Winter-like conditions persisted through most of April here in the Northwoods of Wisconsin. We entered the month with a solid 20 inches of snow on the ground and the lake iced over from shore to shore. For the first week of the month there appeared to be no sign that winter was ready to release its grip on our region. We started the month with daytime highs that would get tantalizingly close to the freezing mark, but wouldn’t cross over the melting point, save for a couple delightful days when the mercury made it into the lower 40s. Unfortunately, those days were usually followed by a bit more snow and cold, so downward progress on the accumulated snowpack was fleeting at best. Finally on the 9th of the month we hit our first 50-degree day of the year and with above average temperatures forecast for that week to come, we were starting to think maybe the corner had been turned and old man winter was finally on his way out.
And what an epic swing in temperatures we had the week of the 9th through the 14th. We started with the first 50 of the year, as I just mentioned, and by Tuesday we hit 60 degrees. The snow depth started drop noticeably, and with a high point of 68 degrees on Wednesday and Thursday came another big drop in the snowpack. We even saw grass begin to emerge in areas with the littlest shade! Just as the warmth set in, the forecast called for three-to-six inches of snow over the coming weekend, but also kept us hoping that spring had finally shaken off the winter’s cold and snow with a forecast of nearly 75 degrees on Friday the 14th. With a bit of rain thrown in on Wednesday night the snow cover was quickly retreating and the sides of the trails I had maintained all winter to the wood shed and the back gate of my yard had gone from shoulder high at the start of the week, all the way down to ankle high by weeks end. And, just as we were hoping… the forecasted three-to-six inches of snow was wrong!
April 7th!
Unfortunately, it was wrong in the wrong way! It did snow, and boy did it snow! The storm started on Saturday night and the temperature plummeted from Friday’s 78-degree high to a high in the upper 20s through that weekend. We woke Monday morning to a fresh 12 inches of snow on the ground! My yard started the week with 20 inches of snow from edge to edge and melted down so nearly half of the grass was showing. Yet again, it was completely covered in 12-24 inches of snow! The following week saw temperatures well below average and with a persistent cloud cover until the 26th of the month it took the full week of the 17th -22nd to get rid of that 12 inches of new snow and return us to where we were on that glorious 73-degree day of Friday the 14th.
The silver lining in all of this persistent winter weather (and it has been a stretch to find one) is that I finally caught the ski bug and skied more in the month of April than I had done in any of the previous actual winter months. Usually, our ski season comes to a halt mid-March in this neck of the woods, so it was out of sheer novelty that I went for a ski through camp on Monday, April 3rd. It was before the first big melt-down, and conditions were mid-winter-good. Then on Sunday the 9th I thought I had better get out on camps trails one last time, figuring that with the ridiculous warmth forecast for the coming week it would be my last chance. Well, when our mid-April snow storm rolled through, I figured why not on Tuesday the 18th. How often can a guy say he has skied the camp trails that late in April? With the lower-than-average temps that followed that storm on Sunday the 23rd that kept the new snow on the ground, I figured that I might never get the opportunity again to say that I have skied camp on April 23rd so down the trail I went, because how often can a guy say he has skied the camp trails that late in April?!
Hoping that I will not have the opportunity to say I skied camp in May of 2023 (though, a small, sick part of me thinks that would be a sweet notch to put onto my skiers belt), it’s Caretaker Joe At Camp.
April 23rd!