The snow close to the cabin is getting very dirty.  Time to find a new water supply for bathing and laundry.

Here is my house from the pond below the deck.

A short distance upstream is a larger pond.  This time last year it was open, but there is not much sign of the ice going yet this year.

The ponds are man-made – or woman-made, rather – by the previous resident of the property.  Ginty Paul had them dammed for irrigation, but that was a quarter of a century ago and none of the ditches carry water now.  The creek has breached the dam underneath and it has made its own path through the marsh.  Already spring run-off is swelling the waters and early in the morning, when the snow is frozen hard, I take a couple of milk jugs over.

My pendulum tells me the water is not fit to drink, but using it for laundry and bathing saves quite a bit of hauling from the Nimpo Lake post office.

It is lovely to see and hear the gurgle of the creek after everything has been frozen for so long.