Kuskokwim is soo close to break-up!

Jeff and I have the week of, and have been going down to the river the last couple of days to check out its progress.  Ice is moving in small and bigger pieces, but the tripod has not been tripped yet!  I'm hoping it'll wait until the time we chose so we'll win the raffle!

We were so close, but we ended up being off by about 2 hours!!!  Wow!

The river: May 24, 2013

I'm going to go get some pictures of the river. Be right back!

Ok so this is the river tonight:

 It's definitely looking more broken up.  The break-up is just above Upper Kalskag on the river. I looked at a map and guess maybe 50+ miles? No idea because the river is so curvy, but we've probably got a few more days.  We're looking at much warmer weather coming up this week.  It's supposed to be 59 degrees tomorrow and into the 60's next week so that will definitely speed things up!  It's crazy to think that it snowed less than two weeks ago!

 Here are some ducks on our lake!

 It's almost all the way thawed.  I'm enjoying the view, but I'm guessing the mosquitoes are going to be a nightmare!

Current state of the river

At this point, the river is looking pretty slushy. As of last weekend people were still driving on it on their snow machines.  I think they're crazy, but I hope they know better than I do.  One of my friends drove on the river a couple of weeks ago to go fishing and they had to wear life jackets just in case they hit a wet spot.  That's the point where I'd be thinking no.  I wasn't really even willing to drive on the ice road unless it was frozen pretty solid!

 Look at all those holes!

 Must have broken down.  Crappy spot to have to get to, although it was gone by the next night.

 The tripod!  Jeff and I bought tickets for the raffle for river break-up.  We chose a bunch of dates and times, including the 26th and the 28th.  That's only two and four days away; maybe we'll win!

 The water is rising quite a bit.  Right now, it's probably about 8 feet below this wall, but by the time the river breaks up, it'll be a foot or two below the wall.  Some parts of bethel (the low parts) tend to flood around that time of year, so I think it's pretty expected.