Farewell To The Piney

                        Farewell To The Piney

Colorado recently lost access to one of its crown jewels, Piney Lake above Vail. The reasons for that are complicated, and hope remains that a buyer for the property can be found who might restore some form of operation similar to what has existed there for many years.  But as of October 2026, those hopes are based only in optimism and not in any concrete plans. 

First some background. Piney Lake is located near the base of Mount Powell in the Gore Range, approximately an hour's drive from Vail. The road to it is an unpaved dirt track that usually gets graded by the Forest Service each spring, though it tends to get worse over the course of the summer as rainstorms and the frequent vehicle traffic make it rutted.  Half of the lake borders the Eagle's Nest Wilderness, with the other half being private land currently owned by Denver Water.  One needs to cross the their property to access the lake, which hasn't been a problem since a concessionaire called the Piney River Ranch has been operating a restaurant, boat rental, and wedding venue there for many years.  Its a truly spectacular setting. The mountains seem to rise straight up out of the lake, though that is something of an illusion.  Between those mountains and the inlet to the lake is well over a mile of great beaver pond fishing in the Piney River. There is also excellent fishing from the outlet of the lake down for about a mile, before the Piney drops into a heavily wooded canyon en route to its confluence with the Colorado River many miles below.  The lake also fishes well, and can be accessed from the shore or from the canoes and SUPs that could be rented.  Piney is also famous as a wedding venue, for there is a huge deck extending from the restaurant down to the water's edge. About 35 nuptials a year were held there against the amazing backdrop.  

 So why is this all ending? Even as the infrastructure has been built up over the years by the private business owners, its been on a somewhat tenuous basis as they've never owned the land that all of the structures were built on.  Denver Water owns the land, and until recently they've been a good landlord. DW used to own most of the water rights to the Piney River with the idea that some day, they might want to build some kind of reservoir down below that they would fill with water from the Piney.  But years ago they relinquished those water rights, so there's really no reason for them to own the land up at Piney Lake anymore.  

Now Denver Water is experiencing issues of their own.  Coming off what might be the worse water year ever experienced in Colorado, they are trying to get their customers to use 20% less water than usual.  They've written $30,000 in fines and over 2,000 warnings to their end users trying to encourage compliance.  But although Denver Water is a utility, its also a business and its business is selling water.  If you reduce the amount of product you sell by 20%, then you're making 20% less revenue.  They're trying to reduce costs and look for other sources of revenue, including selling off some of  their real estate portfolio. So why not that incredible piece of property they own in Eagle County?  To facilitate a sale, they elected not renew the lease to the private concessionaires who've been running Piney River Lake for well over twenty years. 

There is hope that some public or quasi-public entity like Eagle County or the Eagle Valley Land Trust might step up to purchase the land, so people can once again access the lake and its surroundings. Denver Water has indicated that they're open to this idea. The next main step is determining what this singular property is worth. The Land Trust sent an appraiser up there to try and determine a figure, but that isn't going to be easy.  When a house goes up of sale, its price is determined in part by what other comparable properties have sold for.  But Piney Lake is unique, there truly is no comparable place to it in the world. Houses in Vail or Beaver Creek sitting on half acre parcels sell for tens of millions of dollars, so how much would many acres situated in paradise sell for? What's to prevent some hedge fund billionaire or tech bro from just writing an enormous check no matter what some appraiser thinks, putting up a big fence with cameras, and keeping it all to themselves? And wouldn't Denver Water be obligated to take the highest offer? Another big variable is road to the lake itself.  Its pretty lousy, and not accessible in the winter.  But if the property appraises at twelve million dollars, and someone comes along and offers fifty, then that buyer could probably afford to pay for the road to get graded on their own dime, and not the Forest Service's. 

But whether or not that eventually happens, the business as its been known and loved for years is gone and is not coming back.  I count myself among those who will really miss it. For about fifteen years, I've been going to Piney once a month driving a bobtail truck and filling the four 1,000 gallon tanks there. Piney is off the grid, and everything is run off a large pair of generators.  I typically spend about an hour filling the tanks, then another hour or two fishing either above or below the lake. When it comes time to leave, I always hate doing so because its such a beautiful and inspiring place.  I've always wanted to spend the night up there, either in one of their cabins, outfitter tents, or just camping. But summers are a busy time for me, working seven days a week running river shuttles, doing float trips on the Colorado River, or delivering propane.  But when I found out it was closing, and that the last Sunday in September would not only be their closing day for the season but maybe forever, I knew that I had to get up there one last time to spend the night.  

So on the last Saturday in September, after running river shuttles I packed my little one man pontoon boat into the back of my 4Runner and headed up to Piney Lake. I made much better time getting there than I usually do in my propane truck, and arrived in time before dark to get my boat inflated and fly rod rigged. There was one last wedding being held there that night, so I avoided the wedding guests and kept to myself. There was a nice wooded spot near the lake's outlet that I parked my truck at, from which I could carry my boat to the lake from.  

Just before dark I rowed out onto the lake and drank in the magnificent scene.  The aspen-covered slopes curving up the rocky peaks were draped in peak fall color, brilliant yellows contrasting to the deep blue sky and even bluer water.  I loved being in my pontoon boat, it felt far more comfortable and safer than the canoe I once borrowed from them to access the lake from.  I have an aluminum canoe of my own, but have never been an avid canoeist.  Once on a Cape Cod pond my French-Canadian girlfriend crawled back to my end of the canoe to get some loving and the whole thing tipped over, sending us and all our stuff into the water.  I've never really trusted canoes since.  My pontoon boat is much more stable and comfortable. 

The lake had a lot more aquatic growth in it than normal, something that practically every body of water in Colorado has experienced in this all-time warmest summer.  On my first trip to the Piney in June, I ended up not fishing because even then, the river was too low and choked with green weeds.  I attempted to float a couple dry flies over some brookies, but as soon as one of the flies would go under it would snag green snot which required removal.  There weren't many deep pools left for the fish to find refuge in, so I'm sure they were stressed already without getting a sharp hook in their mouth as well.  So I gave up pretty quickly and was glad that I had the opportunity in the past to fish this scenic piece of water. 

Once I got out onto the lake, there were weeds even there that went way out almost to the middle, but there was an open path where the small amount of current kept the growth at bay.  In that clear water I could see rising fish, so I rowed through the weeds to keep them unspooked.  Putting my pontoon boat a rod's length from the clear water, I readied my three weight dry fly rod.  Not only did the weeds keep my boat from creating waves, it also prevented the occasional light breeze from moving the boat around.  Perfect. 

On my second cast I fooled a trout but missed it. I missed a couple more before my little barbless hook finally caught some mouth, and I pulled a fine little brown into my net.  I was still relatively close to the ranch, and didn't want to photo bomb anyone's wedding picture, so then I rowed as far as I could to the other side of the lake, looking for the inlet which is where I was going to fish next.  Rowing an eight foot long boat is a dream compared to the usual heavy sixteen footers I'm used to.  Its very light and maneuverable and takes almost no effort at all. There are a pair of footrests like stirrups to keep your feet out of the water, but by slumping down in my seat and supporting my calves with them, I can almost completely lay down in it. 

At the farthest corner of the lake I saw a dark shape that didn't quite fit in, so I rowed over to take a closer look.  It was almost completely dark and I didn't see what it was until I got closer. It turned out to be a moose, and as I sat there motionless in the water two more moose emerged from the shadows to join it slurping weeds out of water.  One them looked in my direction and kind of snorted, but I wasn't too worried that he might swim faster than I could row that agile pontoon boat. 

By now it was fully dark, though it wouldn't be for long.  There was going to be a full moon that night, and soon a big moon as orange as a pumpkin appeared over the hill.  An already spectacular scene somehow got even better.  I had a surprise in store for the employees a little later, and looked for the best spot from which to initiate my plan. With me I had two very large fireworks shells purchased in Wyoming that are definitely not supposed to be used in Colorado. We've been sitting on them for years.  Back in the day, we and the neighbors would set them off on the Fourth of July over the river, but for the last few summers its been too dry to do it.  So our fireworks celebration has been on New Year's Eve for the last few winters, but last season it was too dry even then, with no snow on the ground. 

But I wanted to give the employees and wedding guests something to remember on this last night of business.  I found a spot across from the lake where I could aim the firework tube out over the middle towards the ranch.  It was still too early to do it, for the employees didn't finish until 10pm. They were notified to expect a special show at 10:15pm.

Until then, I had some time to kill.  I rowed my boat back and forth across the lake in the brilliant moonlight, enjoying myself in that water as much as I've ever enjoyed rowing anything in my life.  It was just wonderful. There's big beaver lodge over on the west side, and sure enough once I got close to it a couple of V wakes appeared as a pair of beavers swam around me in circles. Meanwhile the post-wedding dance had begun, and the music boomed across the lake.  For a while I didn't mind it, but the music wasn't all that great at times.  Some of it really didn't fit in with the setting very well. Really no music at all would have been perfect, but being a freeloader and not in the process of spending thousands of dollars at the ranch I couldn't really complain. So I brought out my secret weapon - some earbuds and put my own music on to drown out the racket.  This was better, I mostly listened to some spacy Pink Floyd just loud enough to keep  the ranch music from seeping in.  It fit the moon-drenched setting much better. The night was so clear, that even with the moon as bright as it was, there were still a thousand stars to be seen as well as the Milky Way. I had long given up on doing any fishing, and was just enjoying my unique view.  The lake had no wind at all, and if I didn't move the surface would soon turn into a dark reflective mirror.  No one moon but two, as well as two Gore Ranges, and two sets of Piney Ranch party lights.

At some point I switched to some Joy Division, and began playing a very bouncy tune called "Digital".  The next thing I knew, I was rocking back and forth in my little boat, basically dancing like crazy from the waist up.  The pontoons have a pretty curved rocker to them, and soon I was bouncing up and down, sending waves from where I was outward to every corner of the otherwise-still lake. I even got my oars into it, pulling and pushing into the lake with vigor.  It was great.  I can only imagine with the moose and beavers must have thought of it.

Occasionally I glanced down at my watch, checking the time.  When I first gave up fishing it was only around 8pm, and I wondered how I was going spend the next couple of hours. Turned out, the next couple of hours went by in what felt like a few minutes.  Time both sped up and stood still.  At 10pm, I began rowing from the middle of the lake to its eastern shore, where a tube holding a Wyoming artillery shell was braced against the bank. It was aimed upwards and towards the Piney River Lake Ranch, currently hosting the Last Wedding of many hundreds.  Beautiful and sad all at the same time. Is that what poignant means? 

I beached the boat and made my way to the tube, which was locked and loaded with the first of two shells. There were three sources of ignition in my various pockets, so I was ready. Earlier I had informed a couple of people of what would happen at 10:15pm, and hoped that the word would spread from that seed. At 10:14pm, I squatted beside the tube ready to light a butane fire starter, and ...nothing.  I tried multiple times but just a pathetic tiny dot of blue flame appeared.  Time for Plan B. I grabbed a Bic lighter from my wader pocket, leaned over to light it with that, and that wouldn't work, either.  My last hope was a third Bic lighter back in my boat, so I ran back to that and got it out of my fishing bag.  Back at the tube, I tried to light it, and it wouldn't produce much of a flame either, but it did make just enough of a blue light to give me hope. The night had gotten quite cool, and being right beside the lake it was damp, too. I lit that Bic several times right next to the wick and finally, a small shower of sparks began hissing from the fuse's tip.  I backed up, and could hear some whoops from across the lake. Apparently the sparks were visible from there. The Piney River Ranch looked like a small ocean liner from where I stood, reflected on the mirror-like surface.  

 

The artillery shell shot up, and created a huge white snowflake of sparks two hundred feet in the air and a hundred feet in diameter. It was accompanied with some loud crackling noises, then followed by a huge booming echo that probably rattled windows in Vail ten miles away.  I had aimed the tube so that the shell would arc towards the ranch and give everyone a good look. There were more distant cheers from across the lake as I hurriedly readied its sequel.  The second one went up and was more colorful than the first, though it didn't echo so loudly. That also illicited more happy shouts, and with that my work was done.  The Piney River Ranch might be closing, but it was going out with a bang. Or two. 

After that,I got back in my pontoon boat, and rowed around out there until midnight. It was an almost cloudless and windless night, and I couldn't imagine being anywhere else in the world.  I did a lap around the lake, rowing up the Piney as far as I could, skirting the beaver lodge again, and revisiting the spot where the moose were. Once the crowds petered out, I rowed over the ranch's dock. My feet were starting to get cold and I saw that some of the people were still up an sitting around a campfire.  It was the wedding party, including the bride and groom.  Most of the people there had seen the display, which I was glad for. I was still suffering from a persistent sore throat, and didn't want to infect anyone else, so I only stayed a couple of minutes. After absorbing some heat, I got back into my boat to row off into the moonlight.  

Back out into the middle of the lake, I slumped down in my seat and got supremely comfortable. I could make the boat slowly spin with just the barest flick of my wrist, and did just that, going round and round taking in my surroundings.  It was like being in a magnificent black and white Ansel Adams photograph, combining his moonrise and Yosemite work. But then I noticed that I was beginning to nod off a little, and realized it was time to head back to the warm comfy bed I had waiting for me in the back of my 4Runner. Whatever thermal benefit I'd gotten from the fire had long worn off. My cold feet were the only things keeping me awake enough to not slip into the lake.  I had a PFD and waders on and I wouldn't drown, but it still wasn't something I wanted to try. 

The next morning I got up and made a pile of eggs for breakfast.  I noticed a lot of activity, and all morning long people kept coming in to be a part of the Piney River Ranch's Last Day. It would have been nice to be more a part of the ... celebration? wake?, but whenever I tried to speak it just made me cough, so I stayed away. I did go back out on the lake though, and it was even prettier than it had been the night before. There was this giant slash of yellow streaking up the side of the mountains, with the aspens at the peak of their color.  I caught a couple of fish, and missed a few more, but ended up putting the rod aside to store as many mental images of this place into my brain's Read Only Memory for future retrieval. 

There was live band, playing original music and some covers.  I rowed over closer for listen, and the next song they played was "Take Me Home Country Road" by John Denver.  This is a great song, and his most played tune on streaming services, but I was kinda hoping for Rocky Mountain High.  Given the setting, it seemed like a no brainer.  Had there ever been a more appropriate setting for that song that where we all were right now, saying goodbye to place we all loved so dearly? A place we were all celebrating in our own way, as well as saying goodbye to? 

After a few more announcements, and a couple of songs, they did play Rocky Mountain High. The first lyric always gets me, "He was born the summer of his twenty-seventh year, coming home to a place he'd never been before".  It describes Denver's personal journey but also mine, though I was twenty-five when I moved to Colorado and "came home" forty years ago. It made me so happy and sad at the same time to be in the middle of Piney Lake for the last time that I noticed tears streaming down my cheeks. They were caused by happiness and sadness and they blended together on my face the way those emotions were mixing in my heart. 

Eventually the music and speeches stopped, and the crowds at the ranch began to thin.  I reluctantly rowed back to my truck and broke down my little boat.  In the distance I could occasionally hear a voice over a P.A. drifting my way in the breeze.  They were auctioning off items from the ranch, for almost everything not nailed down was being sold off. I would like to have been a part of that, but being there would mean talking, and talking would mean coughing.  After packing everything up I drove a little closer, and saw people leaving the ranch with odd items that had been up on the walls being carried off to their cars. This drove home the point that it  was really happening, Piney River Ranch was going away, one piece at a time.  I stopped in just long enough to say goodbye to the wonderful Australian ladies who'd been running the place for as long as I'd been going up there. I kept my distance, but before I could leave the manager asked one of her employees to get something from the office.  She came out with a T shirt bearing the message, "GOAT - Piney River Ranch Crew '26 - One Hell Of A Ride - 1989 -2026". The shirts were made for the people who had worked there that last summer, and getting one made me feel like an honorary member of that august body.

What the future hold for Piney Lake is anyone guess.  I really hope that it will live on in some way, and not become the private playground of some wealthy one percenter.  I've made many small memories up there for myself, hope that others will be able to as well. But until then, I'll never forget sitting out in the middle of the lake under a full moon surrounded by one of Colorado's most spectacular landscapes. Its a special place that everyone should be able to experience at least once. 

Jack Bombardier

October 2026

On TikTok as JackBombardier 

This is what I wrote about fishing at Piney a few years ago..

https://jackbombardier.blogspot.com/2023/10/pining-for-piney.htm

Mid-Summer Report, or Too Low, Too Warm, Too Dirty

To All,

 

We're more than halfway through the summer of 2026, and after a pretty boring start things have finally gotten interesting, (in a Chinese curse sort of way).  

  During the first part of the rafting season, the Lower Upper Colorado River was too low to float a boat down. This was due to the second lousy snow year in a row, and water providers not wanting to release a drop more of water than legally obligated to. I've been living beside the river for over twenty years, and have only seen it go as low as 400 cfs once.  This spring, it got below that several times, and I saw rocks in the river that I never knew existed. 

Below Pinball at those levels, I couldn't get my big cataraft through. I was able salvage a couple of trips by making them half days, and just going from Derby Junction and taking out at Pinball.  It was a little frustrating to deal with knowing that there was water being held back upriver in various reservoirs. But this is one of the things that make this stretch of the Colorado River so special - it lies above the demands made by the Shoshone hydro plant, the Grand Valley, and other irrigators. But it's also below the many buckets holding the precious liquid above.  When water gets sent down the river, it has to flow right past my backyard to get to wherever its going.

The second most senior water right controlling the river's flow is the Shoshone call, which is for 1,250 cfs at Dotsero and dates back to 1905. 

(The oldest is the Cameo call, which is for the Grand Valley ditch downstream). This trumps every water right held by the Front Range. But the Shoshone call is also satisfied by the Eagle River, which due to minimal storage upriver had a fairly normal looking annual hydrograph. The flows of the Eagle look much like they would have been before the era of dam building.  It does have Homestake Reservoir on it to capture flows from the Sawatch mountains, but most of that water goes to Colorado Springs. The Eagle can get very high in the spring, but very low in the summer. By contrast, all of the reservoirs on the Colorado River have the effect of smoothing that hydrograph out.  We may not get the high spring flows we should, but come July and August when the water finally gets released it gives us a navigable river when every other river in the state becomes too low for boating.  Those reservoirs are what created the outstanding trout fishery we enjoy today, even when factoring in the amount of water getting sent east to the Front Range. 

This year the Eagle peaked early, and held up well for awhile. As a result, the Colorado River remained lower than usual since the Shoshone number was satisfied by the Eagle. The low water in the Colorado made it warmer than usual for late spring, and also promoted the growth of algae and river grasses.  This effect is something we're still dealing with even as the Colorado's level rose when the Eagle dropped. Waterways getting choked by algae and grass is something I've been seeing all over, even at higher altitudes where it's usually not an issue. Last week I was up at Piney Lake for my monthly trip, and the creek below the lake was too low and choked with bright green algae to even fish.  Its something I've never seen up there before. There are also some private ponds that I get to see while doing propane deliveries, and they look the same way.  Usually during warm summers when the rivers get too warm for fishing, anglers can find places to do it at higher elevations. But this year, even those refuges are experiencing their own challenges. Today I spent an hour in the river ripping out river grass by hand, which isn't the worst job to do when its almost a hundred degrees out.  I've got to remove it before the ice forms this winter, or it ruins it for ice skating later. I jump into the river at least once a day anyway, especially after an afternoon of driving a non-air conditioned propane truck.  After all, if the Colorado River is your backyard, who needs air conditioning?

  After a relatively quiet spring, things got more interesting once the Colorado River came up and everyone started getting out on it. The first river mishap occurred on the Fourth of July, as some boaters running past the Red Dirt Bridge decided to go river left. Their raft got hung up and pinned against a rock near the lefthand pylon, and a couple of women went for an unplanned swim.  They ended up on a rocky shoal about a hundred feet from the bridge, and spent a long time there apparently waiting for the Coast Guard helicopter to come pluck them off.  Even though the level of the river between them and safety wasn't that deep, they remained there until the folks from Gypsum Fire showed up with their swiftwater gear and a pretty sweet little raft to pluck them off. Then the rescue crew went a step further, winching the raft up from the bridge deck and freeing it from the rock it was stuck on.  Well done! 

Then last week a friend of mine took his wooden dory down the left channel below Red Dirt, or tried to, and got stuck.  I spent most of that Friday afternoon crossing and re-crossing some really thick vegetation to attach ropes from his boat to his winch, all to no avail as the ropes kept breaking.  In the end, I had to go pick up his partner and yellow lab in a ducky because the dog refused to get into the river and rejoin us on the other side.  It was definitely the most waterphobic labrador I've ever seen. 

A week after that, we finally got the monsoon weather that everyone's been hoping for during this long, hot spring. On late Monday afternoon, a small intense storm cell that the canyon section is known for struck.  The dry wash at Jack Flats was temporarily not so dry, and a tremendous amount of wood got blown into the river. Along with that was a huge alluvial fan of dirt and large stones which now block half the river channel. The upside is that a really nice wave has been created by it, for all the water that used to span the river is now being squeezed into a much smaller channel.  I've been calling the new river feature the Jack Flats Wave, its so perfect it looks like it was engineered for a water park.  

Further down the river, Posey Creek (which is also normally dry) also blew out, and it also choked off half the historic river channel there as well. In addition to what came out of Posey, much of the wood that came down the river from Jack Flats got snagged by the debris field and the railroad bridge. What a mess it created. That night, I could see along the drive home that the river had turned bright red, not an unusual occurrence during our summer monsoons.  But what made this storm stand out was the incredible amount of woody debris in the river. In over twenty years of living next to the "Lower Upper" Colorado River I've never seen anything like it.  There was so much floating past my backyard that it looked as though I could walk across the river like everyone's favorite Jewish carpenter.  

 I drove up the River Road to see where it was all coming from.  At the Red Dirt Bridge, there was not only wood, rocks, and red mud spewing into the river, but a wooden bridge with a couple of ATVs attached to it was wedged between the two bridges.  One was upside down and submerged, and the other high and dry and looking like it was ready to go for a ride. Then I went further up the road, and noticed that above Jack Flats that the river was perfectly clear. So I hiked over to where I could get a better look at Jack Flats from the opposite hill, and it was almost unrecognizable. The eddy above it had even more floating wood than my backyard did.  

But the crazy thing was how fast the river cleaned itself out. In two days, it had cleared up pretty well and the river looked like a river again. Then on Thursday morning, on the drive up the road I noticed some Union Pacific service trucks near the bridge.  I stopped to see what they were doing, and noticed they were using grappling hooks attached to their winch to rip out some of the wood stacked up above the bridge pylon.  Below the road bridge, there were logs all scattered all over the river pinned to rocks, some of which were encroaching on the limited pathways through. The night before, that part of the river was clear. Now, there were numerous obstructions potentially creating issues for anyone in a boat. I pointed this out to the Union Pacific supervisor, and he didn't seem too worried about whatever problems they might be creating on the river.   After all, once the wood was away from the bridge it was no longer their problem. He told me that the river would come up, and lift the wood away.  I told him that this was true, but that it wouldn't happen until May 2028.  He raised his eyebrows at that, so I told him that we were at least two snowy winters away from having a decent runoff on the Colorado River again. Our water bank account is going to be dry by November, and it will take more than just one good winter to get it back into the black. 

A couple of days later, I attached some old tires to the front of my dory, and ran the river trying to knock as many pieces of wood out of harm's way I could. I wasn't very successful, but it was fun to float a river with some new features not seen before in any of my hundreds of previous runs. 

So now that the rains have finally come, and the river has gone from being too low to float, then too warm to fish, to now offcolor and dirty. Its begun to look like a lost summer, fishing-wise at least. There are some high mountain lakes still in play. Last week I fished on Rock Creek near Gore Pass, and the water was still cold and deep enough for trout there. I'm sure there are other places to fish, but one will have to be creative to find them!

  If you still want to fish from the comfort of a boat, there is a nearby lake I rowed yesterday that I really enjoyed. Stillwater fishing is not usually my jam, I strongly prefer the sights and sounds of moving water.  Presenting a fly to a rising fish with a nice cast and a better mend and a perfect drift is the heart and soul of fly fishing, at least to me. Stillwater fishing is just not as compelling.  But this lake is my personal favorite, and if going for a float on it in my dory sounds interesting to you, reach out and I'll tell you more. 

What we're experiencing now is almost exactly what I envisioned would unfold back when I was skiing in that gorgeous May weather back in March.  As nice as it was to be spring skiing in a light jacket that early, it was obvious we would have to pay for that. In March the snowpack disappeared faster than I'd ever seen it go, and I knew that only a very wet spring would save the river. Of course, we ended up with just the opposite. But even though this is what I thought would happen, seeing it all unfold is a reality that's hard to watch. 

Today was a brutally hot summer day, and to cool off I took my little 8' pontoon boat down the river from Pinball to my backyard.  It was so much fun riding the Jack Flats Wave, that after running it I carried my boat back up to the top and ran it again. It might be the most beautiful wave I've ever seen. On the TikTok video I posted of it I call the the Angelina Jolie of waves, and if you see it you'll know exactly what I mean. 

So although the summer doesn't look too promising for fishing, September is coming, along with cooler weather and cooler water. The ability of the river to heal itself never fails to amaze me.  Also the potential of this winter to deliver some meaningful snowfall looks very promising. Maybe if enough people keep imagining heavy snowfall we can collectively manifest that result. One good winter isn't going to dig us out of the hole we find ourselves in, but its where we start.  I'm looking forward to the big water we'll have to play in come May, 2028!

Jack Bombardier

Ps, if anyone wants to see videos of some of these things I've described I've put a lot of stuff up on TikTiok under my name.

Also believe it or not this email was going to be a lot longer, but I cut a big chunk out and will be sending some of that out soon under a different title

The Last Last Last Day

To All, 

Its May 17th, and the worst Colorado ski season in memory has finally ended.  Most people I know gave up on skiing weeks or even months ago, but shouldn't have. The last few weeks have actually been really nice, and the fact that people stopped showing up made it even nicer. Nothing like short to non-existent lift lines to make a good day even better.  

Closing days at ski areas are always a bittersweet affair, for enjoying something you love for one last time creates some mixed feelings.  There aren't many activities we do that come with a finite end date, so enjoying those last few blasts down the hill makes me sad and happy at the same time. Ski area closings usually happen progressively, not all at once. Locally, Arrowhead and Bachelor Gulch close first, then Beaver Creek, followed by Vail and Steamboat. Breckenridge and Copper come next, and A Basin is usually the last to close.  This year they all closed early, which reinforced the perception that the skiing was terrible, though the last few weeks of skiing were actually pretty good.  I went to Steamboat's final day, and they got thirteen inches of snow that last week. If you looked up at Mount Werner from town, the ski area looked bare. But the reality was that the upper mountain was terrific, and the skiing was great. Since there was no snow on the lower part of the mountain, getting off the hill involved taking the gondola down the hill which felt a little strange.  It was worth it though. Although we didn't get any huge dumps of snow, there were other pretty good days and I was able to time my trips there to be there when they happened.  

 On the Thursday before Steamboat closed, I ran up there to ski on my birthday.  It has snowed the day before, and I was looking forward to getting into some of it. On the way up to the top of the mountain riding the Wild Blue gondola, things didn't look too promising at the bottom of the hill. But then halfway up, things changed. The world became white again, the transition from spring to winter was almost instantaneous. The skiing was great that day, and I was able to ski amongst the aspen trees for one of the only times all year. But it was a very windy day, and as the wind blew harder the Sunshine Express lift was closed for safety. At the end of the day it was necessary to download to the bottom on the Wild Blue gondola, since there was no snow down there. There was a bit of a line to get on, and I ended up sharing the gondola with two women, and a family foursome. The Wild Blue opened last year, and is one of the longest gondolas in the world, going from the bottom of Mount Werner to the top. As soon as it began its descent, it began to rock back and forth in the wind.  After some quick banter, everyone settled in for the ride.  Due to the wind,  the speed of the gondola was slowed waaay down, to maybe walking speed. As the gondola swayed back and forth, I thought about a detailed news report I had just watched that week. It was the fortieth anniversary of a tragic accident in Vail in which a cable broke, and a couple gondolas plummeted to the ground resulting in several fatalities.

  During an awkward silence, my inner wiseass awakened, perhaps feeling some birthday entitlement. I told my gondola partners about the Vail incident, and one of the women looked at me with lowered eyebrows and "thanked me for sharing".  There were a couple of chuckles, and then more silence as the gondola continued its ever so slow crawl down the hill, while swinging back and forth. After another silence, I added to no one in particular that the Vail gondolas fell 125 feet, and that they were travelling 60 mph when they hit the ground.  This time, just more lowered eyebrows from the woman, and a couple of nervous titters. After a half hour of the world's slowest gondola ride, we were almost to the bottom. The gondola was still pretty high, but the wind had finally eased up a little. The father of the family looked towards the bottom of the hill we were finally approaching, and said with some relief "Well looks like we finally made it!" My inner wiseass wasn't done however.  I heard myself say, "That's what one of the Vail survivors said just before the cable broke".  We were close enough to the bottom that everyone laughed, even Ms. Lowered Eyebrows.

In March I got to ski Aspen, and was initially disappointed by the conditions.  March should have the best snow of the year, but I wasn't used to seeing so much bare ground everywhere when it should have been ass deep powder. But then I thought about it and tried to put it in a different light.  What if it were May instead of March? If I were skiing those same conditions in May, I'd be ecstatic.  The problem wasn't the snow that I found myself on, it was the expectations I had for what March skiing should be like. So I managed my expectations, which I could control, and found myself enjoying the actual snow conditions under my feet, which I couldn't. By pretending it was May instead of March, I suddenly found myself enjoying a spectacular day of May skiing on Aspen mountain.  Since it was warm enough to feel like May, it wasn't that hard to do. It was wonderful May skiing, just in March. 

Like Steamboat, when Beaver Creek closed the following week the upper mountain skied well but the lower part was barely covered. I skied there a couple of weeks before they closing , and it was pretty good from top to bottom. But when I went back a few days later, I was shocked to see how much the snow had disappeared in such a short time. March is usually the snowiest month in Colorado, but this year it was the hottest and driest on record, and that really did a number on the snowpack. But the last day turned out pretty great.  I found a groomed run that everyone seemed to have missed, and just kept doing laps on it until everyone else discovered it, too. I didn't want the day to end, so I began thinking of doing the hike up to the Bald Spot, which is through a gate above the Cinch lift.  It had been years since I'd skied it, and it wasn't even sure if there was enough snow up there to do so. I knew that there was usually an end of season party in the pasture on the way to the Bald Spot, and hoped that I'd find someone else who might want to hike there as well. When I got to the pasture there were already about a hundred people there, some loud thumpy dance music blaring through some big speakers.  Meanwhile, some guys were building a ramp to jump off of, using their snowboards as a shovels. The pasture was sloped, and when the jump was finished some of them began walking up the hill. Then, one at a time they began skiing and riding down the hill to fly off the ramp they made. The first few didn't have much speed, but as the track became packed down they went faster and the jumps and tricks became better.  I couldn't find anyone going to the Bald Spot, and so, I walked up the hill and did a run and jump myself. No tricks on my part, just a boring jump off the ramp and clean landing.  Then a member of Ski Patrol showed up on a snowmobile, and I thought that would be the end of the party. But he was just there to announce that the mountain was closing for the season, and that Patrol was leaving, so we were on our own. He asked us all to be careful, and to please clean up after ourselves, and with that he turned the snow machine downhill and left.  

Then the party went into another gear.  This was a stage of the party I'd never stuck around long enough to see. People started disappearing into the woods, and emerging with dead branches. They began stacking them up just below the ramp, and when the pile was big enough someone set it on fire. At that point people began trudging up the hill again, and this time when they flew off the ramp they were going over the fire as well.  Most of them made it with room to spare, but one guy on a snowboard cut it a little close, possibly due to alcohol consumption.  Anyway, if he had he caught fire there would have been plenty of frozen water to put him out with at 11,500 feet. 

With the Beav closed my attention turned to Copper Mountain.  This is a mountain that I've really come to love and respect since I started skiing it again back in 2020.  It has a combination of high altitude and extensive snowmaking that makes a great place to ski during early and late season.  And the scenery is sublime, with some of the best views in Colorado and thats saying something. Sometimes I think that it might the last place people will be able to ski at in thirty years, given the warming and drying trends we've seen over the last twenty. Copper also previously announced an early closing date, but got creative and managed to squeeze out a few more weeks. Since the base areas seemed to be the weak point for most of the local ski hills, Copper took the snow from the tubing hill and moved it over to the base of the Superbee lift. Then they shaved the snow from the side of their halfpipe, and put it near Center Village to keep those lifts running. It was a brilliant move and it worked.

Their last weekend was a real lesson in how to run a ski resort.  This is when those bittersweet feelings first began to emerge, since A Basin was also planning to close on that coming Sunday. First, on the last Friday Copper was open they kept the lifts running until seven pm, something I've never seen a ski area do in my fifty years of skiing. In addition, for their last weekend they opened up the close-in parking lots and made them free, so there was no bus ride from the more distant parking lot needed.  On top of that, at 330pm they temporarily closed the upper lift so that they could send a squadron of snowcats up to groom Copperopolis, a wide blue run.  When they restarted the lift at 5pm, we were welcomed to the sight of a wide, perfect swath of corduroy. There was a beautiful sunset that evening, and many of us on the slope took our sweet time getting down the hill. For me, since it would be my last run of the year,  I was in no hurry for it to be over. It was sad to be packing up my ski gear for the last time, but I was consoled by the fact that it was such a great day to end the season on. I had begun skiing at eleven am, and skied until almost eight pm, and was pretty worn out but in a good way. 

Then on Monday came the announcement that A Basin was going to add another week.  This was great news, for I couldn't wait to get back on my skis. Even better, they got 20" of snow in the previous week days. So on Thursday night, I drove up there and dirtbagged it in the back of my 4Runner. On Friday morning I rolled out of my sleeping bag and into the lift line, and got to be one of the first people back on top of the mountain, with an endless expanse of fresh snow awaiting me.  The sun was out and I was as happy as I could ever remember being.  What followed was seven straight hours of non-stop laps down the mountainside.  It did get a little crowded, especially for the upper lift, but I realized that the lower one was being ignored, so I did run after run on that and was loving every turn I carved. When the final run was on tap, it occurred to me that sometimes at A Basin they can be a little slack as to when they stop loading the lift, and will go a wee bit past four pm.  So instead of taking my sweet time for my last run of the year, I pointed my skis straight downhill and went as fast as I could on very tired legs. That effort was rewarded though, for when I tore into the lift line at 404pm they let me back on.  I got to do one more Last Run, and this time I went as slowly as possible. It was a great way to finish a lousy year. 

But then, a miracle. On Monday I found out that A Basin was extending their season for one more weekend! On Thursday night I drove up there again, and once more spent the night in the back of my truck. After a burrito and some hot coffee, I was back near the front of the lift line and riding up the hill again.  This time fewer people seemed to have gotten the memo that they were back open, and the lift lines were very short all day. Although there wasn't any fresh snow that week, what snow they had held up well and it skied great.  The sky was a brilliant blue all day without a single cloud, and the snow softened up beautifully.  There was no lift line for the upper lift, so I did laps off that all day.

The small pond that forms near the summit each spring at A Basin was back, and its just not springtime at A Basin without a little pond skimming.  The first time I tried it many years ago I made it, but every time I've tried to do it since I've fallen short.  Its pretty humiliating to find yourself sinking into a frozen body of water in front of a hooting crowd of people, but for some reason I kept trying. On Friday that pond was a little smaller than normal, and a majority of the skiers and riders I saw doing it seemed to make it across. One person failed when another tried to do it at the same time, and when he reduced his speed to avoid the other skier he ended up in the drink. Another guy I watched from the chairlift didn't keep his tips up, and did a complete face plant into the icy water. So I waited until my last run to try it again, and secured my phone in my back so that if I went swimming too I could keep it dry. I waited until no one else was going, and began my run down to the pond.  One thing that I've learned from my many failures at pond skimming is that you need to go as fast as possible.  As I rocketed down the hill and approached the water, I noticed a guy waist deep in the middle of the water.  I yelled out a loud "Oh Shit!" and when the guy in the pond saw me heading his way, he began furiously paddling his way to the side.  This was my one shot, and I wasn't going to slow down or wait til next year to try again, so I was going for it whether he was in the way or not.  I hit the water with speed, kept my tips up, and shot across the water splashing the interloper in the process. (It turns out he was a Fail, and had gone back out into the water groping for his lost ski).

Mission accomplished, I was finally ready to call it a ski season.  And although its been a winter to remember for all the wrong reasons, at least it ended with three of the best days I've ever had on skis.  

Jack Bombardier

PS - I love Tik Tok. That seems to make me a minority amongst my fellow 65 year olds, but sorry I think Tik Tok is great.  The only other person I know who enjoys it is the young woman I met a few years ago while she walked from the headwaters of the Colorado River to the point where it disappears into the Sea of Cortez (her handle is "Nomad Diaries" if you would like to share her trip. This summer she paddled the length of the Green River). 

  Anyway a few weeks ago I started posting videos on Tik Tok myself.  I get to see lots of interesting things each day, whether it be scenery, wildlife or just interesting places in Colorado. Most of the videos are pretty short, so if you've got time to waste you can check them out at" Jack Bombardier" on Tik Tok. They're as plain as can be with no bells and whistles.  They are just little glimpses into mountain (and riparian) life

A Short Window To Fish?

 

To All,

Its been a bumpy ride this spring watching the Lower Upper Colorado rise and fall like a rollercoaster.  There have been some days when its been fishable, but they've been far and few between. After running at 400 cfs for awhile, (which is too low for me to get through Pinball cleanly), its inched back up to 500cfs. Living here beside the river for over twenty years, I thought I had a good feel for what the river would be doing next, but this spring has left me scratching my head. Its been more of a river to wade than float this year. 

However there is relief in sight. More water is scheduled to start being released later this week, just in time for Memorial Day weekend. I think that we may be entering a short window when the Colorado River might actually be worth fishing. That window may not stay open for long though.  We won't be seeing much of a runoff if any this year, and if things stay as warm as they have been, it won't take long for the water to warm up.  If that happens, we may be looking at voluntary fishing restrictions, and that could potentially last through summer. 

Even if that does happen, things should be sorted out by the fall, when the flows and fishing usually peak. But if you want to fish the Lower Upper Colorado River sooner than September, the next few weeks might be the best time to do it. Get out there while the getting is good!

Spring Sprang Sprung

To All,

It's Mother's Day 2026, in the middle of what has certainly been an interesting springtime in Colorado ("interesting" in a Chinese curse sort of way). After a winter in which we got only half our normal amount of snow, we're now seeing less than half the normal amount of water in our rivers. The Lower Upper Colorado River, flowing about twenty feet away from me as I write this, is currently at 468 cfs and dropping. That doesn't sound too bad, but for  context the mean average for May 10th is 2,200 cfs.  

Yesterday I drove along the Arkansas River to Salida, and things are the same down there. Flows are around 300 cfs, but it should be in runoff mode right now and much higher. The primary reservoir source for the Ark is Twin Lakes, but that's pretty low right now too. It doesn't appear as though it will fill either this year, which isn't good news for the normally bustling rafting businesses on the Arkansas.  There is a management agreement in place which is supposed to "guarantee" 700 cfs during the summer to keep those many rafts afloat, but if there's no water to supply it then that agreement might have well been written on water.  

  Driving through the heart of the state yesterday, I saw a lot of irrigation systems that didn't seem to be doing much. If there isn't water for the fields in May, what will July and August look like? The folks in Fruita that my wife has been buying hay from twice a year don't have any to sell this year.  She thought that she had lined some up to come from someone in Laramie she found on Craigslist, and paid them a $700 deposit using Venmo to pay for their diesel. But when they didn't show up yesterday, and she did a little more research, she realized that was a scam.  They've taken money from others using the same tactic. Now we're scrambling to find some food for our livestock, and we're not the only ones.  It wasn't very nice getting ripped off on top of everything else. I can't understand how some people sleep at night, I assume it must take a lot of alcohol or pharmaceuticals.

At this point the low flows aren't posing an issue for the fish, yet.  The cold water coming out of the bottom of dams is keeping the water temps from getting too high, but that probably won't last.  Its already risen to 65F about a month early. In every low water year we've had, water temps have spiked and in some years there have been voluntary fishing closures to protect the fish.  Unless we get a drastic shift in our weather, that will happen again this year.  

Then there are the fluctuations the river has been going through.  Typically, once the ice melts off the river in late March, the water stays low and clear until the snowpack begins to melt.  It usually peaks in June, and then drops back down to some stable flow.  With several reservoirs upriver on the Colorado or its tributaries, that peak flow gets smoothed out, but that water which is held back in May and June gets released in July and August.  Its the management regime which is what created the fine trout fishery we enjoy today. But this year that steady rise hasn't happened, or rather its already happened a few times, followed by a big drop.  The normal hydrograph profile that should look like Volkswagen Beetle looks more like the roller coaster at Elitches.  

In the twenty plus years I've lived beside river, I've never seen the flows bounce around like this before.  I'm hoping that the low water not being released now will be coming down the river later this summer when it will be more critical.  

The one bright spot this spring was the skiing, oddly enough.  It may have been one of the worse snowpacks ever recorded, but there were some good days to be on the hill if you were able to time your visit right.  And though the season ended earlier than usual, conditions were pretty good at most ski resorts when they did pull the plug.  Steamboat got thirteen inches towards the end of its last week.  The upper mountain skied well, but there wasn't a snowflake to be found down below. Getting off the mountain at the end of the day involved taking a gondola downhill, an odd sensation. On Beaver Creek's final day, most of the mountain was pretty well covered though it was getting thin at the bottom. It could have stayed open longer, but it would have involved a downhill lift ride a la Steamboat. Closing Day came two weeks earlier than planned, which doesn't seem like a big difference. But the Beav usually closes not because of the conditions on the ground, but due to Forest Service permits and elk migration. It often has excellent snow on Closing Day. 

 Then there is Copper Mountain.  Copper did a better job of extending its season than any other ski area I'm familiar with. First, they managed to stay open almost as long as originally intended when the season started.  There initially was an early closing planned, but they did a great job of moving snow around at the bottom of the mountain to keep access to the lifts open. The snow from the tubing hill ended up near the bottom of the Superbee lift. They scraped snow off the side of their huge half pipe to keep things white at the Center Village.  On the Friday of their last weekend, they kept the lifts running until seven pm. This is something I've never seen a ski area ever do.  They also waived paid parking for the last weekend, so you could walk to a lift without having to take a bus.  The other unusual thing Copper did was to groom the run Copperopolis at four pm, and so when the lift that served that run reopened at five it yielded access to huge swath of fresh corduroy.  A Basin got into things by extending its season an extra week as well.  Twenty inches of snow fell during its last week, so when the lifts reopened on Friday morning for its last weekend, I was one of the first people in line.  It was a wonderful last day to ski, with lots of fresh snow and sunshine. The end of the season may have come too early, but at least it was a positive way to go out.  

So now at roughly the midpoint of springtime, the coming summer looks like it will be a challenging one on many levels.  What gives me some hope for the Colorado River is that although the reservoirs upstream are only half full, there are several of them.  The "Lower Upper" sits in the sweet spot below the supply, but above the demand.  There is enough water to keep us going this summer, so long as its released when its most needed and not too much of it flows east instead.  

There is supposed to be something called a "Super El Nino" forming in the Pacific Ocean, which may or may not result in a wetter weather pattern this summer, fall and winter.  The snowpack numbers for the last twenty five years have shown a steady decline, but every few years there's an outlier year where the snowpack looks great. We are due for a year like that, so I'll be doing a snow dance in October!

Jack Bombardier

Winter Without Winter

                         Winter Without Winter

Its the first day of 2026, and I keep looking up into the sky hoping to see some snowflakes.  Sometime this afternoon its supposed to snow or rain a bit, depending on the temperature. There are thick dark clouds above, but so far they've yielded nothing.  Unless you've just emerged from a coma, you're undoubtedly aware that this has been a very warm and dry winter in the Rockies.  For most of it, a large high pressure system has been sitting over Colorado driving all of the moisture and colder weather north. For a Winter Guy like me who spends his summers dreaming of ice skating on the Colorado River, or carving through deep powder snow through aspen glades, its been a disappointing start to the season. 

The numbers from across the state are sobering. The snowpack is about 50% of average depending on what watershed you look at, though it feels like even less.  Most of the ski areas in the central mountains only have 20% of their possible terrain open.  Without man-made snow it would be worse than that.  Hovering over those realities are the thought of what next summer's water supply will look like. Here along the "Lower Upper" Colorado River, we should be in better shape than most, given the number of reservoirs we have upstream. Of course that will only be helpful if there's water in the reservoirs to release. Lake Powell might need to get propped up with water from the big federal reservoirs on the San Juan, Gunnison and Green rivers, which will not be great for people who recreate on them. After last year's underwhelming runoff, this is exactly what we didn't need this winter. 

Most years, the river in my backyard begins to freeze just after Thanksgiving, and by Christmas the ice is thick enough to skate on. That scenario began right on time this year, for it was cold on the Sunday night after Thanksgiving and I had to break river ice to get my boat out the day after.  Over the next few nights the ice slowly built up, but then the following week it got warm and it all melted away.  I ended up putting my boat back into the river, something that I'd never done before. On Christmas Day, I did a short float in my dory from my backyard down to Horse Creek.  It was a warm, beautiful day but my boat kissed a lot of rocks along the way.  It felt more like November or April than it did Christmas.  

Last night it was New Year's Eve, and for many years we've had the neighbors over for a bonfire, ice skating, and to shoot off industrial grade fireworks.  This was the first time we didn't do that in many years.  The ice is too thin for skating, and the ground too dry for fireworks. Maybe we'll do it in a week or two conditions permitting, but it was the most boring New Year's we've had in awhile.

Last week I did a propane delivery to Sylvan Lake State Park, and noticed that the lake was not only frozen over but safe enough so that there were a couple of ice fisherman on it.  I walked out onto it a little ways, and was surprised to see that the ice was pretty nice.  The day before I had been up near Sweetwater Lake, and there was still open water there. I got to thinking that maybe I'd have to come back with my skates.  

On Saturday night there was finally some snow in the forecast, with Steamboat predicted to get the most.  I began watching the live snow cam on top of the mountain, and was happy to see it coming down pretty heavily. Finally!  I decided to go there on Sunday, and maybe get into some real snow.  But then the next morning it occurred to me that it was still the Christmas holiday week, and that Sunday might be blacked out on my Ikon base pass.  I looked into it and saw that it was.  We finally had some snow and I couldn't get out into it. So instead, I grabbed my favorite dog and headed to Sylvan Lake.  When I stopped in at the visitor's center, I asked how much snow they'd gotten up at the lake and they said a few inches.  You should have been here yesterday, I was told.  The ice was in great shape before it snowed.  I was disappointed, but drove up there anyway.  When I got there, the lake was shining under a brilliant white blanket of fresh snow.  There were two ice fishermen, and a handful of people playing around in the snow near the lake's edge.  It seemed like more than two inches on the ground, but I walked down to the lake anyway with my dog Ronnie, an undersized black lab with an oversized heart.  

 

Out onto the lake's surface, I rubbed away the fine powder snow with my toe and found the ice underneath to be perfect.  It didn't seem all that deep either, so I went back to my truck and got my skates.  Once they were on, I found that I could move easily across the lake, the boots of my skates were just high enough to clear the powder, so it didn't slow me down at all.  And it was just deep enough that it gave Ronnie decent traction, as long as she didn't try to change direction or stop too quickly. I started making big strides to the far end of the lake, with Ronnie running happily alongside. It was a beautiful day, with  a cobalt blue sky and no wind other than what I was creating with my own forward motion.  After going out and back, I started doing laps around the lake just going round and round with my happy dog running at my snowy heels.  It might not have been quite the same thing as skiing a fine powder run, but the chemicals flooding my brain were the same. 

Ronnie started falling behind a bit, and I realized that she was getting a bit tired. So we went back to the truck for a little break, and I began to wish that I'd brought a snow shovel to clear off a spot.  Since I go up there regularly to deliver propane the rangers know me, and I was able to borrow a snow shovel from one of them.  I parked back down near the lake and let Ronnie have a nap, and set to work moving some snow. I laid out an area about a hundred feet long by fifty wide, and got after it.  It took me about two hours of labor to complete, and by the time I was done I was in just a long sleeve T shirt.   A little kid came over when I was about halfway through and helped, but I'm not sure how much snow he actually pushed.  He was with his family ice fishing, and it it was nice to get a little moral support at least.  By the time I was done, my feet were cold and I was too tired to actually break out my stick and puck and use the clean ice surface I had created. Hopefully others have this week. I let Ronnie out and we did some more laps around the lake, and when she began lagging behind again I knew it was time to go home.  It wasn't the day I was expecting to have when I woke up that morning, but it wasn't a bad way to spend it. 

That evening we had the coldest night of the year, and when I woke up on Monday the river ice had formed again, locking my boat back in.  After work that night I went out to check on it, and though the ice had melted a little during the afternoon, I knew if I didn't get it out then the boat would be stuck where it was until March.  So I tugged on my neoprene waders, and set to work.  It was a very bright evening under two-thirds of a full moon, and I started by stomping my way along the bank breaking the ice with my feet to sever its anchor to the riverbank.  Then I used a pickaxe to free the boat, and got in.  Initially I was only going to clear enough of a path to back my trailer in, but all of the broken ice just hung there, and I knew that if those chunks refroze it would make for a rough surface for skating. The more ice I chopped away, the more random pieces lingered around, and I realized that it was going to have to be all or nothing. So for the next two hours, I turned that Hog Island dory into an icebreaker, repeatedly ramming the ice, then using the oars to push the loosened ice chunks out in the current.  It was actually pretty hard work, and by the time it was done it felt like I'd be rowing my big cataraft all day in a windstorm.  But all of the ice was gone, and it could start to refreeze that night with a clean slate. And what a beautiful night to be out on the river!  Even with the moonlight for competition the stars and planets shown brightly, and though the temperature was in the teens the physical effort I was expending kept me warm.  I was tempted to float the mile downriver to my shop takeout, but then I remembered that it was locked in by ice, too. My arms and shoulders also reminded me that they'd supported me through sixty-four years of doing crazy stuff like shoveling snow off ponds and clearing ice from frozen rivers, and wouldn't the hot tub also be a nice place to watch the moon from? So that's how I enjoyed the rest of the evening instead.  

By the next morning, a new sheet of ice had reformed on the river, this time without my boat stuck in it. Three days later, and I'm still waiting for it to thicken up enough for me to get out on.  The last couple of nights its gotten below freezing but not by much.  The weather for next week looks like more of the same, unseasonably warm for January.  In this winter without winter, I'm beginning to wonder if it ever will freeze again. 

If it doesn't, I'm glad to know that I got to spend my life playing in water in both its frozen and unfrozen state. It does make me wonder if the little kids I see ripping down ski runs, or playing hockey outside will still get to experience that by the time they're my age.  I really hope so for their sake, and if reincarnation is an actual thing, for my own as well. 

  Jack Bombardier