Ahmic Air's Beaver, a trusted workhorse of the north, is roaring off again. My personal carbon footprint is awful.
The benefit of travelling with a collapsible canoe.
To Fry Inlet, the southern end of Contwoyto Lake.
Plenty of space to the next tent.
My trusted companion is taking on shape again.
Contwoyto Lake is large.
Very grateful for duck pond conditions.
Contwoyto Point.
Belanger Rapids: a short portage of the odds and ends ...
... to then guide the empty canoe down the drop.
Aluminised Tyvek makes staying inside the tent even in scorching sunshine bearable.
The difference in shadowing - with and without the Tyvek layer.
As expected after the unusually early ice break-up: a very low water level.
And one of the many stones exposed then led to a serious situation: a pinned canoe.
Most of the items were salvaged. But anything lying around loose in the canoe is at risk of being swept away by the current. On this occasion I lost a pair of shoes, binoculars and the most painful loss: my sailing mast.
Two drastic rescue cuts prevented the worst: the water pressure wrapping the canoe around the stone.
Stitching and glueing for two days.
The tension of the Ally set-up prevented me from fully closing the gap. Then Shoo Goo goop was applied to the Kevlar yarn.
But more than 80% of the glue-job was done with superglue! Finally, the entire edge was sealed with liquid PVC.
Ready to go again. But! How durable is this repair? The river proper with its rocks and rapids was yet to come.
Lake Kathawachaga - an opportunity for a floatplane to land.
As I wasn't sure whether my repair would hold, and the glue had also been pretty much used up, I contemplated whether I should take this opportunity and pull out.
Thankfully, I decided to carry on. So much I would have missed!
Pretty far inland from the coast. Rremains from a hunting outfitter's business? May be due for a clean up?
Nadlok "crossing-place-of-deer" and its unusual antler dwellings.
Caribou bone and antler blanket the island and pave the shallows around it.
Layer upon layer of bone fragments, carbon-dated to 1450-1750 A.D., a time refered to as the "Little Ice Age".
When a cold spell increased the thickness of the ice along the coast, closing the seals' breathing holes and forcing the people to migrate south.
The remaining waterway at such a low water level.
Prospects for hiking are looming.
After navigating Bellanca Rapids.
A scenic spot as nice as could be.
My tent being the white dot at around 3:30 hours on the clock.
Upstream view, the stretch just before the Bellanca rapids.
At the confluence of Burnside and Mara. The Mara River comming in from the left (behind the esker), the Burnside joining in from the right. And, the only reasonable campsite for quite a while.
The same spot from on top of the esker, with lots of smoke from the wildfires down south.
The no-go zone before the descent into the Burnside canyon.
Same as before at close up.
Looking up stream, camping at the very last opportunity. The usual take-out for the portage is about a kilometer up stream.
My start of the 5-6 KM long portage.
Bathurst Inlet - at last.
The input after the portage
A little awkward with a load.
Savouring the view on the way back to camp.
Beautiful Bathurst Inlet once again. A very pretty place.
The final cascade of the Burnside.
All set, once again, ready for part two, "on salt", soon to come.
Bathurst Inlet proper.
Allen and Connie Kapolak securing the catch of the day.
For the upcoming lunch.
For sometime later.
The old mission.
More of a shack these days.
Allen is making me a new sailing mast/tent pole. Now much needed to make progress and pitch my cooking tent in foul weather.
His workshop. Looks a bit jumbled, but I doubt there's much he couldn't put together somehow. The Inuit seem to have a particular ingenuity to make do with what is at their disposal.
Camped on that sandy beach to the left.
Same place, looking in the other direction.
Drinking water was not a serious problem, but it does require a certain amount of consideration and forward planning, and some luck.
Umingmaktok (as Bathurst Inlet is), populated during the summer by (former) residents who now live in Iqaluktuuttiaq (Cambridge Bay) or Kugluktuk (Coppermine).
Still lots of smoke from the wildfires way down south.
I was lucky enough to be invited to a picnic.
Bannock, Muktuk, whatnot.
A quickly deployed net soon provided fresh food.
The land of old and new: Fish head soup and smartphones, Muktuk and instant noodles, Crocs and traditional dress, drum dancing and Starlink.
Bobby Klengenberg boiling up some tea, burning arctic heather (Cassiope Tetragona), an important source of fuel in the far north.
Saved for a later feast.
Back on the water and still smoky.
Along an inhospitable coastline.
Grateful for the calm weather.
Not the kind of place where you want to be forced ashore by unfavourable winds.
On Melville Sound, things are getting pretty exposed.
And lo and behold, before I knew it, I was windbound for 5 nights.
Fortunately with drinking water right at hand.
And, plenty of hiking opportunities, weather permitting.
This tent has kept me out of the wind for many, many hours on many a voyage.
Moving on again.
Under sails.
On Hope Bay.
Looking north across Hope Bay towards what is yet to come.
Still on Hope Bay.
About to clear out of Hope Bay, through the gap to the right.
Fetching drinking water from a distant lake.
Seeking shelter in a protected bay.
With a good dozen assorted tent rings from times gone by.
And, much appreciated drinking water once again from a nearby lake.
A (nar)whale's vertebra?
Tent ring cove.
On Elu Inlet, with the predominant land mark: Uvaajuuq Hill.
Cutting across Elu Inlet on a string of islands.
Not what you would wish for when looking for a campsite.
So, on to the next island, where it hopefully looks more favourable.
Not quite.
Nope.
At last, an appealing bay.
Breakfast stop.
And, again, so grateful for the calm weather.
The final kilometers on Elu Inlet.
The view back towards Elu Inlet.
Musselshells - as far as the eye can see, from the time this was the ocean. 'Abandoned shorelines', as they are called by geographers. The land is still rebounding strongly from the last ice age.
Gaining elevation, on sweet water, on my way to the last leg: Itibiaryuk Portage.
Step by step.
One pond after the other.
Blown ashore by a sudden gale.
Looking back towards Elu Inlet in the far distance.
Beaches full of shells. Mind you, this is all fresh water!
The start of Itibiaryuk Portage, a rather short and easy walk.
Queen Maud Gulf, at last, the North West Passage proper.
Not a single corner of the bonding has come undone. This result was truly remarkable considering the low water level on the Burnside, the many rocks and the fast current. Mind you, glued with superglue!
And the whole affair neatly bundled up again.
A rather harsh landscape.
George Angohiatok and his wife Mabel kept a careful lookout for rocks in these shallow waters on our way to Cambridge Bay.
So glad that I managed to get out on a calm day, so late in the season, end of August.
Establishing at the float base in Cambridge Bay. With a rented (50$/day), derelict four-wheeler that ran for about two days before the solenoid gave in.
The other side of the spectrum: cruise ship tourists on their way through the Northwest Passage.
And multimillionaires on the same trip. Here the Shinkai (deep sea) with its very own submarine alongside other fancy technology.
Inuit face tattoos, a tradition that was rediscovered around 2016 by people like Angela Hovak Johnston from Kugluktuk.
On wrists and arms too.
The Canadian High Arctic Research Station, a 120 million US dollar project, providing a stark contrast to the rest of town.
As the wildfires around Yellowknife were still not contained, the return journey was a story in itself: Cambridge Bay - Iqaluit - Edmonton, and many stops along the way.
Flying over an extremely barren landscape.
Iqaluit. Note the tidal difference of up to 10 metres.
