Digging Out

Digging out again in the Keweenaw today.
Current snow total = 181" or 15'1"!
Hope to have some more photos for you later today.  Meanwhile, here's Cocoa.  She had just smashed through the drift on the side of the garage to reach the gate when she heard Steve in the driveway!  She's standing on her back legs.  Notice the height of the drift next to her.  Steve keeps this path clear for her between storms, so this drift was created in the last 24 hours!

(NOTE:  Click on any photo within a post to enlarge the photo.)

Dinner is over.  Now, back to our story.  This storm wasn't our greatest in terms of inches, but it was a heavier snow than usual, and the strong winds made the drifting pretty extreme.  Steve used the snow blower on part of the driveway last night before church, so that helped him out a bit today.  Still, he had a big job ahead of him.  He trudged through a drift to get into the garage and saw this view out the back window of the garage.

Steve let Cocoa out of the backyard, and she sat at the driveway entrance guarding him while he worked.  The occasional pedestrian and Bruce, the mailman, greeted her warmly.  Bruce allows her to jump right up on him and gives her a big bear hug.  She got 2 treats from him today.  It took a while, but Steve got the path along the side of the garage and to the back door of the house cleared again.  This is Cocoa's winter dog run. 

Steve then tackled the driveway.  Shovel, snow blower, shovel, snow blower, shovel, snow blower. . . .  4 hours later, he threw in the towel, and said the rest of the snow could wait to be removed until tomorrow!  No, he wasn't discouraged, just in pain.  No regrets.  We still love it up here.  All is well in the Keweenaw!