River Down, Lake Up, Ice Moving

 Here's Marsh's Falls today. You can see that the flow is much less than a few days back. That's good news.  Not that there isn't still a lot of H2O flowing...  but the river is down and the MNR advises that the river has passed the crest of the flood.  Of course, they also say that there is more rain in the forecast. A tricky lot, the MNR.

Meanwhile, back at the Lake, the levels continue to rise as the lake absorbs the inflow. The water is now quite deep over the docks, as you can see. 







 It wraps all the way around Anchor cottage, but the boathouse downstairs is still high and dry, for which we are very grateful!







And the ice is on the move.  The good news about the ice is that is breaking apart, it is now down to the stage where it is long crystals, easily broken apart. 











Of course, it is still pretty thick, and when it moves horizontally along the surface of the lake it can pack a lot of pressure in front of it.  It pushed one of the barrels full of water back along the dock at Farside about six feet.  It took both David and I to wrestle that back into place.






You can see the ice flowing across the dock really well in this photo.  Our Bondi guests will recognize the canoe racks up on the shore, and the walkway  around the deck chair lawn. That would be under that big drifting iceberg...





Here's another angle to let you see the ice sliding over the dock...









Taffy bravely came out onto the dock to assist us.  Despite David's cautionary comments, she did manage to fall off the dock at one point. It was hard to tell where the dock ended and the lake began, with the ice sliding around,  so she had her first swim of the season.






The crystals look so innocent, just sort of drifting about. As they bump into each other with a bit of wind, they sound like wind chimes. It's quite marvellous. Until you see them peeling away your buildings or docks.... Looses some of its charm at that point, somehow...





David spent a bit of time today with a big stick just smashing up the ice as it started to pile up against the docks. Here he is at Beaver's dock, ably assisted by a slightly damp poodle.

With a bit of luck, a bit more warm weather, and --dare we say it? -- a bit of rain, the ice will simply vanish at this point.  It's right on the edge of being gone, and won't take much more encouragement to turn back into water.  That would be a good thing for all the docks and boathouses around the Lake of Bays, so fingers crossed...




All the same, you just cannot beat it for beautiful...


The little rafts of ice pile up against each other, and create these strikingly lovely bits of artwork.


We have all been reminded, during this flood, of the power of water. Mother Nature is not to be messed with, and the force of flowing water is formidible.

It's good to be also reminded of how beautiful, how truly unique and precious Nature is as well.




We have to take a few moments to admire what is currently happening along the shore and out on the bay...

We would just prefer that it leave our docks alone...






Taffy can keep the geese away from the docks, but despite best efforts and intentions, the Ice is just not listening.