Minnesota igloo

Use for trip reports and photo's for general non-climbing trips
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kealia
Posts:25
Joined:Tue Nov 11, 2008 8:26 pm
Minnesota igloo

Post by kealia » Fri Dec 26, 2008 1:20 pm

I don't know if you can really call this "camping", but i did build two igloos in my front yard, and my son and I spent the night in one of them! So, I guess you can call that camping. And we do live in the Midwest, (Minnesota).

After waiting for three weeks for snow, we received over two feet of the white stuff in less than ten days. We built our first igloo, an 8 footer, during a big blizzard. As experienced winter tent campers, we were amazed with the warmth in the igloo. Two bodies and two small candles brought the temperature right up into the 40's!

A couple of nights later we decided to test the theory, and spent the night in the 'gloo. The temps outside dropped to -22, but the two candles kept the 'gloo in the middle 30's.

A few observations; the warmth is incredible, the lack of sound is a little disturbing (even though we live in a small town, the sounds of cars and airplanes are always present. Not in the igloo), also, since everything is totally white, time has a way of disappearing.

Learning to make the blocks took us a few tries. Since the temperatures here have dropped into the negative numbers almost every night for the past three weeks (bottoming out at -34 last week), the snow takes some processing to make it stick. Recently we have had some high temps in the teens and twenties, and this has made a huge difference.

We continue to practice our technique and are planning an expedition to the Boundary Waters next month..

Mark in Minnesota

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Igloo Ed
Posts:336
Joined:Fri Feb 29, 2008 1:44 pm
Location:Lyons, Colorado
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Re: Minnesota igloo

Post by Igloo Ed » Sun Dec 28, 2008 7:20 pm

kealia wrote:A few observations; the warmth is incredible, the lack of sound is a little disturbing (even though we live in a small town, the sounds of cars and airplanes are always present. Not in the igloo), also, since everything is totally white, time has a way of disappearing.

Learning to make the blocks took us a few tries. Since the temperatures here have dropped into the negative numbers almost every night for the past three weeks (bottoming out at -34 last week), the snow takes some processing to make it stick. Recently we have had some high temps in the teens and twenties, and this has made a huge difference.
Mark in Minnesota
Glad to hear you figured out the feeling of packing that cold dry snow. I'm must have had an honest face when I told you it worked. :)
The quite is really something, it's the realm of the igloo. You can be on a mountain top or in a stubble field and it's all the same when your in the igloo.
We once built one on the golf course in Park City, UT and had trucks going by all night. At first they woke us up but then we figured it was deliveries to the ski area. But NO! It was the tow truck taking illegal cars from the ski area lots. Low and behold, ours was one of them. Sheesh.
A picture from my Christmas:
Image
Part of my igloo is visible on the lower left of the picture.

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