Ice out should be declared in the next day or two. I was out all day yesterday. There was floating ice "floatillas" in the Broads and up to 5 mile island. Most floating ice was on eastern and southern shorelines first thing in the morning but the wind coming out of the south moved that ice "into play" as the day went on.
We felt very safe coming out of West Alton Marina with the protection of Ragged and Sleepers island. Even as we saw floating ice moving in from Ship island, we said "no way that effects our return trip". Well, sure enough that ice all went like a magnet to the mouth of the inlet for west alton marina. Fortunately both us and another crew in a bigger boat behind us, could SQUEEZE around the ice.
There were a few broken sheets of ice around 6 mile but the only organized ice we saw was on the Moultonboro side of The Hole in the Wall and the northeast side of Little Bear. We didn't even try navigating it but it looked solid enough that we think it will be there until late this week (even after ice out is declared).
Water temps varied from 36.3 around Rattlesnake to 39.4 behind more protected areas to the north. I'm pretty sure we could have made it to Black Cat but we were fishing and running out of time so we explored less.
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