Monday, April 19, 2010

Return to the Flowage

At camp the weekend before last, we menly men talked about paddling the Chippewa Flowage again this spring. We must have been sending out subconscious brain waves because when we got home Sunday night we had an email from the GurneyGranny informing us she had booked the R&R Bayview cabin and she was going whether we all did or not. That sort of decisive action is hard to duck so we all did go and it was another superb, unseasonably warm, spring weekend. The owner of the resort says he remembers standing on the ice and working on his docks this weekend last year, but the only ice this year was in the cooler keeping the beer cold.

Seven of us pretty much had 16,000 acres of lake and 140 islands to ourselves. We saw one boat on Saturday, one on Sunday, and that was the total extent of human contact on the water. Migrating waterfowl and birds on the other hand, were all over the place. The ducks, geese, cranes, herons, and eagles were around every turn and in every bay and indentation. The water was calm enough, and I felt confident enough in the Aquanaut HV, to have the very non waterproof Nikon around my neck and got some excellent images. It was almost like jump shooting ducks in pothole country back in my youth, except this time we went home to a supper of pasta rather than mallard.
It's late, I'm brain dead, and I'll write more in the next couple days. For now you have to look at bird pictures. The weather, company, and birds were fabulous. I think we may sneak into May without a snowstorm yet.

2 comments:

Nan said...

Great photos, as usual.

Janet said...

Thanks for your writing. I enjoy reading your blog, don't stop!