Sunday was a clear, calm, sunny, warm (upper 30's water and air) day on Casco Bay, so I thought I'd take my first longer paddle of the winter, from Falmouth town landing to Peaks Island and back (about 10 nm round trip). Saw eider ducks, oldsquaws, buffleheads, mergansers, loons, and possibly one shy seal. The usually plentiful harbor seals seem to have gone south, so perhaps it was a gray seal. Paddling along Great Diamond's cliffs, I looked up and saw two does foraging in the snow at the edge of the cliffs. They seemed to notice me a little, 60 feet below, but not to be concerned. A minute later, I looked up again and saw a mighty 8 point buck, standing stock-still in the snow, staring at me. What a royal sight! When I put in, there was no ice visible in the water at all.... but as I went farther south, nearer to the mouth of the Presumpscot River, I started to see occasional smallish chunks of ice. I thought it would be fun to paddle through (and over) some ice....but the scraping sound on my fiberglass hull convinced me to do this only once. So here's the question for all you more experienced winter paddlers: how hard is this on the hull? Is it to be avoided? Is the bark worse than the bite? *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List - All postings copyright the author and not to be reproduced outside PaddleWise without author's permission Submissions: paddlewise_at_lists.intelenet.net Subscriptions: paddlewise-request_at_lists.intelenet.net Website: http://www.paddlewise.net/ ***************************************************************************
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