January 19, 2015 Snow, Hockey & A Missing Snowshoer

Perfect 5-point antler shed that Dinga found.

Rabbit tracks near the chicken coup.

Friday 1/16. We had actually received 5"-6" of snow last night.  Hard to tell exactly with the wind sculpting it.  Erasing all our tracks from yesterday for a new beginning.  The wind was gusting to 11 mph most of the day til late afternoon.

Right after breakfast JB got the snow blower out, much to Dinga's delight.  After lunch we cleared the snow off the roof of the girls' house, then JB took Miss Kitty down to plow the road.  Again he had issues where our road meets the mail canyon road and it took him a half an hour of shoveling to get out.  It can be very easy to get pulled into the snow on the side of the road.

The Feb/Mar issue of Cowboys & Indians has the results of their annual photo contest and is phenomenal!  The Spring issue of Capper's Farmer is another good current magazine.

I really was surprised that Elsie had never been to a hockey game.  I somehow assumed that attending at least one hockey game was mandatory if one lived north of the Oregon/California border, in the mid-west or the northeast.  Well, I guess tomorrow night will be her one hockey game. . .

Saturday 1/17.  It was 24 and overcast with some nasty weather in the forecast for later today: snow, sleet, frozen rain, etc.  Should be arriving just about the time we leave for Larry and Elsie's to go to the hockey game.

Snow fell from about 9:30 am til 1:30 pm and then turned to sleet.  We have 38" so far this season, but we really need a couple feet more.

JB plowed the road up and around the south ridge after lunch, then took the plow off Miss Kitty for our drive down this evening.  We had an early dinner, filled the wood stove, and left a little after 5:00 pm.  It was still sleeting and we had quite a time cleaning off the windshield.  Had to stop a couple times for me to clear it off as we drove down since the windshield wiper has stopped working.

The hockey game was a lot of fun, even though the Wenatchee Wild lost in a shoot-out.  I think it was a bit noisy for Larry and Elsie though.  It is good to visit the world in which we used to live, but I wouldn't want to linger there.

The rain falling in town soon turned to sleet as we drove up the paved canyon road and we heard on the radio about a missing snowshoer in the area.  When we arrived at our private road turn-off, there was a police SUV there.  He was waiting for the sheriff as the missing person's phone was pinged right at about where RJ's cabin is!  So we left the gate open and when we got to Larry and Elsie's, Larry took off in their UTV to go up to the cabin the back way.  As we drove home, we looked for tracks but never saw any.  Larry didn't find a sign of anyone on the way to or at the cabin.  After arriving back home and calling us on the radio, he drove back down to the pavement, but the police and sheriff had already left.  By then it was midnight and we all figured they had found her or relocated the search.

Sunday 1/18. The temp was 40, the skies were blue and the wind was gusting to 38 when I got up at 8:00 am.  I fed the girls and the dogs, then was back in bed at 8:40 am for another two hours.  Between the wind, the snow and ice roaring down from the roof, and the fact that we did not get to bed until almost 1:00 am, there was just no way I could stay up.  JB lay down for his two-hour nap at about 11:30 am.

The wind had created a thick, crunchy crust of ice on the snow that was very noisy to walk on, but everything under it was very melty.

In the Jan/Feb issue of Home Power, Kathleen Jarscke-Schultze has a very interesting article on a new version of an older solar oven.  May have to look into that.

The wall of snow that had been hiding the mountains all day finally blew into Rose Camp - horizontally - a little before 3:00 pm.  Just minutes after we came inside from clearing the snow and ice off of the hen house roof, shoveling out the wood shed gate and around the generator.  We got a couple of inches of snow/ice yesterday, and now this storm.  When it began, the temperature was about 35, but that soon fell to freezing and we had quite a blizzard going on for a few hours.  But this is good.  We need the snow.

This evening when we talked to Larry on the radio, he told us he had been up til 4:30 this morning helping to look for the missing girl.  The sheriff and another guy came up on snowmobiles and Larry went out with them.  Either the GPS device they were using was faulty or a deer had swallowed her phone and was wandering the canyon.  Don't know that they ever found her.

Go Seahawks!  They are on their way to a second Superbowl in as many years!

We finished watching season four of Warehouse 13.  It just gets better every year.

Monday 1/19. This morning is 30 with blue sky and a light winds.  JB will probably plow the road today.  I certainly hope we get some good news about the missing girl.

Thought for the day: Snowmen fall from heaven unassembled.