Over the weekend we finished up all of the deer hunting prep work done so today I decided to get on the water and give my coldwater gear a shakedown.  I must admit it was a great experience to paddle the waters that I grew up fishing on with my dad and uncle Jim.  What was really cool was covering distances in minutes that used to take much longer plodding along in a row boat.  

I put in at Memorial Park on the east side of Wausau in a back bay that was glazed with ice.  It was my first experience with paddling in ice water and it was interesting to feel and hear the ice breaking to the pressure of my bow.  Later as I cruised along my wake would run into the ice glaze along shore sending off the sounds of shuttering waves of crackling ice. 

I posted more photos and a video of the ice breaking on the Photo Gallery page.     

My Kokatat drysuit and thermals worked great.  If anything I was a bit too warm which is OK with me as I can simply adjust the layers I wear under the drysuit.  It was my first real experience at wearing pogies and found that I went from my hands being too warm inside and too cold outside.  The simple solution was to open up the velcro attachment closure a bit to ventilate them.  Overall it was a great day on the water and I'm feeling good about how everything is coming together.