The blog
Trial by fire; zodiac edition
I was sitting in Abbotsford International Airport, about 20 minutes before boarding my first of 3 flights, wrapping up a call with Scotiabank to finalize my mortgage for Yellowknife. Possession day was 5 weeks away, and in 24 hours, I’d be touching down in Aberdeen, Scotland. From there, a couple days later, boarding the Quark Expedition Ultramarine for almost 2 weeks to sail further north than I’d ever been in my life.
I didn’t know what to expect of Scotland, or this entire cruise. I’d barely had time to think about it. For the week before flying out, I was sleeping on yoga mats on the floor of my dad’s place, painting, cleaning and packing the final few boxes of his life before he’d leave forever for the Philippines.
Retirement, at last.
My flights over took me through sunset, the northern lights, sunrise, way too much time in Heathrow, and a second sunset. I fell in love with Aberdeen. European grocery stores, twilight walks, daytime walks - accidentally to the next village down the coast in one instance. Grassy cliffs and fields blowing in the wind, hills of yellow flowers and charming neighbourhoods at every turn. Dolphins and seals visible from the harbour and cliffs. It was heavenly. I loved every second.
“Everyone’s a birder. Some of you just don’t know you are yet.”
Our first night on board the Ultramarine started with, of course, endless safety briefings, but also some news that a little storm was headed to us which gave such little hope of being able to go ashore to Fair Isle, we were instead making a last minute decision to try North Ronaldsay instead, where we ultimately were able to anchor down, zodiac to shore, and spend as much of the day as the weather would allow us.
I chose the long bird walk, because as Mark, our amazing, amazing bird expert expedition guide on board said to us our first night, “Everyone’s a birder. Some of you just don’t know you are yet.” And I loved it. I needed little convincing. I was hooked. Ready to give up a life of aurora chasing for birding, until he told me there’s no money in it either.
So instead of heading back to the ship via the zodiacs over increasingly rough seas we were warned about the night before, I and one other, literally, ran over to the 173 year old lighthouse to climb the couple hundred steps inside up to it’s balcony. That was one of the coolest experiences I think of my life. The wind up there made it nearly impossible to get all the way around the deck, but the views were breathtaking. But finally, windburnt, sweaty and out of breath, I ran back to the shore to begin what would become a trip long habit of being on the last zodiac back to the ship. Waves crashed up over the bow of the zodiac and over our heads. I understood without a doubt why waterproof clothing, head to toe, was mandatory, and not just recommended.
Back to the roots
In a separate tab, I open my blog to check on my last post and manage to surprise myself seeing that it was back at the end of February. I knew it had been a long, long time, but I didn’t think that long.
I also knew when I titled it ‘Closing in’, that it was a subtle lean into what was coming - a somber end to my few years in Whitehorse. At the time I wrote that post, my apartment was under offer, I knew where I was going, but not yet where I would be living, and between those two small life changes, I would be embarking on the trip of a lifetime that never once felt quite real - but more on that next post.
For right now, my days are filled with reacquainting myself with where this life of chasing the northern lights nightly began. I am home again in Yellowknife, exactly 10 years and 2 days from when I moved here the first time, to once again take possession of a home I had not yet actually seen.
With so much to do, we wasted little time and began light renovations the day after I moved in, and it all remains ongoing. Tours begin in August, and I cannot, cannot wait. And finally I’ll lead you out of Whitehorse, through the summer in BC, and finally up to Yellowknife with a chaotic collection of photos.
After moving out of my place in Whitehorse, I spent some weeks with Doris in hers before I would head south for an abbreviated summer. We packed, and repacked every single box I thought I had perfected to all fit into my Sienna to take with me. No moving company this time, just what I could bring with me. But I had too much stuff, and I was too heavy. Moving day was not the best day of my life.
Over the next week and a bit, we opened every single box, re-sorted and repacked them, got rid of a lot (Doris will be eating dried lentils and rice for the next 3 lifetimes), weighed every single box and loose item, and set aside 2 boxes to ship ahead of another Canada Post strike.
All of this set me up full to the car ceiling, exactly 40kg under the car’s maximum takeoff weight, for an early, early morning out of Whitehorse to drive straight-ish through to my mum’s place, some 2,200 kilometres south. But this was not without a cat nap or two along the way as my eyes got heavy, twisting myself over and around boxes and plants to stretch out, time at the Liard Hot Springs, of course, and photography stops too.
Late, late pizza takeaway after move out day
Just completely taking over Doris’s life with my chaos here…
Weight ended up becoming a bigger issue than space
A little tail heavy despite my best efforts…
Driving through the night in northern BC and of course she kept me company
Typical summer views from my mum’s place in Kamloops
The final weeks leading up to departure day for Yellowknife were chaotic in everything from helping move my dad to the Philippines, couriering original (thank you, NWT, for being so relentlessly, painfully archaic - never change), notarized documents to Yellowknife from BC in the midst of another potential Canada Post strike, and making endless design decisions for spaces I had once again not actually seen.
With our final days planned and our departure from Kamloops sured up, we first spent some nights in Calgary with my grandparents, making final final decisions on design with trips to Home Depot and IKEA, but most importantly, bean bag toss tournaments in the backyard.
From there, just 1,800 kilometres and one overnight in smoky northern Alberta was between us and Yellowknife.
Smoky morning leaving High Level
Christmas in June…
So this is about where things stand. 70L of white eggshell paint down, 3 major appliances unexpectedly replaced, many IKEA orders received, more still on the way, and the main bathroom 2/3 gutted but on it’s way back, with the ensuite mostly finished, and a few closets gutted and redone.
When my dad asked how it feels to be back in Yellowknife, I said I wasn’t really sure because I haven’t actually really interacted at all with Yellowknife yet. I’ve barely been outside for more than repeating trips to Home Hardware and Canadian Tire.
But I am settling in, sleeping more than 5 hours a night finally, and taking time to breathe and practice yoga, of course. Sparrows, yellow warblers, and robins sing outside my windows all day, a neighbourhood cat wanders into my yard at breakfast for cuddles, and both the front and back steps make for perfect afternoon fika spots.
My first tour is already only about a month away, and I can’t wait for that, but all of this time since closing day in Whitehorse on March 28th has passed far, far too quickly. For now, time could not slow down enough, but this evening I’ll prepare for my new dishwasher that I should be wrestling into my place sometime tomorrow, while the rest of the bathroom walls upstairs are calling for the tiling to continue…
Closing in
Unsure in yet another feeling of a spring arriving much too early, I can’t decide if it’s just my lack of experience in Whitehorse, and this is the usual here - to be flirting with temperatures around freezing and seeing the outside world melt - or if this really just is the changed way of the north now.
This daytime warmth and melt is a familiarity I used to find in Yellowknife toward the middle of April, so normal or not, this still feels strange.
We’re nowhere close to the end of the aurora season yet, there are plenty of dark nights ahead still - despite that soon the sidewalks and neighbourhood streets will be dry enough for evening roller blades.
In the meanwhile as I write this, it’s +1° outside, with the sun drying up my patio. The warmth of the sun on my skin is easily identifiable and for a moment I wonder if it’s worth throwing off the cover of the patio furniture for a coffee outside.
But the last few weeks have been the closest we’ve had to a real winter this year. Nightly temperatures sunk consistently into the -20s, and low -30s. Aurora chases have taken us from barely outside the city limits to well over a hundred kilometres out in search of clear skies. We’ve experienced everything from the softest nights of the aurora to the absolute most spectacular.
Life gets really busy over these next few weeks, but I’ll be back with more again soon.
A highway chase
It wasn’t quite the way I had the night drawn up on paper, but isn’t that the way working with mother nature on multiple fronts goes.
I had hoped that after making our way some 70 or so kilometres from town, we’d have arrived under mostly clear skies. However we had arrived under mostly cloudy skies, which was a vast improvement from town, but far from ideal. Clear sky was breaking from the south west, which prompted a little running back and forth chasing clear breaks along the highway. Referencing weather maps, running a few kilometres, rinse and repeat for the first half of our night. And finally later in the night, the weather stabilized and arcs of green aurora shone through clear sky now open in the north.
Winter blues
The full moon blue night sky on a frozen lake is the heart of winter kind of feeling for me. These few months are the time of year full moons transit brightly through the sky high over snow covered landscapes. Ghostly greens and vibrant pinks dance across the horizon in front of us at -27°, and that feels so much like home.
Every one of us was bundled up tightly in our parkas, in our big boots and big mittens, faces covered, and that was a kind of comfort too. It’s a comfort of what winter should feel like and how I love it to feel like. So having to dress this way out of necessity feels almost like a privilege when so many days and nights lately just bounce between 0 and -10°. My fingers and face appreciate the warmer temperatures very much, but for my heart, the -30s are far more comforting.
