It's surprisingly reassuring to fly amphibians in the winter. In the case of a forced landing, floats onto snow have a hope. We flew across the ice cap in Norway a few summers back, and most of the way, I could pick out a forced landing site had I needed it. I have landed an amphibious floatplane twice onto ice when one main wheel would not extend. Ironically, though they were two different planes, more than twenty years apart, it was exactly the same set of floats! I should have learned the first time!