Chickawaukie Ice Boat Club

Our ace skater/spy Bob Lombardo, and his trusty fellow-skater Carl, sent in this report from our beloved Pushaw:

As of 3pm 1/11/16 Goulds Landing was locked in and we were able to walk down the bare ramp onto the ice. Ice was at least 5″ of clear ice under 1″ of slush ice as of yesterday [Sunday] and a mix of ice avenues, large areas of dark grey ice and minimal snow cover. Today there was just hard light grey ice as far as the eye could see. That 5″ of clear ice is still there and no snow or water that we could see and well drained off. There will be pressure ridges and drain holes for sure. We will circumnavigate the entire lake tomorrow on skates of course [we are skaters] and hope to see some boat action.

Photos taken today at 3pm from Goulds Landing

Winds are predicted to be stronger in the afternoon, possibly reaching 8 MPH or so. Snow predicted in the evening…..sooo….buddies….
are you ready? The lake is just NW of Bangor, Maine

Lots of warm rain, 2+ inches, and gale wind blew out Chickawaukee, back to start. Damariscotta seems, on Dammycam view from launch area, to have held. Later in week promising. Lloyd

This just in from Denis in Quebec. The lesson here is communication. Had they known, these guys could have had a great day on Sabattus. In this age of amazing communication tools, it still comes down to having people willing to share their plans and the ice.

“Hi Bill
You won’t believe how stupid we can get when we search for ice and wind close to home. First, we drove to Pushaw (Jory talked about a fairly good surface). But it was 3/4″ of packed styrofoam. Then, We took I-95 and went to Unity Pond. Very nice ice, but very light wind. So we decided to head back to Québec because today’s forecast was also poor. We stopped in Skowhegan to see Lake Wesserunsett: 8″ of ice everywhere, but 1″ of packed snow. Then we stopped in Jackman to see Wood Pond. 5″ of ice but better ice, less snow on it. Final Result: 700 km, no sailing!!

In Lambton, Lac St. Francois has 4″. It must have frozen on Monday because it was still open water last week-end (I was here). Amazing how ice built fast. I am confident to sail here next week. We expect rain tomorrow and quick drop of the temps on Monday, and light snow with strong winds until Mid week. The surface should be OK for the end of the week if snow remains light.

Tell your students that it is a crazy sport. Or a superb sport for crazy people. ”

Cheers

Denis

Dave Fortier sent this in:

“Received a call Friday evening at about 1930, Eben and Eric were on the road and on their way north. They had heard about the ice and were in the need of some ice time before traveling to the worlds in a couple of weeks. So, while they were driving north I unloaded the Super DN that I had sailed on Friday, and loaded the DN so that we could all be sailing the same boats. Also had to get all my wet gear out of the car so it could be dry by morning.
The boys arrived sometime after 2300. It was misting and slightly below freezing. Eben helped me move some of the heavy stuff on and off of the roof racks so the my rig would be ready to roll in the morning. We were all tired, so not much talk and hit the sack.
In the morning, we had coffee, and watched the weather report, and the prediction was good enough, we carried on. We went to the local Cafe for our hearty breakfast and more coffee, and then it was off to Sabattus. If I remember correctly there was a few raindrops as we got on interstate, luckily that did not last, and the temperature was hovering at 0C.
Driving in at the launch we saw Henry Capotosto and a buddy there, and more ice fishermen than during the week. There was even a fisherman right in the launch area. As we set up our boats we noticed a bit of wind, it was hard to tell how strong as the launch area was protected from the north wind.
So, we finished setting up, and got out on the lake and the breeze was sufficient to sail at a satisfying clip. We were able to sail up and downwind at iceboat like speed. We were able to sail most of the lake chasing each other around as we did not bring the marks! We had a good time and were happy that the wind cooperated, and the rain held off. Eric and Eben were happy to get a bit of ice time, even though it was less than their drive time!
Sabattus is a nice lake, hard to believe we have not sailed it before. It has a nice launch area, and is of good size. I hope that it will survive the rain. fingers crossed, Dave”

Sabattus Pond is a lovely shallow pond of some 4 X 1 miles on the Northern edge of Lewiston Maine, a nineteenth century mill town. We have no resident ice spies there and I believe have never sailed there before. However our ace itinerant ice spy Lee Spiller sniffed it out last week, miles of grade 9 with lots of grade 10 black ice several inches thick. The indian name Sabattus roughly translates to “wild goose chase”, but we didn’t know that.

Despite forecasts of meager air we congregated from as far away as New Jersey to a lovely small town park with a sheltered anchorage for fleets of a dozen plus ice boats both days. Wednesday a scratch race course was set up for a reaching race and a fleet of 7 DN’s drifted around the marks three times. This was repeated with diminishing numbers of competitors for three races, enough for a regatta! Commodore Fortier won two out of three and declared the event “The Commodore’s Cup Regatta”. (A conflict of interest was raises its head). Competitor Raymond came in first in race one and second twice and pointed out that because Fortier cannot run he had given him a head start on race two which Fortier won. Fortier claimed he won race two by a large margin, much more than the head start he had been given. Perhaps the board of directors could take this up come Spring.

Friday was forecast to have a steady 6 mph breeze all day and indeed in the morning there was a promising zephyr moving off the ice and through the town park. The NEIYA gang set up real pyramidal race marks but by the time boats got on the ice the breeze was already dying. “T” Theiler demonstrated his top ten magic by seemingly effortless cruising around the course while most of the rest of the fleet had trouble. One race was enough and the ice boating mostly became standing around in the warm sun and talking, an important part of iceboating.

In the meantime temporary MIT professor Buchholz arrived with his retinue of seven students who are receiving instruction in iceboat construction assembling four DN’s from materials kits that Bill carted down to Cambridge in his Whiz trailer. They seemed a pleasant lot, apparently from Indonesia or therabouts. They brought 3 complete DN’s with them plus Bill’s Dn and it took a while to get everything put together by which time the wind had pretty much gone. One them came out onto the ice and I let him sail “Cheap Skate” which he did successfully, including figuring out what to do when the sheet pulley let go, he just held the boom by hand and returned all smiles. I don’t know how his classmates made out but hope we will get a report from Porfessor Buchholz.

Saturday is providing light snow turning to rain and heavy rain Sunday onto about two inches of ice on Damariscotta and Chickawaukee. Forecast accompanying high winds may blow us all back to start. However cold is forecast for next week perhaps punctuated by snow, Winter is starting.  Lloyd