Jimio's Icecapades

Jeff - Joe - Jimio - Mike

Many Groovy Winters were had on Gilletts Lake. There were many things to do [not as many as summer time but almost]. I remember just free skating over the entire lake stopping at each fishing hole to see how many fish were caught. Those poor guys, it must have been a horrible death freezing and flopping on that ice and having dogs come up and sniff you. Some Ice Shantys had all the comforts of home - TV -Icebox full of beer and a table to play poker on. I saw a guy spear a pike once. That was cool and those fork tips are really sharp! It was fun chashing the dogs on skates, we would get going fast in a straight direction then turn sharp and watch those dogs trying to turn on the ice was hilarious. Some of the Moms would have their pooches pull their kids on the ice while sitting on sleds. [Wish I had gotten pics of that] One year a friend named Kevin, his dad brought out an old Renault car on the ice and pulled us. We used water ski tow ropes and got up to 60 mph. It was ok if we fell, we had hockey kneepads on and the smooth ice kept you from rolling over and over. But when the snow did cover the ice was the best time to make our hockey rinks. In the early years our goals were nothing except a pair of shoes or boots and the puck had to go between them to score but during my junior or senior year I built a goal with 3 sections of 2x6's and it worked out swell. Night skating was the best for me, chashing snowmobiles with my coleman latern. That latern could light up an entire rink so our hockey games could proceed into the late-night hours. I learned how to identify the constillation Orion while laying on the ice late at night and always think of night skating whenever I see it. Some days it snowed so heavy that by the time we shoveled off the rink, we had to start shoveling the other end again and even if it was -20F out, you could get pretty hot and sweaty under your coat and you would have to take your coat off for a few minutes. On the south side of the lake was a different school district than ours and these 8 guys challenged us to a game and even though there were only 4 of us, we won. It was also a blast going down by the deserted ends of the lake were the swamps were and making Bonfires. It got pretty hot near them flames and though I thought we would burn a huge hole in the ice, it never hardly hurt the ice. Thats because heat is not very hot hear the base of the flames. A few years we had "Black Ice" which is very smooth clear ice. It was really groovy skating along and looking down, you could see the bottom and the fish swimming around. You could actually chase the fish around by the Sandbar where it is very shallow. And watching a lot of thick weeds just under the ice seemed creepy. You can tell how thick the ice is by looking at the cracks to see how far down they go [providing the ice is fairly clear] I only fel in once and it was only 1 leg up to my knee in front of my house. I test the strength of the ice with my hockey stick. apparently it was safe near shore but farther out it hadn't frozen quite long enough. Our lake is pretty shallow and out front by my house its only like 4 feet deep so I was not too worried. Its best to stay in shallow areas on new ice. In town at Loomis Park they used to flood the ground for ice skating. One year the figure skaters were complaining about the hockey skaters so the park flooded 2 areas and all were happy. Also at the Cascades Park there is a nice pond to skate on which also have 3 or 4 connecting ponds attached to it. Cross-Country skiiers also are also near the pond due to a golf coarse in the park. I also had some cross-country skiis and loved using them on Gilletts Lake cause it was a nice flat terrain. If you ever get out to the lake or a pond try your hand at skating, play a little hockey or put on some cross-country skiis and above all - [Take a Camera]  -This is Jimio saying *Happy Wintering*