YIKE! IKE!

BEFORE









AFTER









The lake giveth and the lake taketh away. It was the latter Sunday night. In spades!

The Weather Bug on the computer started chirping a warning in the afternoon...Hurricane Ike would be sweeping through the upstate NY area....possible gusts up to 55 mph...Sure enough, around 8pm the warm tropical breezes began. The moon was reflected in the water. It was actually pretty! Around 10pm stronger gusts set in and we got off the back porch and closed the windows. Midnight - a bit stronger...Pat moved our cars into the garage and we went to bed. At 430am my cousin Bonnie called. When Pat answered she asked him if we still had a boat. She explained that many people in their area a few miles from us had lost boats. So Pat went out to check and was totally shocked to see that we not only did not have our Boat - we also no longer had a 60 ft steel dock nor did we have a rail system! (We learned later that there was a 12 ft storm surge and winds were clocked just north of here at 90+ mph!). We waited til first light and took off trying to find the boat. Sadly we found it filled with water about 6 houses down the road. It was a total loss.Our neighbor said he saw it go by on it's side, window smashed and top ripped off followed by other boats and docks. Our dock which easily weighed a ton, had been split in two. One section was lodged on the rocks on the beach next to ours and the second half was visible by one of it's wheels - out in the lake. The heavy steel rail system had wrapped around our seawall at a 90 degree angle. The force of the water caused our jaws to drop. It was very sad to see the "Lee Marie" (named by previous owners) hauled out with the jaws of a bobcat and placed gingerly on a trailer, her sides split from the hull, and the hull caving like wet cardboard. We had 6 rides on her before she slept with the fishes and she will be missed. Luckily, the house stood firm and Pat, Max and Me are all fine.
The natives say they haven't seen anything like this storm. Just our luck!! When you come to visit next summer - BYOB. Yep, that's Bring Your Own Boat!