NorthernDestinations.com

Thursday April 23rd, 2015

Greetings and welcome!
It has ben a very different week than last week. We have had rain, snow, winds, and haven’t made it into the 50s yet this week. I was driving home from work early week in a hard wind driven snow and it was accumulating a little on road shoulders. I thought to myself, wow that was a fast summer.

I did wake up to a light snow on the car the next morning, but it never really accumulated. Wednesday we had off and on snow showers that would suddenly snow pretty hard with gusty winds, and just as fast it wasn’t snowing. Again it didn’t accumulate here, but places in the UP and Vilas Co saw upwards of 4″.

With lows in the mid to upper 20s the wood burner has been gobbling wood again. Likewise plans to turn off the heater in the well house were delayed for another week.

Today the clouds parted and it was a little nicer. The ever present wind was again with us, but the sun and lack of precip made it feel a lot better.

The weather will calm down for tomorrow and the weekend. We are actually expecting to get into the 50s and with nice weather. Sunday could get into the 60s, and after that we should see more normal or even above normal temperatures.

The grass is really greening up now. It isn’t time to cut grass yet, but it is an ideal time to clean up before the grass sprouts really get going.

Cleaning up the yard brings the urge to burn brush, but be careful. The fire danger is at moderate and will rise over the weekend. We have a lot of dead grass from last year that is always a danger in the spring. The TV news this morning said that we are at 60% of normal precip since January 1 and 80% of normal for April, so it is a lot drier than usual. Be careful with your fire.

The road weight restrictions have been lifted for all of the county roads as of Monday. You could tell too. There were dump trucks, excavators, loggers, and all kinds of big trucks on the roads. It is good to see those folks get back to work.

The ATV trails in the area will open Friday May 1st according to the Dun-Good and Red Arrow web sites. (Covering Goodman-Dunbar and Townsend-Lakewood respectively.) Again people will be happy to be back on the trails.

The opening of game fish season should go better than usual. The lid of ice is long off of the lakes, and the water is warmer than usual for this time of year. This week didn’t help, but last week sure did. Some years we worry if the ice will be out by the opening of fishing, this isn’t one of them.

The days are much longer now. It is 8pm and still a little light out. That sure beats December when the sun sets at 4:17 or something like that. Once we see 60s next week it will be nice to have a couple of hours of light and decent temperatures after work.

Well time to get back to work. Have a good weekend and thank you for visiting!

RJB

Thursday 4-16-2015

Greetings and welcome!

We have had some very nice days this week, and golly have things changed. Some lawns in Wausaukee are almost fully green. The maples are starting to get their first red flowers, and the cottonwoods have first leaves emerging making them look hazy at a distance. Here is Silver Cliff the grass is just getting started, but the greening is definitely under way.

The frogs in the pond are putting up quite a ruckus now. There are the peepers and the croakers, and they are really loud. Sometimes you can get surprised while driving along and passing a little pothole pond or wetland and the frogs are suddenly so loud.

The turkeys are not as abundant up by the roads anymore. I did see a Tom strutting Tuesday, so the season of love is still here for them, but they have moved more into tthe woods and fields.

Fire danger is very high right now throughout the state. Really watch your fire. They had red flag warnings for most of the southern and central parts of the state this week. With a little more humidity and a little less wind they reduced it to very high fire danger, still really bad.

This will be a good weekend to go whitewater rafting. The Peshtigo River is running high. The last that I saw it was close to +24. That is a very fun water level, and with decent weather, Saturday would be a good day to hit the river.

We hit 73 today, similar temps Tuesday, and 69 Wednesday. Tomorrow should be in the low 70s too.

The weekend doesn’t look quite as nice, but Saturday looks good. Temperatures should be in the 60s Saturday and about 60 Sunday. Saturday looks nice, but Sunday brings a pretty good change of rain after about noon.

Earlier model runs had held off the rain until Sunday night. Hopefully the weather will follow the earlier scenario and we end up with two good days.

While some years have us wondering if lakes will open in time for fishing, this isn’t one of them. Most lakes are ice free. All of the small ones that I have seen were wide open. When I went by Townsend Flowage last Friday the north end had a lot of open water, and the south end looked dark like it was ready to open up. Our 60s and 70s probably finished that off.

The ground has firmed up quite a bit this week. There is still soft stuff out there, but it has come a long way. A week ago the wood truck was parked by the wood shed because it would make huge ruts if I moved it. Today I could drive right out.

It is a little early to speculate when ATV trails will open and road bans will be lifted, but we are ahead of normal.

Well time for me to get back to work. Have a good weekend and thank you for visiting!
RJB

Monday 4/13/15

Greetings and welcome!

That was a great weekend!! Saturday was nice in the mid-60s, but Sunday got up to 73 or 74. Later the wind whipped up pretty good and was roaring in the trees. Monday brought 60s again, but with more strong wind.

We are looking at 60s all week, followed by some rain Friday night and a little cooler weekend. The TV and the NWS have us for 67 and Sunny Friday and near 60 for the weekend.

I heard the first croaker frogs in the pond Saturday, and the peepers started their vreep vreep Sunday. Tonight when I came home from work they were loud.

The warm weather wasn’t lost on the insect world. I killed my first gator last week out in the work shed. I was hoping that it was the mother ship, but apparently not. I had a few visit while I was working on cars over the weekend.

There hasn’t been much greening yet, but this week should help. It is pretty early for green grass and things sprouting but the soil should warm this week and get things started. The ground around the house has firmed up since last week.

The warm spell and rain has the Peshtigo River roaring pretty good. When I checked earlier it was running at a +24, about 1,400cfs. That is a great level for whitewater rafting. If you want to catch high water and good weather together, this week and weekend would be the hot ticket.

That’s news from here. Have a good week and thank you for visiting!

RJB

Thursday April 9th, 2015

Greetings and welcome!

We have been having a rainy dreary week this week as a stationary front moved back and forth across the area. We kicked it off early week with at least 4″ of snow here, and close to 6″ up by Amberg. The snow didn’t last long, but the drizzly dreary days lasted all week.

Today we saw much heavier rain. I don’t have my rain bucket out yet, but I’d call it at least an inch.

This winter was close to being an El Nino winter, with conditions in the ENSO region of the Pacific dabbling near the line between neutral and El Nino conditions. That kept our weather coming out of the northwest, with cold weather and played out storms that only brought an inch or three. We never did see a big southern storm that brought a foot or more of snow.

This is the one. This one is a genuine Gulf of Mexico fed southern storm, complete with a secondary low pressure system. The way that the low is tracking it would have easilly been a 12-18″ snow two months ago.

Since we didn’t have much precip over the winter, the wet weather and big rain is actually a good thing. Last week we were heading for some moderate to high fire danger.

It is also a good thing for the whitewater rafting. The ground is still soggy and frozen in places. Not only will this rain hit the river for the weekend, it will make it rise fast and roar. A fast rising river is the funnest for rafting, and that will be the case this weekend.

We have some road construction that a lot of you will want to know about. Hwy 141 is closed (!) just north of Crivitz, The official detour heading north is to take 64 east to Marinette and take 180 north to Wausaukee to rejoin 141. It is the proverbial 50 mile detour.

Personally I would take A to X or C and get back onto 141. Some people are taking Louisa St out of Crivitz to Smith Creek Rd or to Cemetery Rd and up to X. Be aware that either unofficia detour will be closely watched.

They are replacing the Smith Creek Bridge just north of Noquebay Rd and the old Platter Restaurant. It is a big job, so it isn’t a 3 day closure. They are also building passing lanes and probably have other bridges between there and Wausaukee to rebuild this summer, so expect construction between Crivitz and Wausaukee to continue well into the summer.

The ‘Road Bans’ are on, meaning heavy trucks can’t drive on most roads. The ground gets really soft when the frost comes out, and the road gets wrecked with a soft base and heavy trucks.

For the same reason ATV trails are closed. Once the frost comes out and the ground dries up a little the trails and roads will reopen. Look for that about the first weekend in May, but it is weather dependent. If it dries up sooner or later the road bans and trail closures will be ended accordingly.

The big critter sighting lately has been the turkeys. I see them daily along the road on the way to work, and three days last week I saw toms all puffed up and strutting their stuff for the hens. Today they were out in the rain and at it again. It is definitely mating season.

There have been plenty of deer along the roads too. They are out in the clear areas anxiously awaiting for something green to sprout. Roadsides are a favorite at this time of year, so keep an eye on the ditches and treeline.

The rain came at a pretty good rate this afternoon. It let up for a while and now the wave of rain from the second low pressure system is about to bring a wet night. The first wave of the second storm was just pounding on the roof a few minutes ago.  That is expected to bring more rain tonight, followed by a couple of inches of snow.

All of this delightful weather is expected to clear out just in time to leave us a pretty nice weekend. The forecast is for 59 and sunny Saturday and 65 on Sunday. There is a small disturbance expected for Sunday night that could bring some clouds and light rain late in the day.

It was nice taking a break between seasons, but I will be back updating this regularly now. Have a good weekend and thank you for visiting!

RJB