Arctic Volcanos

Looking much more like the arctic than Indiana, a walk on the Lake Michigan shore during winter offers some interesting ice formations one normally associates with seascapes of the North. As the wind stirs up Lake Michigan, the waves pound the shore and pile up the floating ice into cone-shaped mounds resembling volcanos. The physics is actually rather similar, at least when it comes to the construction of the cone. When the waves pound against the shore or other shelf ice, waves force water and ice chunks into the solid structure where they splash up and fall onto the shore in a pile. This happens over and over again until the pile forms a cone around the area where the ice and water is splashing vertically. The center often remains hollow, a tube that transports the ice and water to the surface. Volcano cones are formed in a similar way, but by hot lava and molten rock spraying up, not ice. 

Walking along the shore during the windy periods is something to experience as well. When hiking down the sand dunes onto the beach, almost all sounds disappear when you reach the area that is sheltered by row after row of ice mounds. You're basically walking in a hallway with ice mounds on one side, and sand dunes on the other. The only sounds are the muffled splashes of the distant waves continuing to build additional mounds.
   

Hiking down to Kintzele Ditch, some of the shelf ice is covered by frozen ponds formed by the always-flowing creek. These icy areas take on the look of ponds, and seem to mimic an arctic seascape where icebergs are scattered in the frozen waters - mounds among smooth ice. These features and forms of the ice are ever-changing, and worth a visit or two each winter.

Matthiessen's Ice Cave

 

One of the highlights of the winter season is the freezing of the waterfalls of Starved Rock and Matthiessen State Parks. While the amount of seasonal moisture certainly affects the size and shape of Starved Rock's icefalls, the icefalls of Matthiessen State Park are almost always fully formed regardless of  precipitation. I believe this is due to the fact that the creek feeding the falls is always flowing and not fully dependent on the snow melt or rain. This makes for great icefalls in the winter. 

One of our favorite areas of Matthiessen is the canyon beyond Cedar Point. To visit this area, one needs to cross the creek, and at times, this can be a challenge. Some years it's flowing knee deep, other years it's frozen solid, this year it was frozen but had quite a bit of "rotten" ice on top due to overflow. Overflow is when a body of water freezes over, but the level of the water later rises and overflows onto the top of the ice. New ice forms, but it's not stable, and walking on the ice can be a hazard if that overflow ice breaks- here we would only get our feet wet, so it's more of a nuisance.

Once across the stream, two waterfalls appear in the distance, and both usually freeze up with plenty of space behind them, creating ice caves. At just the right time, one can relatively easily get behind and explore. Wait too long into the season and the opening will be too small to climb through.

 

This year, we hit it at the right time. The ice was covering the overhang of the canyon forming a cave, the openings were accessible, and the floor of the cave was frozen and not filled with water. It's an experience to venture into these caves, the ice is so interesting when it's backlit. Without ice cleats, it would be quite difficult to access these caves, and at times, impossible to even access the icefalls because of the slippery approach.

 

The rock overhang that makes these ice caves possible, is almost six feet tall, so when the ice forms on the floor, there's a ceiling of about five feet in some places, on down to four feet. Still, it's quite easy to access if you don't mind a bit of squeezing and climbing. Getting out is sometimes sketchy, but this year, the opening on the left side of the cave was large enough to walk through. Some years only one side is large enough, and the right side requires traversing over round, icy rock - something that's more difficult leaving than entering.

The Ice Barrier

 

 

The period of cold, windy weather over the last few weeks provided the perfect conditions for the formation of shelf ice along the Lake Michigan shoreline. As the water freezes, the wind and waves push the ice chunks toward the shore where they pile up and freeze together with the water splashes an spray. Over time, the ice builds up higher and higher, and the mounds grow up and out, creating an arctic-like range of ice hills parallel to the shore.

   

Walking carefully along the beach (on solid ground not ice) looking at the formations of the mounds and the flat areas between them, one feels as if they're in the arctic instead of Indiana. Winter at the Indiana Dunes National Park is like nowhere else in the state, a treasure for certain.

 

The French Canyon Icefall

 

On our hike through Starved Rock State Park, we ventured down the icy steps toward French Canyon, a blind canyon with a cascading waterfall at the terminal end of the trial. 

The narrow passages are sometimes difficult to walk over in wet weather, but rather treacherous when iced over. Of all the places to visit at Starved Rock, this is the only one with signs warning of the dangerous icy conditions. Other canyons have steep drops and ledges which you'd think would be more dangerous, but this canyon can fool people because of it's innocent looking approach. So many people attempt to walk up the trail and either fall or give up. It's trails such as this that demand the use of ice cleats, and wearing them, one can simply walk up the icy approach with no concern. 

The waterfall in French Canyon does not freefall, it travels over the rock face and, in cold weather, the ice covers the entire surface, creating a beautiful ice staircase up the canyon wall. Of course at 45 feet high, it's too tall and too dangerous to use as a staircase, but because of this geography here, this waterfall almost always guarantees a beautiful formation of ice.

 

A few years back, a couple of trees fell into the creek, and ultimately into the canyon; these logs remain at the foot of the falls. The logs now act as a centerpiece on the canyon floor, adding some natural interest to the waterfall. 

On this visit to Starved Rock, French Canyon's frozen waterfall was the most impressive of all the canyons we visited. Perhaps this will change once the current snow melts and refreezes while falling down the other rockfaces.

LaSalle Canyon's Frozen Waterfall

Even though I love hot weather, and don't really like winter, I actually look forward to the frozen waterfalls of Northern Illinois, specifically the many frozen falls found in Starved Rock and Matthiessen State Parks. All I do is complain about the cold weather, but somehow, I have absolutely no problem being out in the freezing cold and wind when I am exploring these canyons and the Lake Michigan shore. It's as if the thought of what I may find overrides the physical extremes I endure. I honestly do not wear gloves when I'm out photographing (unless I'm carrying a tripod), and have no problem handling a camera in 15° Fahrenheit, or even in -5° Fahrenheit. I find it much more comfortable and efficient to place my hands in my coat pocket as I hike around, then handle the camera with my bare hands. So far, so good, no frostbite!

With the temperatures in Illinois dropping below 0° over the past few days, I figured the waterfalls of Starved Rock would be frozen and impressive. After heading out today, I found the falls to be moderately frozen. I suspect the dry Fall, and Winter so far starved the falls of runoff and snowmelt, preventing the falls from building up. Even though they were relatively small, they're always a thrill to explore and photograph.
   

The first canyon we visited was LaSalle - one of my favorites due to the fact that the ice usually forms a curtain across most of the rock overhang, and one can walk behind the frozen falls. This time, there was only a single column of ice to view. I imagine with the warming temperatures of the next week, the snow in the high ground of the park will begin to melt, and then freeze at night, adding to the size of the icefalls. I'll head back in a week or two!
   

As we arrived at the park, the clouds parted and the sun washed the canyon walls with warm light, providing a strong contrast to the frigid subjects of our exploration. It's amazing how warm the canyons can appear on such cold days; the rock walls are often covered in deep green mosses and bathed in yellow light. It's interesting how this sight can actually keep you from thinking about the cold.

We left LaSalle Canyon feeling a bit underwhelmed, but encouraged by the thoughts of what the other canyons may hold for us.

The Occultation of Mars

Not only was tonight's full moon a wolf moon, but it also took the opportunity to hide one of our neighbors - Mars. A relatively rare event called an occultation took place. Rare at least for individual areas on earth. Similar to an eclipse, the moon and Mars need to align to our perspective, so the moon passes in front of the planet, hiding it from view for about an hour. 

Today's occultation took place between 8:07 PM and 9:17 PM, where Mars disappeared at the bottom left of the moon, and reappeared at the top.

It was said you could watch with the unaided eye, but we didn't see anything until Mars was quite a distance from the moon, probably due to the glare. With a camera and 1100mm lens set up, it was visible and really quite red. 

 The series of images here were taken handheld, with no tripod. It's not unusual to capture images of the moon handheld; it's really quite bright. However, I would have been happier using my tripod, but it was 80 miles away. 

The image below shows Mars as it just peeks over the top of the moon.




This image shows Mars a few moments after it reappeared from behind the Moon.