Saturday January 21, 2007 we did another nice long hike.  We had so much fun the previous weekend that we decided to do another winter hike.  Joining me again were Bob, Pete and Steve.  It was a cold day, with the temperature in the single digits, around 9 degrees F.  We went back out to Stoney Creek for this hike. 

We started out on the main path around the lake with full intentions of making the complete loop.  We got about ¾ of the way around when Bob decided to walk out onto the ice of the lake.  We had seen some ice fishermen out on the lake with their little enclosures, so we figured the ice must be thick enough to hold us.  Even when you see other people out on the ice you still get a little nervous as you first walk out.  It is a weird feeling at first being in a place you normally can only be while in a boat or kayak.  I enjoyed the view and the different than normal perspective when looking from the middle of the lake toward the shoreline.   

Steve brought his camera, so needless to say we have many pictures and videos to share.  Matter of fact we have enough pictures and videos that if you take the time to look at them all you will feel like you did this hike with us.  I have created a separate page for all the pictures.  I will put the link to the pictures at the bottom of this page. 

We even came across a guy out in the middle of the lake with a huge kite he was trying to fly.  I’m not sure but I don’t think this was one of those kites that people use to pull themselves along the ice with a snow board type device.  We have seen those guys out on the frozen lakes this year, but today this person was simply trying to fly a kite. 

The wind picked up a little as we were out in the middle of the lake making the temperature feel a bit nippy.  At first I noticed we were all walking with a little distance to each other.  I wonder if everyone was thinking about keeping our distance to distribute our weight better as we walked on the ice.  It was obvious as we got further out that the ice was quite thick and we weren’t in any kind of danger.  When we started walking on the lake our goal was to walk over to the island in the middle of the lake.  Somehow we got off track and we never did end up going to the island, but we did walk clear across to the other side from where we started.   

Both Steve and Pete brought their Garmin GPS handhelds.  The batteries in Steve’s died quickly.  Pete’s worked a bit longer.  It was kind of cool to see the location arrow showing our present location right in the middle of the lake.  I have to admit I never thought I would see this position on a Garmin. 

Once we got off the lake we completed our hike the rest of the way along the path to where we parked Bob’s van.  Again this turned out to be a very interesting adventure including making our way out to the middle of the lake on the frozen water.  We always keep our options open when it comes to new places to go and things to check out when we are out on our bikes, hiking or kayaking.   

After this hike we decided to go to the Hamlin Pub for lunch.  We hadn’t been to the pub for a while and it was good to visit this comfortable place.  A soon as Mike, the Pub manager spotted Pete he came over to our table to harass Pete about still not having a large screen TV.  What Mike didn’t know was that Pete had finally made up his mind after weeks and months of deliberating, and he finally bought a nice 60 inch wide screen rear projection TV.  Mike and Pete had a nice conversation about Pete’s new TV.  He said he never thought this day would actually arrive.  Now that Pete has his long awaited electronic baby, he has an empty feeling, like something is missing or wrong.  Pete told me he feels somewhat lost without having the need to research and shop for his TV.  Knowing Pete this feeling won’t last long, he will come up with something else to obsess about before too long. 

Our lunch was good, as usual and we had a good time enjoying each others company.  We all agreed these long walks are just as much fun as our bike rides.  I have a feeling we will be doing more of these hikes over the next few weeks until the weather breaks and the snow melts and the temperature warms up. 

Here is the link to the many pictures Steve took on this day.  Again, I edited out a few of the duplicates to make it a more manageable quantity.  I’m sure you will agree we still ended up with enough pictures to get a good feel of this hike.   This link is for the videos. 

Following are the statistics from this hike, approximately 5.5 miles, maybe up to 6.0 miles total distance.  
David Lindquist