Dec. 6

DISCLAIMER: TRAVEL IS AT YOUR OWN RISK AND DISCRETION. THE FOLLOWING IS OBSERVATIONS AND FOR INFORMATIONAL PURPOSES ONLY….. A very eventful day at Malachi, in many ways. Started this morning from Indian Bay with the drill and onto the new ice. Dry holes at 6 1/2 inches. Worked our way up the west shore and kept finding dry holes. The slush that was quite prevalent has frozen in a lot of areas. The drilled holes where mostly “white ice” ie. frozen slush. We went 3/4’s of the way down the west shore, then cut a diagonal to the main trail at the point, just North of Butchs dock, en route encountered patches of wet slush and in the dry areas again dry holes. So, at the narrows we decided to do the main trail to the North Otter trail entrance. Again the slush has frozen, giving us a very smooth surface with a surface skiff of light powder. And of course some patches of slush, with no stretch of slush much longer than approximately 75 feet. This left a nice puddle which is anticipated to freeze somewhat over night. Ice into Copelands is reported as being the same. There has been no holes drilled East of Campbells Point Retirement Home into Bradleys Bay as of yet. The narrows crossing reflective poles are up, There are no markers as yet on the trail.