Wednesday, 8:00 AM. 1 degree, wind WSW, calm but the flag in the park is fluttering. We got a little more snow last night and the barometer predicts more, but the sun has begun to shine.It is considerably warmer than yesterday at this time, and the cloud of condensation over the channel is light enough to see the Island. There is still no skim coat of ice on the water, but there is ice on the Island shoreline, and I can make out the ice down in the Chequamegon Bay proper. Everything looks very distant today, even if visibility is relatively good. Atmospheric conditions often drastically alter the perception of distance, particularly in the winter, I think it has something to do with the way light refracts in more northern (and extreme southern) latitudes. Byrd makes note of this in “Little America,” which I am reading, evidently making even travel on skis difficult at times in the Antarctic. Things very near seem distant, and distant objects close. He also notes the amazing colors and shadows of the frozen landscape and the skies, something which I comment on all the time even here in Bayfield, which after all is not the Arctic (although of late you could have fooled me). But we take heart, since Bayfield is “the banana belt of the Great Lakes,” as was touted by one enthusiastic 19th Century real estate developer, as is proven by the 20 degree rise in temperature this morning compared to yesterday.
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