winter caught up with us

We knew that all the mild weather with hardly any snow would catch up with us. And it sure did. Good thing we had stocked up in Gore Bay on the day that we took the pictures of Mr. and Mrs. Grouse. The next day we were treated to some old fashioned snowfall of 20 cm in total, followed by a good wind storm, but true to Manitoulin form, we had a clear skies the next day and Tim cleared the driveway 

The sun came out and the path to the solar panel was blown out, and then, because I was whining about having to, yet again, have to open up a trail for snow shoeing, blew out the trail in our woods to the back of the property, around 1250 ft. Doesn't seem like much, but it is enough to get you warmed up and then hopefully go on and break new trails. I try, and I tried, and then we had some more snow. Everyday a bit, and sooner or later it all added up to 1 foot of packed snow in the woods. Made for nice snow shoeing though. Here some pictures of the first weeks of February.

Tim snow blowing the trail to the solar panels in the field

And a nice walk to the back of the property, with Stella for company, on my snow shoes

That's where I had to break a new trail. Tim caught up with me and took this one

Stella is well ahead of me.

We also had some phenomenal sunsets. Tim grabbed this one from our tower cam

Then this came, after we were lulled to sleep. 25 cm, followed by a good west wind, and this was the end result: our road closed because of snow drifts

Stella is up to her shoulders in the drifts. Her legs are 40 cm or so long

Once again the path to the panels was cleared and then more clearing of the trail to the back and then more trail breaking. The days are getting longer though and the sun is getting higher, and so it's all good.