From Yellowknife, Part II

Yesterday we did the drive from Lady Evelyn Falls to Yellowknife. I'm getting confused in my mind about miles or kilometers, but I think it was about 200 miles. At first it was the same landscape we'd been in for days: forest, with interspersed marsh. This isn't exactly pretty or dull country, it's just impressive, and wild; an immense expanse of forest, with smallish trees (due to climate I think), mixed evergreens and aspen. We've wondered how people found their way around such a vast expanse of similar-looking terrain. Other than following rivers, there seem to be absolutely no landmarks.

Just shy of Fort Providence, we reached the great Mackenzie River at last: The one that collects the waters from all these other rivers, and delivers them to the Arctic. This was the first of several ferry crossings that we'll need to make. In winter, you just drive across the frozen rivers; in summer, it's ferries. As experienced ferry-goers, we were impressed with the skill required to navigate across such strong side current. At this particular spot, they are building a bridge, so the navigational obstacle course also includes the future bridge pilings.

As soon as you cross the river, you are passing along 50 miles of bison preserve. Right off the ferry was a sizable herd, young calf nestled incongruously beneath stacks of bridge construction materials. The Wood Buffalo visitors' center had stark warnings posted about bison: "Vistors have been gored by bison. When charging, they can run three times faster than you. Do not provoke them. "

Having spent time in Yellowstone, the bison experience is not new to Enrico and me; we know that despite their docile appearance from the car, they are not to be messed with. We also know that when the bison decide to cross the road, you wait. If the bison decide to lay down in the road for an hour-long siesta, you park the car and wait for an hour. They are bigger than you. But when this fella took up the face-off position down in the road, Enrico and I each began humming that gunslinger showdown tune. Do-dee-do-dee-dooo....wah-wah-waaaah.
He looked like he was all but pawing the ground and readying the charge, though that almost certainly wasn't true. We put the car in park and waited. A stare-down, however, is one of the brashest statements in canine language, and the dogs were wild. They would have come out through the windshield if they could've. We pondered whether there was any sensible fear in their reaction, or if it was all bad-assed bluster. In any event, the dogs have generally barked and growled at bison, at least if they're moving. We saw lots of them on this stretch of road.


As we swung around the north side of Great Slave Lake, the landscape began to change. George commented to us that "most of the country is sitting on one big slab of rock, and the rest of it is just bobbing on water." The big slab of rock, of course, is the great Canadian Sheild, a sheet of hard rock that runs from the Great Lakes to the Arctic, literally covering half of Canada. Here, now we see it popping up in rounded mounds and jagged ledges, pink and burnt brown. I havent' gotten a good shot of it yet in sunlight, but the pink is very striking.

There's even a slab of it built into the wall of our hotel. It has been underneath us all this time, but suddenly we see it everywhere. There's also a lot more water. Yellowknife sits on Great Slave, but most of the city center - the Legislative Assembly, museum, city hall - sit on smaller Frame Lake. Walk paths abound in Yellowknife around the many lakes.
Prince of Wales Heritage Center on Frame Lake:
Yellowknife's first schoolhouse:


But before arriving in Yellowknife, we crossed a bridge at Rae across Frank Channel. My great-great uncle Frank perished here in 1922, with his 2-year-old daughter, when their dogsled broke through the ice. The story goes that he could have been rescued but wouldn't let go of his little girl, and they couldn't pull him out by one arm; and when the RCMP finally retrieved the bodies, they were still locked in that frozen embrace. And so, Frank Channel got its name.

Weather is overcast here, which is good for us as sun makes it impossible to leave the dogs in the van; trees aren't tall enough here for any real shade. Yesterday as I was making the laundry and car-wash run, however, it was hot and sunny, and I snubbed my nose at the bugs and wore shorts and a tank top. Bugs aren't too bad in the city, and it felt so liberating to feel the air and the sun on my skin, to be out of the layers of clothing and mesh that have kept me sweatily bug-protected for days now.

Anyway, we're doing some business here; today we are trying to get Eva for her spa treatment (aka oil & lube); we washed a mountain of mud off her yesterday at the car wash. I plan to spend some time at the museum and archives. I have an overwhelming craving for a burger from A&W. Exciting stuff.