Sunday, July 14, 2013

Woke this morning in Alex to a skiff of snow. Headed out to the Lower Manorburn for an early skate. Luckily the ice was not too badly effected by the snow - hard and bumpy but and easy skate. Skated most of the main basin due to being out early when the ice was locked in. Before I left I took the chance to have a go with the Nordic skates. Very smooth on the bumpy ice and a bit of fun for a change. Would be great when the surface is too rough for ordinary skates. Headed to Poolburn for a look and really stuck winter up there! Cold and very windy. Interesting to see what the wind and snow was doing to the ice - creating holes and covering hard ice with weaker snow ice. Had a good skate in a lee wind bay where the black ice had been smoothed off. Ice was too unpredictable to get out the Kitewing..... Plenty of snow on the road home and other skating spots were well covered.
Holes appearing
Cccccold!

Nordic for a change
First marks...


4 comments:

nandos said...

May I know where this is Dave? I came across your blog from this link http://aardwolfsice.com/News/NIR/NIR_Page.html


Do you know which lake in south island has the highest probability to become frozen during winter Dave? Thank you

Dave said...

Hi Nandos - where are you based? The highest probability in Canterbury would be Lake Ida - but has a bit of a walk in if gates are closed. You walk in passed the top of Lake Evelyn which may freeze anyway.
In Otago the most probable would be the Manorburn Dam.
That said it depends on the freeze. We usually try for Poolburn - which is the top pictures in this post. You get to it via the Ida Valley in Otago.
If you want to make contact there is an email link on the about tab. I can keep you updated. We are Dunedin based.

nandos said...

Thanks for the reply Dave, I'm from Auckland. I'm going down south to ski in july and hoping to see a frozen lake. Poolburn looks cool but it's too far from our destination because we are skiing on mount dobson. Thanks, I appreciate it if you can keep updated :)

Dave said...

Best to keep an eye on the Aardwolfsice site as they report mainly on Canterbury and sometimes report on the area around Tekapo - you might be able to make a dash for one of the spots if the ice is in. Clearwater would be worth a look if the ice is on.

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