December 12, 2013
Lake St. Catherine – Poultney, VT
Outside Temp 18*
Windchill 13*
Water Temp ??? (She’s icing up)
What does one do for their 49th Birthday…
I guess most people would go to work, perhaps take the day off and relax. Some go out at night and drink and/or dance the night away. I’m not some, and I sure ain’t most.
After feeding Lexie and making myself a nice breakfast of French Toast, Bacon, OJ and Coffee (yes, Lexie always get’s some of the bacon too) I had just one thing on my mind. KAYAKING!
Well OK, sounds reasonable…if I was not living in Vermont. If the temps for the last week were not sub freezing. If the lake had not already started to freeze over. But, I do, they were and it did, but that was not about to stop us.
First up, layers, lots of layers. Then I jumped into my waders, then a few layers of sweat shirts and a windbreaker Followed by my FrogTogg water resistant coveralls. Then it was time for the baklava. After this I greased all remaining exposed skin and now it was Lexie’s turn. Layer’s lots of layers. 4 to be exact and then her rain slicker and boots. Then I greased the inside of her ears as her fur would keep her face and nose OK for the short duration we’d be out, and now it was time to venture out to the lake.
I rolled the Kayak down to the waters edge, secured Lexie in it and then I walked myself into the water and broke up the first 15′ of ice by hand. Now I launched the kayak, climbed aboard with Lexie and and and…well nothing….The Ice was really thick. 7 minutes of ramming the ice and we finally broke through to open water.
I began to paddle out and noticed that the Lilly Pond was completely frozen over so I paddled around the edge toward the West Shore. There I could see the ice had reached the shore as well so I turned around. Made a quick stop at the shore line to inspect the kayak and continued on along the East Shore. I got to the beginning of the State Park Land and it was frozen solid there too. If I could just get to the other side, the big lake was wide open. I paddled along the edge of the ice and found what looked like a narrow band near the middle with some open holes scattered through it. Well, let’s give it a shot I thought so I turned Lex-T-Sea into the ice and rammed it.
The first few attempts worked good. The ice was breaking up under the force of the kayaks nose, but after I got about half way through, it was getting a bit tougher and I was I was a bit concerned as to the brittleness of the HDPE plastic in 18* temps with a 13* Wind Chill and the water was freezing to the kayaks surface on contact. I know I have a 500lb capacity which means we have about 250lbs of payload we can carry (500lbs – 195lb me, 5lb Lexie, 50lb Gear) so that’s 250 lbs of ice on board, but I really didn’t want to be testing the limits here. Structural failure in this water in this spot and with the gear I have on would not fair well. Rescuers, even if called the second I was in trouble, would be 15 minutes away at best and the lake is about as empty as it can be this time of year. Chances are, no one knows I’m out here – or so I thought.
Well I took it easy and kept working towards my goal chipping away little by little and eventually we broke through. I was on the other side and the Big Lake was now within reach. I paddled out against a stiff headwind toward the neck of the Big Lake and there had to be 50-70 Canadian Geese in the water ahead of me all wading in the water or up on the shore of the sand bar in front of the Lake St Catherine State Park. I tried to paddle by them without disturbing them, but they all took off anyway. All but one. Sadly, one was having some difficulties keeping its head above water and flying so I paddled toward him hoping he’d let me take him out of the water, but no luck, He barely flew and not very far. I truly hate to see an animal suffer and it was obvious he was not going to make it through the night. I let him be so he could go peacefully in his habitat.
Now I headed for my goal, the Lake St. Catherine State Park Campground Beach. With daylight short and a strong headwind, I did not want to risk an around the lake paddle so this was a nice short run. We reached the shore and I stepped out into the water and pulled the kayak up to the beach. I unhooked Lexie and let her stretch her legs running around on the shore. She loves to explore here in the Spring and Fall. Its too busy in the summer though. And to think, we were here in the beginning of October and I was in the water without all this protective gear. We missed the stratification process (where the lake turns over) for the Fall, but we were here for it in the Spring and boy is it stinky when it happens.
Time to head home so I got Lexie and secured her back in the kayak and off we went. That’s when I noticed someone up at the state park watching us with a bright orange jacket and he had a dog too. Probably thought we were nuts, well one of us is, Lexie just goes along for the ride. 😀 I was surprised to find the conditions very rough. I’ve been in some tough surf, handled tidal currents, white caps, ocean surf, but this was different. The waves and the wind were hitting us from two directions so while the waves were rolling in West to East, the wind was hitting us South to North and since we were headed North we had a hell of a tail wind that was pushing us against the surf. I would not have minded in the summer, but taking water over the nose now could be bad and I was trying my hardest not to let it happen.
I was approaching the State Park sand bar when a thought came to me; I should have marked the channel I made through the ice because with this tail wind, its going to push me into it and I’d rather hit my channel and go right through it. So I began to search hard for my channel. But this isn’t right. Why can’t I see where the water is washing up over the ice? If I can’t make out the edge, how will I find my channel. I started to think I was imaging things because I wasn’t seeing ice. Not 30 minutes earlier the ice was thick and went the entire width of the lake. I know, I paddled it trying to get through, but its not there now. This can’t be right. I continue to paddle, but sure enough, its GONE!
I get to where I know the ice was and its all open water as far as I can see. From edge to edge its open water. I began to think about this. I was happy about this, but I began to think….had my cutting the ice in half caused it to sink? Well it must have because as I continued to paddle back to the house I could see bits and pieces of sheets of ice that were not there before. Yes, my cutting a channel through it allowed the water to break it up and sink it and now its scattered all over. Boy, talk about how your actions can affect the environment. Not sure if I was happy or sad about this, but I was glad I had a straight shot back to the house.
I arrived at shore and immediately noticed someone standing by by the road. A man in an orange jacket with his dog. I released Lexie and the dog came down to greet her. I pulled the kayak out of the water, mounted up the wheels and headed to the house. The man was still up at the driveway so I called him down and invited him in. As it turned out, I know him, he’s a college student renting the house a few doors down and we had met both on the water and at one of my garage sales at the end of summer. We chatted for a bit, I told him about Sandy and out adventure and showed him the bus.
Well, outside of my main computer crashing tonight as I was editing the videos from today, it was a great birthday. I’ll see what I can do about the computer and the videos, but for now, here are the pictures from today.
Enjoy the rest of the pictures under the video:
Ice Kayaking
