Saturday 31 August 2013

My first fish

We have seen a couple of great sunsets. I was a little late for this one, last evening, but I thought I would share it anyway.


This is our friend, Edward. He is known as Brother Prince here in LK. He is the preacher of the Catholic Church. We helped him scape the church today.


He took us fishing late in the afternoon. We were out on the water for about two hours.


This is a view of the community from the lake.


We headed to the mouth of Spar Lake where there are lots of trout feeding on siscos, which are large minnows.


The lake was beautiful and calm. And it is true that you do not need bait. We just use lures. Here are the two fish that I caught.


David did not caught any. Beginners luck for me, maybe!

Saturday 24 August 2013

Arrival in LK

We arrived yesterday. I flew "shotgun" to the community. This is the plane we flew on.


And this is me and the instrument panel.


This is the house we are currently living in. There are so many empty houses that we may move closer to the water.


This morning we climbed up to the ridge of rock that over looks the community. As you can see the community is tiny. The Coop store owner says that there only about 260 people here and we expected 360.


More pictures from the rock.


The plants are really different. This is a fern growing in the outcrop. It is tiny. The largest stalk is shorter than my baby finger.


In the distance you can see the airstrip!


And when we arrived home from our walk this crazy looking dog was sleeping on our step. Apparently the guy who owns this house (but lives in Yellowknife) owns him. Someone in the community feeds him. He is very friendly and would love to come in. Our first LK friend!



Thursday 22 August 2013

The NWT Legislative building and Prince of Wales Cultural Centre

We walked to the NWT Legislative Building today along the other side of the Frame Trail. It was a lovely walk and we loved the way the grass and trees want to grow in the rock.


It was about a 40 minute walk to the Legislature. And the building itself is a work of art. It is shaped like an igloo.


The works of art we saw today were amazing.


This caribou is carved from a single vertebra of a bowhead whale.


Each block on this community quilt represents a family from its community. Each block is beaded. The beadwork we have seen is lovely.


The Legislative chamber was a work of art itself. The back drop is natural occurring zinc. And in the centre of the chamber is the skin of a polar bear. It was a beautiful room!


The boots and slippers we have seen have been gorgeous.


Tomorrow we head for Lutsel K'e and move into our new abode. Yellowknife has certainly been very fun and worth a visit. I look forward to coming back soon.

Wednesday 21 August 2013

Cameron Falls

Today we rented a car and headed for Cameron Falls. Here is the plate # of the car. I had heard that the NWT was getting rid of these great plates but every car has one.


This is the falls, they were beautiful.


A group from Mississippi took our picture.


We were able climb to the top of the falls and then cross a bridge to the other side.


Above the falls was a 'head pond'. One of the Mississippi guys is sitting at the top of the rock overlooking the head pond.



Later we visited the fur shop and they had this fabulous door! And great stuff inside as well.


This is the view from Old Town, the original 'Yellowknife'. These are floating houses that people live in ALL year long. They were very cool. A magazine had a poem about them.


Two verses read:

Now the really weird are a group that's veered
To live out on the frozen lake.
In the summer they float, in the winter they don't
And they think that it's just great

Now a house that can float is not a boat
And we don't go motoring around.
We chose to build where it wasn't filled
A great alternative to hard ground

And the last verse;

This houseboat living gives a glorious feeling
A style unique to Yellowknife.
At the end of the day, it's our northern way
Of making the most out of life!



And just so we didn't feel to far from home, we found some Covered Bridge chips.


We have met great and friendly people here in Yellowknife (from all over Canada and the world). We have had great meals too. We have had supper twice at a great restaurant called Coyote's. We are heading to the legislative building tomorrow and maybe we'll drive out to see some bison?!?!

Tuesday 20 August 2013

The Far North

Well, I have retired from the NB school system but not teaching.  I have decided to continue my teaching in NWT.  In May, I accepted a job in the community of Lutsel K'e, a 40 minute plane ride from Yellowknife.  So this is my new adventure.
We arrived yesterday and we were greeted by this beauty,

We had supper at the Wild Cat Cafe and this plane landed as we ate,

Yellowknife and the rest of the NWT are built on the Canadian Shield, which I learned about in grade 5. I remember thinking that it just sounded like rock and it is just ROCK and it is beautiful.

So here I am heading to downtown YK along the Frame trail beside Frame Lake.

And here is David. Lots of rocks!!!!

We had to visit some quilt shops. They were very nice with lots of stuff you never see at home.


We had a great day and we will be renting a car tomorrow and driving to Cameron Falls, about 45 minutes away.