Swallowed Up

[malibu001]

I work in the Alberta Oilsands in Ft.McMurray Alberta and today on the way from Edmonton to Ft McMurray I dicided to check out some of the enormous swamps that line Hwy 63. Well let me tell you that the ground was as hungry for me and my wife as the world is for the oil that we extract everyday. We pulled off the hwy and drove a bit on a logging road to a large expanse of muskeg . My wife went in first and was immediatly sucked in up to her breasts. To My surprise she asked me To ahem unzip and Well... proceeded To Well you get the drift... I stepped in and started to sink immediately my wife got as deep as her chin and i was struggling not push her under. Well our camera we brought was slightly water damaged but im confidnt can repair it and show u all pictures... in the end, my wife submerged and so did i we were both tied off To the truck via 30meters of rope took 3hours To get out and clean... what a day i tell i. nice way To start the week would you say?

[PM2K]

I would think so!

[bart1997]

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[Boggy Man]

Oh yes, those Alberta bogs can be lots of fun! You can see a picture of a small one and a MegaUpload link to my video of me exploring it, "inside" and out, in this thread!

What is that "Muskeg" all about? There seems to be no fitting translation even to british-english. Is that something similar to a floating bog (some thin "firm" moss above a deep layer of watery/muddy peat)?

Muskeg is basically another term for a bog.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muskeg

[undergrain1]

Whole pieces of heavy road-building equipment sank out of sight in muskeg bogs while they built the original alaska highway in 1942.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muskeg

[PM2K]

Whole pieces of heavy road-building equipment sank out of sight in muskeg bogs while they built the original alaska highway in 1942.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muskeg

Not to mention entire trains and tracks back in the day when they were building the Canadian Railways in the 1800s...

[bart1997]

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[Boggy Man]

Terrific location, you are some lucky Canadians to still possess these vast untouched areas of pure nature!

As it turns out, the spot I sunk in, a ways west of Edson, Alberta, was far from untouched! In fact, it likely wouldn't have existed if they hadn't dug that peaty area up to lay in a pipeline (which was abandoned, probably due to the soft conditions), and then covered it back up with the peat, resulting in a quagmire in that one low wet, peaty spot! But, it also had the effect of the mire being full of sticks from the trees that were also dug up, although some spots had fewer, and were therefore more enjoyable/sinkable, like the one in the video. I had previously found another similar spot southeast of Edson where another pipeline was buried, where I stood in the edge of a tuft of grass beside the bare peaty ground, and the ground started giving way beneath my feet, getting my shoes wet and making a very nice long sucking sound! When I probed that spot with a stick, it was only waist deep, but still quite enticing! But, it was also in view of an oil pump with an access road, which I had used to access the area, making it too risky to sink there. In fact, after hiking around the area and returning to my bike which I parked in the woods beside that spot, a worker was scraping the surface of that clay road to get rid of the roughness/ridges/ruts formed from it being traveled on while soft!

[undergrain1]

Malibu, you should mark the spot of your discovered muskeg on the map and give it the ratings and such.