For the past week, we’ve had (relatively) warm days where the temperature soared to the high 30’s and low 40’s. The thick layer of snow outside has been slowly melting. Then at night, it generally drops below freezing again. The result: our driveway is quite literally a sheet of ice.
Sure, there’s some gravel peeking through, but the bulk of it is ice roughly an inch thick. And when it’s warm during the day, there’s a thin layer of water on it. As everyone knows, a thin layer of water atop a smooth layer of ice is about as close to frictionless as you can get.
Sooooo… driving up and down the driveway is fraught with peril. This morning, heading out at 6am, we just sort of glided down it. Now and then the wheels would catch on some gravel, or we’d intentionally drift over near the edge where there’s still some slushy snow which provides a bit more grip. But overall, it’s pretty freaky.
After returning home and barely making it back up, we decided to break up the ice. Pepper pulled out our industrial ice chipper, I grabbed a sledgehammer, we donned our crampons, and marched down the ice to see what we could do. The results were… not good.
I banged away on this little patch of ice with all my might, slamming the sledgehammer into it, and succeeded in making a few good-sized dents in the ice and blasting a few chips off. Pepper, meanwhile, toiled beside me, banging the ice chipper into the unyielding surface. We spent about fifteen minutes working, at various points along the driveway, before concluding that we simply weren’t going to make a dent in it.
I love my house, but wow do I hate my driveway.