Friday, January 10, 2014

DOUGLAS LAKE, MUD & ICE

Today is the first day I've been on Douglas lake this year in an official capacity and it was an experience.  I launched, or tossed, the boat into the mud and was off.  The lake is out there somewhere in the pictures below.
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I gazed out over the grandiose scene before me and searched for water.  It was right here last year.  TVA is really cranking out the hydroelectric power this month and the water level is at an all time low.
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About the only thing I can say about Douglas Lake is, well, it's impressive.
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It was ice broken up into small sheets floating on the surface.  When that boat hit it the sound was unbelievable.  This is a first for me.  I've seen ice back in coves where the water is shallow and along shorelines but never across the entire lake.  The boat lifted out of the water when I hit it which startled me.  It's sort of like running up on land, if you can imagine that.
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Now, the above shot is of ice that previously was broken into small sheets but became frozen back together again creating a solid surface.
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The above shot shows another place where the ice has refrozen to form a solid mass.  It is this that I hit at about 30 miles per hour.  The boat actually ran up on top of the ice and tilted to the side.  It broke through as soon as the motor made contact.  Whew!
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The picture above is of a solid sheet of thick ice that runs clear to the shore.  I really believe that would wreck a boat.
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I came up against the ice in the above picture and decided to turn around and go the way I came because the bow of the boat kept wanting to run up onto the ice.  If it was my personal boat I might have played with the situation a bit, but it isn't my personal boat and I'm not out here to play.  My name ain't Ernest Shackelton..
The sounds in the following videos are of the boat cutting through the ice. 
Pushing through broken ice
Now, the next video shows the little jon boat actually breaking ice.  I got myself into a place where the ice was solid clear to the shore and I eventually turned around and headed back where I came from.
Breaking through solid ice at times
Good ole Douglas Lake – it’s an adventure in mud and now ice.  I think that lake is trying to do me in.  It’s an amazing body of mud, I mean water.


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