The first dip was a bit late this year due to the cooler weather

Often around the May long weekend, I will take my first dip in the lake. That normally is the weekend that we begin cutting up trees that have fallen or died during the previous year to create firewood to warm the cabin in the fall and the hot tub throughout the year.
The split wood will dry out for the next year.
The exercise, sawdust, and dirt seems to cling to my body and the only solution is a quick dip in the lake. It is refreshing, breath taking and when exiting from the water leaves your body tingling all over. Dunking my head under the water now takes my breath away. When I was much younger we took great delight of diving into the lake with ice still under the dock.
This year, that first dip didn’t happen until May 31. I had been working on projects around the cabin and really needed a bath. We don’t have shower facilities and the only recourse was that dip in the lake. The gauges on the boat said the temperature was 50 degrees. The dip was quick.
Other members of the family resisted the temptation until this past weekend. By Sunday the temperature of the water in the bay had almost gotten to 60. They claimed the first swim of the year because they swam 10 strokes. They seemed really righteous by actually recording the first swim of the year.
It has been that kind of a year. When the flowering trees around Fort Frances hold off to the first week of June, you know the temperatures have been below normal. The blue berries were just flowering this past weekend. That will put the picking season off to the end of July.
I am caught in a dilemma with the blue berries. Last year by the end of June the plants seemed to be laden with berries, only for us to have one of the hottest July’s which dried the berries and whither on the stems. I want the heat of the summer to arrive, but I really don’t want to see another blue berry crop fail.
The next full moon is a week off and maybe that will cause a change in the weather. It will be followed by the Summer Equinox that same week. The signs are there for improved weather. All those summer activities of skiing, swimming, snorkeling can then begin.

–Jim Cumming,
Publisher