OFF LINE ENTRY

Fred Henne Territorial Park Campground

Yellowknife, Northwest Territories

Thursday, August 28, 2008, 4:15 pm Mountain Time

Partly Cloudy, with some sunny breaks, and breezy;  temperature, 55F

Altitude: 193 meters (about 600 and something feet, I think)

Well, we’ve made it to the shores of Great Slave Lake on the edge of the Arctic tundra, but we’re still not sure it was worth it, because we haven’t seen the town yet.  We are camped in a territorial government campground on the outskirts of Yellowknife, with electrical hook-up only.  But we have two FM channels of CBC radio (news and classical music), three channels of over-the-air television (one in French), and a cool breeze to keep the bugs away.  Due to the long drives of the past two days, we decided to just plop for the night, drink a little wine, have a nice dinner, go to bed early, sleep late, and explore the city of Yellowknife tomorrow.

The road up here was, how should I say, different: lonesome, paved all the way, but rough in spots, and as we neared Yellowknife, full of frost heaves (mini-roller coaster).  After we left the 60th Parallel campground on the Alberta-NWT border, the road went through forest, forest, and more forest.  Then, out of nowhere appeared Enterprise, a crossroads town the guidebook said had a gasoline station, cafe, and most services, but to us looked like a dump--literally.  Junked cars, snowmobiles, rusty pickup trucks, etc. lying about between run-down houses and closed, boarded-up buildings.  The cafe had several long haul trucks parked out front, so I guess the food was edible, or maybe all that was available.  We kept driving.

More forest and no sign of human habitation, except road signs reporting how many hundred kilometers it was to Yellowknife.  Occasionally we’d see a red and white post along the road marking an underground pipeline, and at fairly regular intervals, a microwave repeater tower, complete with one or two propane tanks to keep its generators going.  Of course, there was no cell phone coverage and no radio (except for our Sirius satellite radio, which worked perfectly).  We finally got to the Mackenzie River ferry crossing and waited about 15 minutes for the ferry to return from the opposite bank.  After the 10-minute crossing, we gassed up at Fort Providence (at Cdn$1.45 per liter, about $5.50 a US gallon), and set out on what must be the loneliest road in North America.  For over 200 km we saw nothing but trees, small lakes, and a few wood bison grazing along the road.  This was absolute wilderness and there was very little traffic, and that was mostly large double semi-trailers hauling the necessities of civilization to these very isolated northern communities.

Re-fueling becomes very important in this part of the world since gas stations are few and far between.  We filled up at Indian Cabins, Alberta, just short of the 60th Parallel, past by the next gas at junky Enterprise, and re-fueled at Ft. Providence.  From there to Yellowknife is a bit more than 200 miles, fine for a car, but too close for comfort when pulling a trailer at 10-11 miles per gallon.  So we drove into Rae, a native community about 10 km off the main road and possessor of the only gas station between Ft. Providence and Yellowknife.  After talking with a friendly, native-looking young man who had never heard of Vermont, let alone where it was (“near New York” seemed to get a knowing response), we were back on the road.   More forest, an occasional summer fishing cabin, and lots of frost heaves--and the trees were getting shorter and smaller.  We were now in the dwarf taiga on the edge of the tundra.  Yikes.  What are we doing here!?

Then out of nowhere, as our backs were getting stiff from sitting and Charley must have been wondering if he’d ever get out of this car, we see the landing light and radar dome towers of a modern airport and soon hear the whine of jet engines--we’ve reached Yellowknife airport.  We’re back in the 21st Century after our drive through the 19th.