I spent today helping arctic explorer Will Steger fill his ice house with lake ice. His homestead is off the grid, on the edge of the BWCA.
A whole crew of folks assembled to help cut, buck and stack these clear, over-sized ice cubes. We used a team of horses pulling a sleigh to haul the ice up from the lake to the ice house.
This is a brief video slideshow from today, with narration about this custom that hails from a bygone era.
Wow, this looks like both hard work and dangerous! (What keeps people from falling into the holes as you pull out the ice?)
Careful footing is a must! It helps that there are a lot of people pulling, so the chunks pull out relatively easily.