M Bowlan 2004 click to enlarge
The day after. The Blizzard sure left a lot of snow! 75cm!

As usual, I laughed it off when earlier in the week, Rhonda, told me that we were going to get a "Hork'in" snow storm on Thursday. But as the day came, the info on the news said they were predicting a good one and to expect a good 30cm of snow! Not bad. 3:00am Wednesday, I was up for a minute and took a peek outside, not a flake, Huhh! Next thing I knew it was approx 9:30am when my friend and business partner Gary was calling to say that no one was coming to work today and that he was leaving now while he could still get home! I looked outside and couldn't see across the street, nor see where anything began or ended. It was a "Blizzard". Obviously school was cancelled and we all stayed home and found things to occupy our time for the day while the storm raged on. The boys thought it was great (me too!). Living only an eight minute walk from work, I can't remember in the last decade when I didn't go to work due to a storm. I would usually suit up, put my snowshoes on if I had to, and go! Later in the day the Provincal Government issued a "State of Emergency" for PEI. Around 9:00pm after dark, the snow had slowed down some, but the winds were whipping at times to 120kph. I was getting a little "cabin fever" and decided to trek out to see what was going on... I also took my hand saw with me. I could not get out the front or side doors as the snow had come up a number of feet and we could not open the screen doors out. The only way out was the sliding patio doors. There was an amazing amount of snow down, huge drifts and it was somewhat hard to see with the strong winds. I strapped on the snowshoes (a must) and walked around to take a few pictures, then checked to see how hard the snow drifts were. It had been over eight years since I had the right combination of time, enough snow and correct snow to build an Igloo... this was the time! (the reason for the hand saw). Three hours later I finished and took a self portrait before I came back inside to the warmth and dry and bed. And to our American friends, yes, we have Igloos, we just don't live in them (most of the time).

The next morning the sun was shining but the winds were still high and still no sign of any snowplows. The news had said that a total of 75cm was dumped on Charlottetown, 95cm in Halifax and approx 60cm in Moncton! Thousands of people were without power; ours stayed on :) . A great Maritime storm! It was one of the worst snow storms since the early 80's (I remember that one, three days!). Everything was closed down and nothing moving, it wasn't into later in the day that the snowplow came along and punched out a single lane on our street.

The boys were eager to get out and play, and check out their new Igloo. We spent a couple of hours outside playing, sitting and talking in the warmth of the Igloo, cleaning out around the car for the tractor and blower to come clean us out, shovel out the doors, talk to the neighbor and hear their news and just check out the SNOW!

We may have snow left in June? Now that's what I call "Winter"