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Ice-Outing, Pier Planting, and Thumb Mashing

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April 20th through 26th, 2026

Last week started with a few hunks of ice separating Lucerne from ice-out. The separation didn't last long. This year, the ice was hurt by the sun and the warm, but wind was the primary perpetrator in opening Lucerne. During the afternoon on Monday, the remaining ice sheets were wind swept to the north where they broke up on the shore. The last sheet sailed into the shoreline during the early evening. The passing ice left behind a deeper lake. Lucerne is 12.5 inches deeper than it was just before ice-in. Currently, the water hazards at the NCC are good, golf ball thieving metaphors for the lake. Time, high-water, and traffic took its toll on the bridges over the hazards on 7 and 8. The one on 7 was rebuilt last week. It looks like the span on 8 will be upgraded soon. As the sun set on Monday, plans were made to put piers in sooner rather than later. We waited a day for the water to warm up a little. It took only about an hour and exactly one mashed thumb. Ta-da! Near the end of the week there was rain. Historically, the lake level rises until June 1st. This half an inch of rain should help continue that trend. After the rain, Lucerne got wickedly un-wavy. In a tragedy that could be related to the lack of boats or cold water, nobody skied. A few did canoe-up all that flattness. It was fun, but it wasn't the same as skiing it up. One of the last events of the week was floating in a small lift. Using two barrels strapped to the bottom of the thing makes the job easy, barely an inconvenience. It's important to be careful when detaching the floats. With the push of a release, there's about 100 lbs of potential energy that can be turned into 100lbs of fast moving kinetic trauma if an arm, leg, or face is in between a barrel and where it wants to go. Currently, there's no ice, plenty of water, and a few piers. If you did not get your pier, dock, or lift in yet, relax. There's gonna be some time before the water gets warm enough to comfortably dip toes. During the weekend, we did meet one brave soul that chose to briefly dip into the 50°F lake. He did not describe it as comfortable.<br><br><br>-Nemo's mashed thumb is almost at 100%.

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