At Lake Cranberry nearby the locals were holding a golf tornament on the ice, driving their trucks on the lake between holes. The temperature was now about minus 12 Celcius. The sheds were for ice fishing - some even had wood stoves inside.
As we got to Lake Placid we saw trucks and dog sleds going across the lake, unbelievably cold but not a lot of snow. The lack of snow is affecting business with a lot of the lower cross country ski routes closed. Some of the locals were saying that many businesses were likely to go under without an increase in snow and hence trade.
We're stopping for two nights here as we hoped to go skiing. This morning we woke to find the temperature had dropped further, so cold that some of the electronics on the car stopped working. Drove to the ski lifts to find that the higher slopes were all shut due to the temperature and only two lifts on the lower slopes were open. Despite being Sunday, very few people about, probably due to the temperature now being minus 23 Celcius at the top of the Gondola ski-lift, at Little Whiteface, and that was without the wind chill added!
Gave the skiing a miss, our clothing simply not up to that cold, but took the gondola to the top for a look anyway. The cold was incredibly intense, even more so in the wind. Carole's Buff froze solid! The gondola operator said the temperature was "brutal" at the top and warned of frost bite - he was not wrong.
At lower altitudes the cold was still intense but just bearable so we walked along a trail to some frozen waterfalls. These are about 60ft high.
There was also a log fire by the river for us to toast some marshmallows
Later in the afternoon we just got chance to go to the top of the ski jump slopes -
The view from the top.
Carole getting in to the zone..
I thought these guys were nutters until we went to the bobsleigh and luge runs and watched the USA team practising for the world cup that's here next week. They look fast on TV but close up the speed was just incedible.
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