Curling in Gowganda

Winter time is curling time. The natural ice surface is prepared when the temperatures stay low enough to keep the ice in good shape. It takes several floodings to build up a level surface of ice. Then the rings are put on and more floodings are done. Maintenance is done before and after every game.

Every Wednesday and Saturday night the curling rink is open to who ever wants to curl or for those like me to watch and yak.

The major bonspiel happens around Valentine's day. Several teams are all ready signed up for this year.

Last Wednesday I wandered over to take some pictures for another view on Gowganda.

New snowshoe trail cutting finished

The last two days spent cutting a trail from North Arm to Milner Bay. The distance about 1.0 km. with very thick bush. Finally today Paul and I arrived at Milner Bay after cutting and trimming pretty well the whole way across. The snow was heavy in the trees so that everytime you chopped a branch a load of snow landed on top of you. Paul quickly learned not to look up. At times I was on my knees like a snowshoe hare looking for a path through the undergrowth. Total time cutting aprox. 8 hours over 2 days. This adds quite a scenic part to the new trail, with lots of twists and turns. Paul flagged the trail as we headed back to the truck. When we arrived at Pauls, Gert had some great cinnamon buns and hot chocolate which topped the day right off, thanks Gert.

This completes the new trail except for it's finish which will be up near Diabase Lake where the snowmobile trail comes out.

Mudding is in progress on the front room with half of it done with the first coat.

Another cold spell

Last couple of nights the temperature dipped to -30C. Even with lots of sunshine the daytime temps with the windchill were very cold. Forecast says for a bit of moderation towards mid week. Can't wait to get the snowshoes on again.

Lots of time to finish up the drywall, maybe tomorrow. Have been doing everything but drywall catching up on all the stuff that gets left behind, mostly tidying up the house, snow removal, bringing in wood and looking out the window to see if the temperature has gone up.

Trimming old trail

Beautiful day today for trail trimming. With so much snow in the bush the trail is getting higher and higher which means you have to be shorter to get through some of the trail. As this isn't going to happen the trail has to be trimmed up. Another reason the heavy growth from last summer is blocking some of the path.

Had time to take a few pics along the way too.

Drywall is 99% up and will be thinking of starting mudding soon

More snowshoe trails

Out expanding the snowshoe trail. Going south from the Hedlund marsh to Gowganda Lake, down the lake and across land coming back up the lake and out a Diabase Lake area. This will add another 5km. to the trail.

I had been down there last winter and had left some flagging to follow today, we only went as far as Gowganda Lake and did some clearing on the way back.

Great day, lots of sun and not too cold.

Mapping snowshoe trail

Finally the cold weather has broke. There looks to be several moderate days in the forecast, some with more snow. Will take it.

Out today with my new Christmas toy. I have always had a GPS but I bought one that could transfer info to the computer. After playing with it for some time I took it along today on the snoeshoe trail.

You can map your progress by way of time, distance, elevation and latitude and longitude for those not familiar with these devices

I had it set to record all of the necessary pieces to produce a map. All the while you can watch it being tracked on the unit itself. Transfering the data to a program on the computer produces a fine quality map. Other data is available as far a elevations and distances travelled and waypoints of specific areas along the trail.

Paul was tracking on his new GPS at the same time we found they were very accurate up to less than 5m. By the way check out his new shoes.

Cold to the point of bone chilling

This AM my thermometer was close to -39C for the second day in a row. I went downstairs and checked the temperature inside 11C. I couldn't put enough wood in the stove the night before because of all the ashes. Won't do that again.
Had to go into town today, I had plugged the car in and put it on a timer, all went well it started easy. The hard part was getting the garage door open, it wouldn't work. After finally getting it up the hard part was closing it up.
Drive in comfortable but when I got to town the clutch felt like it was attached to a semi. I guess the wind chill at -35C and 100km per hour has to be pretty cold. It wasn't until the afternoon until it felt like it should.
Got home and cleaned the ashes out and now warm and comfortable and have set the oil furnace to come on when the wood fire starts to wind down. Lesson learned.

Inside update

Finally got all the outside walls covered with drywall. It sure is making a big difference to the heat. The cold that used to creep across the floor is next to gone. The temperature from back to front is constant and the whole room is quieter. That may make the truck traffic disappear, wishful thinking

Couple of new shots of the work. The door area hasn't been finished as there is a new insulated door on order.

It's been awhile

Well here's a few days all at once, it will be quick. OK, drywall, drywall, drywall that looks after a few right there. In fact I'm about half way through the walls. In between blowing snow and hauling firewood (been a bit cool here especially during the nights) I got in some snowshoeing.

On to the trail and took a path up to a high point directly north of the trail. Good view up there I could even see the towers of Gowganda. These pics are looking towards the west.

Speaking of towers, I got a call from a lady at Ontera looking for my address, they are sending out a letter to say that nothing more will be done to the tower in Gowganda until the Shining Tree tower is standing. Not only that they are having trouble with getting a permit for the tower in Shining Tree. What a disappointment after all the build up with the new tower standing there ready. Paul and I are still looking into what all this will mean.

Great day on snowshoe trail

Paul and I left about 1:00PM for a snowshoe, weather warm around -10C and sunny. About 7cm. of fresh snow in the track, just right. There is about 60cm+ of snow in the bush.

Got up to the broken beaver dam and took some pics standing beside part of the dam and another at MacIntosh Lake.

Will be finishing up the vapour barrier tomorrow, hopefully.

Yesterday's sunrise

Not a bad day today, a little snow cleaning and a trip to the dump with the old ceiling. Started on the vapour barrier on the outside walls, that should get rid of the drafts and make it even warmer.

Mary Bullock sent me a couple of pics she took of yesterday's sunrise, which are spectacular, I unforturnately slept through it. These are taken from her house towards the homestead. Thank's Mary.

Finished breaking the trail

Out today to finish breaking the trail around to MacIntosh Lake and down to the Hedlund Marsh. Paul Trudel was on the trail today with me. There is so much snow hanging in the trees that it is hard to find the flagging from last year. Made a couple of wrong turns but didn't wander to far until the next flagging showed up. Started to snow on the way in and by the time we got to the truck about an hour and half later there was close to 10cm. of snow had fallen.

Some pics of Paul fixing up his new harness and the amount of snow clinging to the branches, we were both covered with snow by the time we got to MacIntosh lake.

First day breaking trail

Finally got the other ceiling drywalled and decided to go and get my snowshoe trail opened up. The trail starts at the road just past Diabase Lake called the Bouche cut road or the Foot Lake Rd. It goes from there 5Km. through the bush to MacIntosh Lake and back down to Hedlund marsh and back to the Bouche Rd again.

I only got a bit of it done today as I didn't want to push it too far. Will be back out tomorrow.

A NEW YEAR

Well here we are starting another year, hopefully with more pictures. Will be starting to get out on the snowshoes on my trails out near MacIntosh Lake and down the creek to Gowganda Lake. Lots of pictures not as much variety as the summer with all the flowers and odds and ends though.

Here are a couple of pictures for Terry in Buffalo (Bigtree) of Dave Runions Camp in the winter. If anyone else has an idea for a picture, I'll see what I can do.