February 12, 2011 Sooley Cabin: (3 Photos)

3.   Winter is finally here in full force. Having very little snow or cold weather throughout the fall and up to the first two weeks of January, the Northeast Avalon has received almost 200cm of snow as of today! With this in mind, we planned our Annual Cabin Winter Trip next weekend. In preparation Sooley, Maffer, Janes and I headed out to the cabin to clear the driveway and check ice thickness on the pond.

2.   Once again today brought beautiful sunny skies as we headed out the highway to Whitbourne. When we arrived we unloaded our sleds on the highway and headed up to the cabin.  In keeping with tradition, we were all stuck in waist deep powder within the first two minutes! Snow conditions were awesome which is something we haven't seen up here since about 2003. Powder is over two feet deep everywhere, and even deeper where the wind drifted it in.

1.   We quickly got the machines unstuck and opened up the garage, Sooley got the tractor going and started clearing snow with the Snowblower attachment. I've found my new favorite snow blower, as much as I love my Honda, the diesel PTO powered tractor blower is just awesome. While Sooley and Janes were snow clearing Maffer and I broke a few trails around the cabin on the sleds and checked the ice on the pond.

Although there was a fair bit of slush and water on top of the ice, we found 8-10" of solid ice consistent all over the pond. Despite heavy snow its been a fairly mild winter, we stayed well away from all river/brook run-ins, and known underwater springs.

With the driveway cleared and everything set to go, we loaded up just after dark and headed home in eager anticipation of an awesome cabin trip!