Thursday, December 20, 2018

Snowed out of camp

I've been going deer hunting with my Dad in northern Maine for a week every November for nearly 30 years now. Usually the first or second week of November we head up there and spend a week not shooting any deer.

This year was different, on Tuesday we got snow, it was supposed to snow until noon, in the end it snowed all day, in the end we got about eight inches. Eight inches of snow is generally no big deal, the roads were clear, stores were open, no sweat. Then remember that our camp is 3/4 of a mile from the road...


This is the first time we've ever plowed snow at camp, we've had snow in past years but usually only a couple inches and a warm day or two usually takes care of it. This year it was cold, like single digits cold and Thursday the weather report was for another five inches...


I'd never had to shovel the path to the outhouse either.


Wednesday night Eric got his pickup (the Chevy pictured above) stuck in a snow drift. The only way to drive in this stuff is in 4wd with a heavy foot, carry some speed into the drifts so that you don't bog down. He was going slow and hit a particularly deep spot. I managed to get him out with my truck but it was a near thing...


Thursday morning Eric and Michael headed south, we couldn't go back on the woods roads since we couldn't see the water holes and wouldn't dare to carry a bunch of speed on the woods roads anyway. Hiking around in the woods wasn't much fun either. So I couldn't blame them for heading out. In fact once I read the weather report I told Dad I didn't think sticking around was a good idea for us either.


That last picture is deceptive, we're pointed down a hill, the snow at the bottom is probably 12-18" deep where its drifted in from the field on the right, this is where Eric got his truck stuck. Just after taking the picture we headed down and even though we were going at a pretty good clip we still nearly got stuck.

By the time I got home that night (9 hours later) it had just started to snow at home. Even in MA we got 5" of snow...

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