I was told the Chief was waiting test results and considering another lockdown? At this point there is no 2 people safer than Debbie and I having gone 5 weeks without seeing anyone! And looks like we won’t be seeing any Manitoba people for a month. Debbie phoned OPP yesterday and was told they are not stopping vehicles heading in Manitoba,just the vehicles entering Ontario. There is a list of exemptions on web and unfortunately coming out to your summer homes is not one them. I’ll rent out my Ontario plates to highest bidder LOL. Still waiting the arrival of the Loons, expect to hear their call any day now that the North winds have dropped. Stay Safe be careful, this will be last post till fall when we start cycle all over again. If anyone has questions about lake they can text me at 1 (807) 466-1891 Rick 

Made it to Cat island

 Yesterday was a beautiful day on the water, sunny, calm high 14. There is still a lot of ice on lake but it has big cracks and starting to move around. I managed to get to Cat Island heading towards Scottys and heading up into Hades I made it a couple hundred yards north of the Red Bouy. The ice in picture is at south entrance to Hades. A friend made it to this side of Town island, With today’s wind will get ice moving. Currently we have huge snowflakes  coming down sideways ! Forecast is for 2-4 cm today.The bridge to Coney comes out on April 20, we should be able to boat to Safeway by Wednesday? The lake temperature is 4C and after last weeks rain/snow mixture we had 2 3/4” in gauge and Lake has risen 7”

Short Boat Ride

 Yesterday was a beautiful sunny calm day, lowered boat pushed through a couple hundred feet of black candled ice ( sounds terrible the ice crunching on aluminum hull but it sure cleans bottom) through the Narrows but not much further, going to try posting a picture, I’m looking NW towards the day marker off Bald Island. Way off in distance. You can see green bouy #E27 in middle of the picture this is the location I thought I could reach. The ice in this area is 3 1/4” thick but still solid so it stopped me from going any further.

Laurenson lake was ice free April 10 and we are usually 7 plus days behind. A reminder that Lake level is 3” lower today than it was this time last year so be careful with short cuts ! No word on when bridge to Coney comes out or if Barepoint Marina is going to open.  Stay Safe

Spring Thaw Update

 Will no longer take quad on the ice after today as it is deteriorating rapidly, this morning is last of crisp mornings @-10 after this our lows hang around 0 with daytime highs around +10. I’m working on docks at floating boathouse and ice is like Swiss cheese should probably be wearing a life jacket !

Yesterday morning the ice was whooping steady for hours it never stopped till 12 noon, then quiet. What happened was a 20’ wide swath ice from the tip of our island to East Allie broke away and sunk. We can canoe across, so in past years from the day this happens the earliest we boated to town was 8 days in 2007 on May 04. The longest time it took was 19 days in 2014 and we arrived Barepoint on May 19.

I’m comparing this year to 2010 temperatures are very similar and we boated to Barepoint on April 14. My first prediction was to boat in April 25. Last night Leonard flew over and predicted April 15. I’m thinking he is early and I’m late, split difference and aim for April 20 th.

Between mainland of French Narrows and East Allie Island this area has been open for couple weeks now with the usual geese/ducks hanging around and also 2swans, seagulls arrived just ahead big winds and Eagles have been here a month already.

Normally when I take truck off ice I park at Barepoint Marina and snowmobile/quad in for fresh produce. Well I did that last year and because of COVID lockdown they wouldn’t let me drive truck out till June 01 So this Spring I checked in and answer was NO they were in another Mini lockdown but were expecting to be vaccinated by end March. So hopefully I’ll have some news on that in future post.

Expect the boathouse to float freely after weekend and about this time next week boat as far North as Green Bouy E27 for usual picture of candled ice.

2021 Spring Thaw

 Well it’s that time of season again as I took our truck off the ice March 17 ( going by memory last year was March 28 ? )

We normally park out at Barepoint and I can access her by snowmobile or Quad to run to town for fresh produce during the ice out period. That is what I did last Spring at the start of pandemic, then Reserve set up roadblocks and we didn’t get our truck back till around June 01. We then rented Vehicle/Boat slip from Smith Camps for month of June and they let us move back to Barepoint July 01.

Not wanting to go through that again I called Manager at Barepoint and he said they are in a mini lockdown as surrounding reserves have outbreaks. The Rat Portage Reserve is getting vaccinated over the next 2 weeks. So for the second season in a row we were scrambling for Truck parking during break up, fortunately friends offered their yard and I can quad/snowmobile to their dock.

This is a different type break up this year, normally we have holes appear on South side of French Narrows Portage that we navigate around as well as our own landing. This year they are still solid it’s the Ministry landing in town was the first to go, the ice was flooded with water so you don’t know where holes are so people were putting sticks in them as markers ! When coming off the ice with big truck it pushes a wave and water spurts up these holes. Another problem was the pressure ridge in Andrew Bay, the water is 12” deep on our side of it. People have been moving over trying to find dry spot to cross but when I took my chainsaw and ice bar to cut it down on January 07 there was no ice on either side of the road under pressure ridge. I’m afraid of dropping a tire in that area. An alternate route for us is to run Parallel to south side Barrier islands to 12 mile but there are 2 pressure ridges this route.

We have our usual spring birds back , crows,Geese, Eagles, Foxes were barking weeks ago. Back on Feb 23 while Debbie was splitting wood for my shop it was plus 4 and we saw a mosquito fly by, must have been in wood ?

On final note I’m leaning towards an early ice out ? Unless we get a lot Spring moisture lake is very low I may not have enough water under the bow of our boat to float her off lift. This wouldn’t be first time.

Stay safe

Pressure ridge

 Ptarmigan Bay has 12-14” ice and there are no roads as of this morning. I checked with the guys plowing the main roads and his reply was he is not sure who is plowing that area ? But if you want to text me at 1 (807) 466-1891 I can introduce you to them.

I’m posting this  that Tom Thomson posted on Facebook showing our pressure ridge just East of Queer Island. It is where the road splits to go into Andrew Bay and Dorian Marsh.

I personally have not spoke with Leonard about this but heard second hand someone plowed a shoe fly around ridge and travel is not recommended?  There is a large pressure ridge starting between Allie island and East Allie island this one blocks travel on South side of Barrier islands to the 12 mile Portage.

Otherwise the roads are in awesome shape, widest I’ve seen.

Snowmobile conditions are perfect, they are marking trails .