A Cold Night

Last night got quite cold, but the cabin stayed warm.... but it sure takes a LOT more wood to keep it warm.

That's in the minus part of the thermometer:

This morning I wanted to drive to town so I had to start the generator to plug in the block heater of the truck (a heating system for the engine so you can start it, for the non-canadians), after two and a half hours the truck started, but not easily. It was so cold that even turning the key in the ignition was stiff. And once I started driving I realize that I had "square tires". The spot where the tires were sitting stays flat until the tires warm up, which does not take very long at all, but at first it is a bit of a weird thing.

The afternoon before I went for a long walk, it wasn't -41, it was -31C (-24F) but I decided to wear a balaclava because it was windy and it is hard on the exposed part of the face. This is what I looked like at the end of my walk, after about an hour and a half outside.

 I know it looks weird, but it was worth it. What would have been a harsh walk (on the face) was truly a very pleasant walk thanks to my balaclava (truly that sounds like a Greek desert to me "balaklava")

Here are some more snowscapes.

Sundogs

Beautiful sundogs the other day. Remeber I posted photos of the sun halo, well these are basically partial halo and much more common that the full halo.
I checked it out they are 22 degrees from the sun. The photos do not do them justice (they both were there, one on each side) because with the naked eye you can see their faint rainbow colours.

The Drive Back

I went to Hay River for a few day and drove the nearly 300 kilometers (180 miles) back in this or worse. The worse part was just all white and does not photograph well:

I arrived at the cabin and of course it was as cold inside as outside but it quickly warmed up.

Buffaloes

Snowscapes

Hard to post much more than snowscapes  right now.
I know it is a lot of white but the light IRL is wonderful.

Ice Chisel

So, I can't easily go across the river but I thought I could at least go ice fishing. I don't know that I necesseraly want to fish, but dig a hole through the ice, now that appeals!
So I bought myself an ice chisel.

I was told about them by a friend of mine. Originally I thought that I would have to buy a manual ice auger, but they are expensive and anyway I couldn't find one where I am. So ice chisel it is. When I was told about them I imagined something a lot smaller, more like a timber framing chisel.

They are quite big. This one is nearly as tall as I am and weights about  8 kilograms (18 lbs).

The obvious thing is a bit chunk of metal like this is going to be really cold on the hands...especially possibly wet hands (and we all know about wet on cold metal .... it sticks), and the other thing is it might get slippery enough to fall through the hole and be lost for ever. So I decided that it needed a handle of some sort after a search on the internet I found a site (I unfortunately have lost its URL so I cannot give it credit) showing how to do this:

A wrapped handle to give it better grip and insulate a little bit from the metal and a strong loop at the end to attach it to something in case it falls through the hole.

Here it as all finished (with old socks at the sharp end to protect both the edge of the ice chisel and the house where I am pet-sitting right now)

I am curious to see if it'll work. My biggest concern is whether or not I have wrapped it tight enough, because if I haven't the all things is going to unravel when I use it.
I'll try to remember to take my camera and use it when I give it a try

Why I Haven't Walked Across the River

I am dying to walk across the river. I want to get to the other side.

But it is unfortunately very unsafe. You'd think that after the temperatures we've had the river would be frozen throughout. But the truth is rapids for one do not freeze, and some areas which I suspect are areas of upwelling also stay open.
Open areas are not per say a problem. But areas with thin ice, either because the ice stay thin in those areas, or because they just recently froze, cannot be seen and are very dangerous.
Falling through the ice on a frozen lake is less than ideal, falling through the ice of a large fast flowing river like the Slave River is pretty much guaranty to be fatal. You would not be able to get back to the hole you fell through because of the current and really the river is practically completely frozen so it would be near impossible to find another open hole.

So very reasonably (boringly?) I am staying on my side of the river.
Though I did get to cross the river in Fort smith (same river just 20 kilometer upstream) where a crossing is clearly marked.

In Fort Smith the open areas where the rapids are can clearly be seen from the fog that raises from them on cold days.

But a crossing is clearly mark where you can not only walk, but also ride a snowmobile across.

And it doesn't mean that there are no cracks in the ice. This on was over the crossing.

The crack below is from the river near me, near the edge of the river. See how far it goes?

The trick traditionally used, if you have to cross the river, is to do so carrying a long pole, a bit like a rope walker. The idea is that if you fall through the pole will not fit through the hole and you will be able to hold on to it and pull yourself out. Then of course you have to deal with the fact that you are wet in the cold and possibly far from any source of heat. Somebody else also mention crossing the river with a long stick AND an axe, so that if you do go under and loose the stick you can maybe break the ice with the axe to come back up... or if you fall through but the stick stops you  you can cut wood to make a fire to warm up.
Either way I will pass for now and stay on my side of the river.

The photo below was taken on a warmish day (-15C,  5F) and you can see a dark patch in the snow on the river where there is open liquid water but there is no fog because it is not cold enough.

Here you can see it.... I used the zoom. Though I have to admit that when you see the water you just want to go and see it up close. It was very hard to resist.

The freezing of the river is not a gentle process. Some parts of the river are smooth, as in the photos above, but some are terribly chaotic.

Frozen Eye Lashes

The coldest day this winter so far was Christmas day. It went down to -38C (-37F). To be honest I did not go for a walk on that day, but on a -29C day (-20F) I went for a walk and as expected on a day like this frost formed on my eye lashes. First I melted the frost on my right eye because my eye lashes were sticking together when I blinked, then I thought that I should take a photo (hence one frozen eye and one ice free).

For the record, it is true that sometimes when you blink your eye lashes sort of stick, but you just touch your eye with your finger and it instantly melts and you can open you eye totally normally. So it is not as big a deal as it might seem.