We now live on a Glacier, A very very cold Glacier

Right now you can't tell the difference between the road, the driveway, the path to the lake
or the surface of the lake, it's just one big

Glacier

                                       Definition of GLACIER

: a large body of ice moving slowly down a slope or valley or spreading outward on a land surface

 Two weeks ago we had about 16" of snow on the ground and very nice weather,

then came the 2 days of rain.

During this rain the driving surfaces packed down and turned into solid ice with water on top, this made for one of the scariest rides I have had in years.

 On my first trip out, I only made it  the 3  miles to the mailbox when I turned back for home. This trip, normally 10 minutes, took an hour and ended with the truck parked in the middle of the road at the top of the driveway and I had the feeling I had cheated death.

On day two of the rain, Pat and I decided to make an early run into town for some sand to grit down our driveway and also grocery shopping. We also used this trip to move Pat's vehicle to the storage building so  we would have only the truck to deal with in the driveway.

All the weather reports that day had called for rapidly dropping temps and rain changing to snow in the afternoon. Well, the temps fell and the rain quit without changing to snow.

which turned all the driving suffices turn into skating rinks .

I pulled into the driveway (big mistake) sliding sideways down the hill . I had no choice but to hit the gas driving us into the woods and hoping for the best. We ended up at a 90 degree angle wedged between the tress and rock garden at the top of the path leading to the cabin and lake.

It took all the sand we had just picked up to even be able to get out of the truck, sand our way to the cabin door and sand enough driveway to get the truck freed and looking up the hill.
 If it didn't have sand on it you couldn't walk on it.

If you would like to read another account of this 2 day event have a look at Val and Kathy's blog,

their driveway is a tight sphincter steep hill ride in the summer. As a matter of fact,  there is a local adventurer

Lonnie Dupre who has been trying to be the first solo climber to climb Mt Denali in January,  if he wants to impress me he should try summiting that driveway.

On Day 3 I was lucky enough to get my truck back up the hill and onto the road to make another trip for sand. Slowly making our way out, we happened to see that one of  the sheet rocker's working on Patrick Sullivan's new house has a plow truck with a large sander in the back,. After talking with him we came up with a plan for splitting the cost and the next morning he sanded down the driveways and road.

That night the heavy snow started. With the low temps the snow was very fluffy and without any moisture it wouldn't stick to the ice. The snow continued throughout the next day ending with around 6" followed by lots of  cold and wind.

Ian, another of Patrick's carpenters plowed out the road on day 4 and ever since then we have been driving on roads that look like this.

Since then the temp's have been,

-22, -24, -24, -27 and frozen pipes, -24 and a new bad sound from my truck. All these temperatures are without wind chill  taking windchill in account and they may have reached as low as -55. 

Right now it's +2 with maybe 7" of new snow coming tonight.

Other then that we have 2 bucks at the feeder now, but haven't named the second one yet