Weather is not Boring

No bears to fight today either. We only saw one little black bear on the side of the road today but we saw lots of other critters. There were 4 white tail deer on the road, 2 bucks and 2 does. There were Osprey in their nest on a man-made platform put there to be a nesting site (win). Best of all, there was a pack of 5 wolves near our worksite today! 2 big ones, an adolescent and a couple of this year’s pups. I admit I spent a good deal of my bear patrol watching wolves frolic. I tried to get pics but they blend in really well and they kept a certain distance. I can’t see them very well on my iPhone but I’m posting them in the hope they work on real computers.

Well, that’s day 1 done. More bear patrol tomorrow. We saw 4 bears today, all on the road. Three ran away as soon as the truck got close but this guy was too busy chowing down to care about us.

bear

mmmm.. clover

Today I am bear guard for a level 5 tech who is doing a quarterly inspection on the automatic weather station at CFB Cold Lake. It’s a bit different from the stuff I usually work on but it’s still cool.

In order to be allowed on the range we had to sit through the range course. Basically, a Master Corporal stands in front of you and tells you not to touch anything over and over for an hour. It’s times like this I really miss the army. I’m sure it will wear off.

As bear guard, it’s my job to wander around and be alert for bears that want to play with our stuff while we’re working or want to eat us. It’s usually the first one. I have bear spray and bangers to use should anything come up but it probably won’t.

Now, because I’m on a base, I’m well trained and I like my security clearance, here’s a pic of a neat spider I saw today instead of pics of airforce stuff.

Here’s a video of a DC-3 taking off from the Sachs Harbour Airport.

The guy is Rich, my team-mate for this trip.

Yay! We made it in to (and out of) Sachs Harbour! We were supposed to be there from Thursday afternoon until Sunday night but due to fog we didn’t get there until late Friday afternoon. Friday we set up our kit, Saturday we worked on the Sachs Harbour autostation then Sunday we hopped on the Parks Canada charter to do our 2 stations in Aulavik National Park. The 2 stations we did Saturday were extra fun because the Twin Otter was holding for us so we were under a considerable amount of time pressure. We landed, grabbed our stuff and got straight to business. The first one took 2 and a half hours and the second took an hour and a half.. and (almost) everything works. It was fun playing “special ops weather troops” (yes, we have been on the road a long time now, why do you ask?)

Sachs Harbour Airport Sign

Sachs Harbour from the air

The Beech100 that took us from Inuvik to Sachs

So far north that the satellite dishes point down.

Green Cabin (aerial) on the Thomsen River in Aulavik National Park on Banks Island

I forgot to take pics in the park after this one because we were so rushed. D’oh!

The "Cold Tax" or I'm glad I drink Guinness

Cold beer is indeed more expensive than room temperature beer.

It’s 9 am Friday morning and we’re sitting around the Inuvik airport waiting for fog to lift. It’s foggy here and in Sachs Harbour. We did this yesterday for a few hours too. It’s all part of northern travel.

The bear is on display here.

We tried again on Wednesday. This time it was a beautiful day and we made it in with no problems. We saw a whole pod of Beluga Whales near the island but my camera didn’t pick them up. If anyone wants a picture of fuzzy white dots on an out of focus ocean let me know.

Me!

Pelly Island Autostation

Video of take off from Inuvik:

Video of the approach to Pelly Autostation:

The land the station is on is eroding rather quickly. We’re losing about 25 meters a year. We’re probably going to move it up the hill next summer.

If the videos don’t play for you let me know and I’ll change the format.