NorthernDestinations.com

Pi Day

Greetings and welcome!

Yes it is Pi Day- 3.14. I told Chris to come back in 5 years and I would be impressed, 3.14.15 @ 9:26 and 53 seconds. (3.141592653)

It is a blue ribbon Pi day indeed. The dreariness from last week has gone away. The rain, fog, wind and all of that stuff has been replaced by a sunny & 62 T-shirt day.

We are going to see a good bit of that this week, with today, Wednesday and Thursday holding promise of more of the same. Thursday could actually threaten 70 if everything lines up right.

Tuesday is the outlier, when higher pressure than we have now moves in, creating a minor disturbance. My maps are showing the sprinkles/light rain mostly in western WI, but the NWS is still predicting a chance of isolated showers and a cloudy day for us. Wednesday won’t be quite as warm, but it will be ramping back up for Thursday.

For the weekend we are looking at a gen-U-ine southern storm. This one could get interesting. When I looked last night the GFS was showing a path that would be favorable for good bit of rain, followed by a chance of 4-8″ of snow about Sunday with more possible Monday. I have my doubts, but that is what it is showing me.

We have some events this week. Monday brings the Crivitz Recreation Association banquet. That is a little like the Iron Snowshoe banquet with lots of raffles and nice prizes, dinner & happy hour.

Wednesday brings the wearin’ O the green for St Patties Day. Apparently it is also Glenn at Curve Inn’s birthday, and they will be having a party Wednesday afternoon and night with free corned beef & cabbage from 4pm till it is gone, and a DJ karaoke guy from 7pm on.

This weekend we have..

Something has come up, and I will have to finish my update later. In the meantime enjoy the nice weather and have a good Sunday.

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Pi Day V2

Sorry, I had to go.

In the meantime, Jabber E-mailed in with another event. I thought it was the weekend of the 27th, it is this weekend.

The event in mind is the March Humm Drumm Poker Run with the Firelane Bar this Saturday the 20th. They will be Meeting at Firelane, Leaving at 11:00. Rapids Resort is the first stop, yes I will be working. Then it is off to Eagle Creek, Brown Jug, I Dont Knows in Middle Inlet, The Chippewa, then back to Firelane.

In other news, the day today was a nice one. Athelstane Weather showed 63.9 for a high. I saw the car gadget get as high as 65 in sunny areas and down to the upper 50s in secluded areas that were shaded and still held snow.

The warm weather has eaten a lot of snow, but there is still some in sheltered areas. The driveway and other gravel roads are soft in spots but firm in many areas. It again depends on how sheltered it is. It has not been a bad mud year, but you can find it easily enough.

The Peshtigo opened up by Kosir’s, but remains frozen upstream. The water is starting to run on top of the ice, usually the beginning of the end for the ice. The water is gathering in the low spots, and while they aren’t flooded, there is water there. Right now all that it will take is a little rain and some warm days to get it all rolling. It is running about+6″ right now, maybe a touch higher. It is just getting started.

The latest GFS model run has backed away from snow for late weekend. We are still expecting a weekend rain storm, but the latest version cheats us out of our 4-8″ follow through. It could easily change again.

The biggest change in the great outdoors was that the chippies came out over the past few days and are rather frisky. I could hear them calling back and forth in the yard and they were zooming back and forth rather energetically. Obviously they are happy about spring.

I have seen my first gnat, but only one. There were a few of those first white moths out the other night too. Even though it is a drab time of year, it is a wondrous one, as each day brings another bug, critter, or plant emerging for spring. It is a cool progression, and it peaks with the great greening of the land in May and June. That is an amazing transformation.

That is about it for today. Have a good Monday and thank you for visiting!

RJB

Friday March 12th, 2010

Greetings and welcome!

It has been a foogy few days, and right now we still have a pretty good fog layer. I can just barely make out the outline of the trees by the creek about 600′ behind the house. The noon news reported anywhere from near zero visibility up to about 1/2 mile in the region.

The fog is expected to continue into tonight and possibly tomorrow. The increasing winds behind the storm are expected to break it up overnight or Saturday morning. In the meantime, there is a dense fog advisory, so be careful.

The heavier waves of the storm have passed. It looks like there will be a declining chance of scattered showers as the weekend progresses. We did see a couple of decent waves of rain out of our storms this week, but I would guess the rainfall between a half inch and an inch.

Over the weekend look for overcast days, some wind, and temps in the mid to upper 40s.

In events this weekend we have Bucket Golf at Dockside Saturday, along with a meat and prize raffle.Here is Chris’s list..

One other event this weekend, we spring ahead Saturday night at 2am and go to daylight savings time.

I recall seeing an ad for the 20th with the Town of Stephenson VFD having a fundraiser at the Woods with a fried chicken dinner, free beer and a band for $10. I heard that it was a very popular event last year.

Beyond that there isn’t much going on. It is a quiet time of year for a few weeks between the snowmobiling and whitewater rafting seasons.

Have a good weekend and thank you for visiting!

RJB

3/9/10 Special Report

A tempest in a teapot or a call to worms?

In my casual reading tonight I found something that might get some people excited. In a nutshell, Obama issued an executive order a while back that would create a federal organization with widely sweeping powers to regulate ocean, Great Lakes, and inland waters management. Some people in the fishing industry are saying that it could be the end of sport fishing, ocean, inland, and Great lakes. The folks at ESPN, BASS, the ASA and others are pretty excited about it.

I read through the interim report that the executive order discharged people with generating. It is an environmentalist and global warming advocate’s dream. There were a lot of enviro-centric generalities and some very broad and sweeping powers advocated, and they kept bringing up global warming.

What wasn’t in there was a direct reference to banning sport fishing. Apparently the pro-fishing groups that were in on the planning did not like where it was expected to go once generalities like ecosystem based management and marine spatial planning became more specific mandates in the hands of the environmentalist driven new agency. There have been some fishing area closures recently that they see as a beginning to more sweeping threats to anglers via this order.

Again specific environmental organizations were not mentioned in the report, but several blogs & articles suggest that that some of the more extreme ones like the WWF were very proactive in the planning and just under the surface.

I have issues with it with or without a direct threat to fishing. First of all, something this sweeping should be introduced as legislation and passed into law, not enacted by fiat via executive order. I know that sixty or eighty  million fishermen will freak out and stop the law if you went the legislative route, and that might be unpleasant, but didn’t we used to be a representative republic?

Number two, don’t we already have like 6 federal agencies that dabble into ocean and waterways management above and beyond regional organizations and the DNR? What exactly is the crisis that requires another one, and how do you figure on paying for all of these wild fantasies?

If these folks really do intend on limiting or stopping sport fishing they are about to get their heads bit off by the biggest meanest grizzly bear in the land, the American fisherman. People are very passionate about their fishing, and there are a lot of us. A wise man wouldn’t tangle with that.

I don’t know if this is a direct threat to fishing or not, but I can do without it.

RJB

Here are links..

http://www.whitehouse.gov/assets/documents/09_17_09_Interim_Report_of_Task_Force_FINAL2.pdf

http://sports.espn.go.com/outdoors/saltwater/news/story?id=4975762

http://www.asafishing.org/newsroom/news_pr100509.html

http://www.asafishing.org/newsroom/news_pr022310.html

http://sports.espn.go.com/outdoors/fishing/news/story?id=4522316

Tuesday March 9th, 2010

Greetings and welcome!

Thank you guys that commented for your support. It is much appreciated. I think that I like the new site, it is possibly the best one yet. I still haven’t finished the header image, but the one of the aurora and sprites is pretty cool too.

Yesterday was beautiful outside. It was mostly sunny and by Athelstane Weather’s account, 61.2F. I saw 58 on the Accuweather gadget on the left side of the site, and 65 in the sun out back. A few people disagreed that it went over 60, but I am not one of them.

I was outside working on the truck in a T-shirt and was hot much of the time. For once we had a warm spring day without the wind coming and putting a chill on it. As you saw in the pix yesterday, it really knocked down some snow & ice.

After working for a while I got a pretty ugly case of spring fever, and recruited Chris to go for a ride.  Here are a few pictures..

Today is a little different. It is in the 40s and as the rain gets closer the fog is creeping in. I am not a fan of fog. Not only is it hard to drive in, that is our snow evaporating, which I would much rather see in the river or lakes.

The NWS has the rain starting tonight and going through Friday night. On the GFS the precip keeps coming as the storm backs up and does it a little more, with rain into Sunday. Sunday and Monday it is showing it as snow. (1-3, 2-4?)

A lot of the time the rain will be light. There are a few heavier waves of rain associated with the storm too. The total QPF for the storm is between 1-1.75″. Too bad that isn’t snow (12-20″).

I did see some road ban signs up yesterday.

This just came in minutes ago.. (TY Eric!)

From: John Scott, Forestry and Parks Administrator
Subject: ATV Trail Closure
For the 2010 season, the entire Marinette County ATV Trail
System will be closed to all vehicles effective March 15, 2010.
This closure is required to protect the soft trail bed from
erosion damage caused by ATV’s and other vehicles during spring
breakup. ATV trails will re-open when conditions warrant.
Another press release will be placed in the paper when the
trails are re-opened.
________________________

Usually the ATV trils reopen the first weekend in May, but that is subject to change with conditions.

Well  have to get back to work. I just wanted to say thanks, catch up on the weather, and show you the pictures. Now I have to pay the price for enjoying yesterday.

Have a good Tuesday and thank you for visiting!

RJB