Marty got VERY interested in a day hike out on frozen Lake Erie. It has been several years since the lake has frozen over and he was quite jazzed about it in recent weeks. We drove to Port Clinton to the small airport there to catch a flight to the islands. He could not wait to see what it was like, so he got out here to check out the ice off the shore in Port Clinton, Ohio.
We got to the airport and climbed aboard the 5/6 seater named Dairy Air piloted by the faux cow fur hatted, Bob. It was all of a 10 minute flight, even with Bob's generous extra loop around Middle Bass Island to show us the iced channels. Not long enough...
Whoa, tight turn there, Bob.
That's better. There's South Bass Island off on the horizon.
That dark smudge on the horizon is South Bass Island, our destination 6ish miles away.
Perry's monument looks like a frivolous backyard ornament from 1000 feet up!
After landing and walking the two miles into Put-In-Bay, Marty and I head out onto frozen lake for the first leg of our trek: to Rattlesnake Island, another smudge on the horizon. We had ice grippers on our boots, so walking on the bare ice was no problem. The black specks are ice fishing shanties. About this time I realized that I was not enjoying the feeling of being out ON THE ICE.
There's Middle Bass Island on the left.
There are many, many ice shanties all over Lake Erie near the islands. Ice fishing is very popular and there was much talk about what the gettin' was like. There was also much talk about how thick the ice was here (five inches) and there (twelve inches.)
The whiteness was immense broken up only by a few ice shanty "towns." They were very busy that day; there were lots of snowmobiles (they call them snow machines) and ATV's back and forth from shore to shanty. I still did not like the feeling of being out on the ice.
It was a spookily peaceful and beautiful landscape and Marty was in heaven or at least nearby; on the moon!
About this time, I realized that I was too spooked OUT ON THE ICE to continue, so I went back to the restaurant in Put-In-Bay and sat and ate curly Q fries and a grilled cheese sandwich and waited for Marty to finish his trek.
While I sat and enjoyed my curlyQ fries, lots of folk clad in bulky snow suits stomped into the restaurant. They came to South Bass Island to enjoy the festival OUT ON THE ICE in Put-In-Bay harbor. Out on the ice! Marty returned from his island to island trek and we went to check out this festival.
They had come on their snow machines and ATV's from the mainland and from surrounding islands on ice roads (ON THE FROZEN lake) marked by Christmas trees.
Someone thought ON THE FROZEN ICE ON THE BAY was a good parking spot for their $25k truck. Note the row of snowmobiles and ATV's parked nearby. Guess THEY weren't spooked by the ice.
Catchin' up and enjoying the bonfire ON THE ICE.
"How old's your little one now?
"Say, hand me a tall frosty one there, will ya?"
"Red Bull Slushy, anyone?"
Little Jimmy plays crack-the-whip on the snowmobile with his little brother in tow! (OUT ON THE ICE)
After a mug of hot chocolate at the restaurant, we tromp back to the airport, reboard our friend Dairy Air to head back to Port Clinton.
The sun flirted through an opening in the dense gray cloud ceiling and tickled the wind-scoured ice surface with orange glitter.
The wind wrought texture of the snow was lacy and elegant.
This ice bound island was home base for several ice shanty outposts. (the black specks casting long shadows.)
An blue ice shanty town boasting clear ice.
Here's a copy of an article from the Plain Dealer a few days later:
CATAWBA ISLAND -- A few minutes after 6 p.m., rush hour begins on Lake Erie.
Headlights flicker on, snowmobile engines spark to life and the drive home begins atop 14 inches of ice. Fishermen who have spent hours freezing over small holes pack up their shanties, grab their walleye and head for the warmth of home.
This winter, the commute is more congested. It will never approach East Ninth Street and Euclid Avenue during a snowstorm. But it is busier than any year in recent memory, as thick ice, hungry walleye and the frozen economy have led more people to the lake, fishermen say.
"It has been phenomenal this year," said John Hageman, the owner of Primetime Ice Fishing Charters in Put-in-Bay. "The thickness of the ice gives people greater access to different parts of the lake."
In simple terms, greater access means a greater chance of catching fish. The state limit for walleye, the primary target of the season, is six per day per fisherman through February.
Some people fish because they are obsessed with the sport, littering the ice with underwater cameras, fish finders and expensive bait. Others want to bond with their brothers, fathers and grandfathers.
Still others need to fill their stomachs.
On Monday, more than 600 fishermen spread out on the lake between Catawba and the Lake Erie islands, some as many as five or six miles off shore. Most of them got out that far after tethering their shanties and supplies to snowmobiles or lighter four-wheelers.
On recent weekends, parking lots have been jammed, mostly because the ice is perfect, as temperatures have hovered below 20 degrees Fahrenheit for weeks.
Thursday, the wind chill made it feel like 15 degrees below zero. It showed on Roger Hansen's gnarled, leather-like face.
Hansen, a retired construction worker from Lucas County, said he caught a 10-pound walleye last week, and he has nabbed several that were 23 to 24 inches long.
"I've been ice fishing for more than 50 years, and this is the best ice in years," said Hansen, 62.
Fishermen who would go out on weekends now spend three and four days during the workweek plunging augers into ice and baiting hooks.
Nik Pugach, a laid-off roofer from Parma, arrived at Catawba at 7 a.m. Thursday and headed home at 6:20 p.m. He saw the sun rise and the sun set. He had no expensive shanty or equipment, just two poles and enough layers to make the Michelin Man jealous.
He makes the trip regularly -- partly because he loves to fish and partly to eat.
Unlike Pugach, Justin Held went high tech. He paints houses in Fremont and has been ice fishing regularly during a slow period at work.
A pair of ice fishermen head back to the shoreline of Catawba Island on Thursday, taking their four-wheeler over a break in frozen Lake Erie.Outside, on a small sled, sat a 24-inch walleye and a bait bucket with a sticker that read, "Find 'em. Fish 'em. Fry 'em."
"It's all I have in my freezer, fish," Held said. "I had to put my pierogies in a small box to keep them."
Of all the fishermen on the lake Thursday, Sam Santell of Kinsman in Trumbull County seemed to be having the most fun, and he wasn't always paying attention to fish.
Sam, 7, bolted from his classwork as a home-schooled student and went fishing with his dad, Tim, and uncle, Ben, on their annual winter adventure. Things were going well for Sam until he stepped in a fishing hole. His boot was soaked, but his spirit was undeterred.
"I like to play on the ice," he said.
Catch anything?
Nope, he said, shaking his head.
A few hundred feet from Sam stood Rollie Woods, a retiree from Bridgeport in southeast Ohio. Woods was as persistent and quiet as Sam was playful.
Over and over, Woods dipped his line into the 8-inch diameter hole until ice formed on it like wax forming on a candle stick. Fifteen feet away stood his grandson, Adam Felt, who did the same. They seldom spoke, content in each other's company.
They, like other fishermen, failed to come up with any major catches Thursday. Some blamed the recent snows, while others said too many snowmobiles scared the fish.
But there is hope. Several fishermen said the best time to drop a line is yet to come. The middle of February boasts some of the prime walleye fishing of the season.
The next five days, however, will bring sun and the warmest temperatures to Northeast Ohio of the winter, as it reaches about 45 degrees.
The heat wave, no doubt, will affect the ice, and it may keep a lot of people home.
But will serious die-hards head out? Probably. They will just look for the thickest ice.
"It'll be a little mushy, that's all," said Justin Held, the house painter from Fremont.============================
Here's a new item from mere minutes after I posted the above on Feb. 7, 2009:
COLUMBUS, Ohio – More than 100 people were rescued Saturday from a miles-wide slab of ice that floated away from the Ohio shoreline of Lake Erie, authorities said.
One person died, said Ottawa County Sheriff Bob Bratton. He said 100 to 125 others were rescued by late afternoon.
Several ships and helicopters from Toledo and Marblehead, and from Detroit, were sent to rescue the people from the ice floe.
Authorities said fishermen apparently used wooden pallets to create a bridge over a crack in the ice so they could go farther out on the lake. But the planks fell into the water when the ice shifted, stranding the fishermen about 1,000 yards off shore.
Ice on western sections of Lake Erie is up to 2 feet thick, National Weather Service meteorologist Bill Randel said. He said it started to crack as temperatures rose above freezing this weekend and wind gusting to 35 mph pushed on the ice.
Ice fisherman who regularly visit the lake have said this winter's thick ice has lured more people to the lake this year.
"There was a heck of a city out there for the last week and a half, two weeks," said 71-year-old Oak Harbor resident Peter Harrison, who has lived on the shore for 40 years.
Ohio Division of Wildlife spokeswoman Jamey Graham said the state annually warns fishermen that there's no such thing as "safe ice."
Even in very cold weather, the ice on western Lake Erie is often unsafe because currents can easily cause the ice to shift. Firefighters in communities along the lake are trained for rescues from the ice and are often on guard when temperatures rise.
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