You guessed, didn’t you? Show of hands, please! How many of you guessed that yesterday’s outdoor adventure was the Winter Carnival 2009 at Michigan Technological University up in Houghton?
You probably didn’t know the theme this year: “A Frigid Place Gets a Blast from Space.” Yes, this is a frigid place. As for the blast from space, you will have to decide…..
Back in 1922 the carnival first started. Any of you alive back then may still recall the festivities. However it wasn’t until ’27 that events expanded to resemble today’s carnival. The students, fraternities and sororities begin building the snow statues weeks before (there are some constructed the night before, although these one-nighters don’t get dozens of photographers snapping pictures in most cases as they’re not as elaborate and magnificent).
We’ve lived here maybe 30 years and only really seriously examined the statues once or twice before. In my memory as of yesterday afternoon, we had never done it. However, my husband teased out a memory of at least one event years ago when we meandered among the statues, oohing and ahhhing. I guess I believe him.
Barry and I cut across campus near the library and attempted to view many of the statues. We never found the first place winner, unfortunately, so you can’t view that particular sculpture. It is amazing how the students craft these statues! I really have no idea how they technically do it (many of them are studying engineering) so let’s find some links. Here’s what Wikipedia says: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snow_sculpture or how about this Michigan Tech website: http://www.mtu.edu/carnival/index.php?
An errant thermometer announced it was 64 degrees mid-campus, but no one believed it, as the statues wouldn’t still be frozen in that heat. Instead it was probably in the 20’s. (I would LOVE to be sharing today’s temperature & story with you….it hit 40 degrees, hurray! but we’re still covering yesterday, so please be patient. Maybe tomorrow I’ll tell you about today and we’ll get caught up on outdoor adventures….)
After dinner, when the world darkened and the lights illuminated the statues, we tried to capture some evening images for you. Not very much luck. The statue we tried to spotlight featured no lights. We were tired and ready to head back to L’Anse. I was sipping a hazelnut latte and enjoying it mightily. However, we did discover a couple final shots. First, a group of students were playing broomball.
This is a tradition up at Tech, making it impossible to find good brooms during the winter at the hardware store. (although, come to think of it, maybe there’s MORE brooms than one would need….) The kids play this game sort of like hockey, except they wear no skates and sort of scurry around a rink attempting to knock a ball into a goal. I was too busy attempting to snap pictures to figure it out, so please return to Wikipedia to study up on the sport: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broomball
One last photo for the evening. It’s my favorite. I know, it’s a little weird. But I am learning to love photography and viewing things at strange angles. We parked our car up in a student lot and walked down snow steps behind a statue. There, behind an ice window, were two perfectly formed “ice hands”. We probably weren’t suppose to be behind there, as most of the statues are roped off. But no signs warned us away, so I crept close and snapped the following picture:
Waving at you! Thanks for coming along to Michigan Tech’s Winter Carnival with us!
11 comments
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February 6, 2009 at 7:41 pm
KD
The pictures turned out great! My favorite is the dune buggy.
February 8, 2009 at 12:18 pm
Thus always to empires « Torch Lake Views
[…] As empires fall, so do they rise. Daugherty Johnson told me he’s working on another sculpture up at Greensky Church, and said his cousin has created a bear. Want more? Take a look at the dune buggy on Kathy’s great post about the Michigan Tech Winter Festival. […]
February 8, 2009 at 3:15 pm
giiid
Gerry recomended your blog, and I went here to see the ice sculptures. That was fun, they are realy great!
February 8, 2009 at 7:05 pm
centria
Hi KD, Gerry and giiid! Glad you enjoyed the Tech snow sculpture photos. News flash! It’s not a dune buggy or car. It’s that land rover or whatever they used to drive around on the moon! Thanks for stopping by….
February 6, 2010 at 8:16 pm
Sculptures of snow and ice « Lake Superior Spirit
[…] If you want to see statues on a bright winter afternoon, please step back in time to last year. Here is the link to the 2009 Ice […]
February 9, 2010 at 2:34 pm
Reggie
I totally love the blue-blue-blue sky behind that landrover thing – it really brings out the brilliant white of the ice. Excellent photo!
February 9, 2010 at 7:14 pm
Kathy
Reggie, I love it that you stopped by to read a post from last year and commented! That blue-blue sky was something. We could use another day or two of blue-blue sky this year…
February 6, 2011 at 8:05 am
Elisa's Spot
i think i’m too sleepy to answer well. my eyes refuse to get all of the way opened and the brain is muttering. At least it stopped using obscenities. I liked ice sculpting at school, however I was not at the time able to fit the class in with the other culinary courses for my major.
February 6, 2011 at 2:06 pm
Kathy
Winter carnival is coming up again this weekend! Send wishes for sunshine, please. There really was an “ice sculpting” class at school??
February 6, 2011 at 5:10 pm
Elisa's Spot
Yes! Really! I did chocolate art instead. I had hoped to take the ice sculpting later, and then they didn’t offer it before I graduated.
February 6, 2011 at 5:15 pm
Elisa's Spot
psst…we needed it for ice carvings for weddings and events and things 🙂