After the Storm

After the storm ... we have a lot of snow, surprise surprise!  The temperature has warmed up to only about -15°C (which is a LOT warmer than -25°C), and the wind chill has subsided.  The roads are open and the plows are back out.  It was basically just a nice winter day out there today, but there was a lot of snow to clean up.

For the most part, the strong winds blew the snow out of the trees, leaving them bare, but in a few places it plastered the trees with white instead.

But I've never seen snowbanks this uniformly high, at least 3 or 4 feet, and approaching 5 or 6 in many places.  This is part of my morning walk with the dog who can no longer clamber over these piles easily as she likes to.

Closer to our place, the snow is over my head at the corner where the plow has pushed it up.  These aren't just narrow ridges either, because the plow tends to blast the snow back 10-15 feet from the road, so the snowbank my be 4 or 5 feet high and 15 feet wide.

 At least the stop sign at the corner still manages to stick up above the pile!

In town the piles of snow are much higher, due to the limited space, especially around small parking lots.  This is at the library, where I volunteered to help put in stakes to mark the gardens and trees so the plows could avoid them.  The stakes are 8' high, and when I first saw them I wondered why we needed these; I need my step ladder to pound them in.  Well, they're actually not tall enough - four of them are buried inside that pile of snow, which is over 10 feet high.

In confined spaces, the piles get higher; this one is nearly 15 feet, higher than the eaves of the store.  The photo is tinted because I forgot to roll down the window, and there's some snow on the outside of the window.

I couldn't resist adding this picture of a hedge in front of a home.  This is pretty typical of how Markdale, Ontario, looks at the moment.