Soon came time to travel down to Inuvik for a gravel meeting with someone at Indian and Northern Affairs Canada (INAC). This provides for a nice escape from Tuk, however, going for just one night overnight can be a bit of a bother, since you have to pack your suitcase and be prepared to stay for several days in case the weather turns bad. Shouldn't complain though, I enjoy my time there. So I had my meeting, and the guy from INAC bothered to drive me around to do some errands I had to do while I was down in Inuvik. That night, I ate on my own in the Mackenzie Hotel (where I stay), down in their lounge called Shivers. It was pretty busy because there was a big natural gas drilling meeting in town at the same time as I was there, so there were a bunch of cowboys from Alberta there as well. I myself had a salad, which turned out to be about the size of a teacup, all for the low price of $8! Hah. Good thing I'm getting paid to eat when I'm away. At any rate, luckily I had already had some other food before I went for "dinner." They are already getting to know me at the hotel, when I go to check in they just hand me my key, knowing my name, and at Shivers they know my name and favourite menu items as well (does that make me sad, or the menu sad?).
Unfortunately, it wasn't swimming night, as it was teen swim instead of adult swim at the pool. I will definitely go swimming next week when I'm there, I should be able to go at least twice.
The very interesting part of the trip came when I was returning back to Tuk on Friday night. Reagen had emailed me earlier in the day to say "We're having a games night tonight, so you should come if you get back... but the weather's looking pretty bad." So I was already thinking that perhaps I'd be in Inuvik overnight. Much to my surprise, they decided to fly us back to Tuk (perhaps due to demand- there were 20 people going that night). However, I was bumped to the "second" flight, which was actually the flight delivering everyone's liquor orders to Tuk for the weekend... and a few straggler passengers.
Back to the story however... So we board our little tiny plane, with only one row of seats and a skinny aisle to use to get to your seat, the smallest plane I've been on yet. So the pilots tell us "we're just going to de-ice, wait for another plane to take off, and get going to Tuk." Luckily, I've learned to always carry my mp3 player to stave off boredom while waiting in these airports (nothing is ever on time, you can guarantee the flights will be at least 1/2 hour late). So we sit, turn on the propellers, and they go, and go... and go... (maybe 15 mins?) Then the pilots turn them back off, and one jumps out of the plane and goes and grabs a truck, which is towing the "de-icer" which is like a powerwasher with de-icer in it. So he washes down the plane with this de-icer (maybe another 15 min task). Then we put the props back on, and wait, and wait some more. Then we start taxiing out to the runway (by this time it's completely dark out), and in comes the plane that originally left before us, to go to Aklavik which is a 30 min flight round trip. So, that plane did it's trip there and back while we were still trying to get our silly little plane going.
At any rate, we take off, and the ceiling is very low, so we go above the clouds, which we don't often do on those little planes. And we're flying... and flying... and flying... and I'm starting to think, "this seems to be taking more than 1/2 an hour, like usual." So I looked towards the pilots, and they are looking a little bit lost to say the least... they are looking all around outside the windows of the cockpit, up (at the stars maybe?), down (at the ocean which we've been flying over for a good 10 mins, the most we fly over it for is usually about 1 minute), and all around... and then proceed to pull out a piece of paper, which they proceed to rotate around, with confused looks on their faces, trying to get it facing the right way. I look up at the counter which lets us know how long we've been in the air for, and it says 47 minutes... so more than 50% more flying time than usual... Eventually, and looking much to the pilots' delight and surprise, the lights of Tuk appear, and we circle around to land. Well, as Reagen had warned me, it was a blizzard in Tuk... So we sort of blow down onto the runway, where we skid across the ice (the runway is solid ice at this time of year), and are home sweet home in Tuk. My bags made it to Tuk before I did, on the first plane, so Reagen had them packed into the truck, and we were on our way.
As for today's snowmobile adventure (Remembrance Day is a stat holiday), after attending the ceremony, the we decided to take the snowmobiles out. So, we had 3 snowmobiles out in total, and we took them out to an oil rig which is not being used at the moment and checked that out... it was a short snowmobile ride away. We climbed up and checked it out... other than the pingos, it's probably the highest point in Tuk, and is actually in the middle of water, but since it's all frozen, we could drive the snowmobiles out to it. Then, on the way back, they let Reagen and me drive back to town. That was pretty fun, we got stuck a few times because we got chicken and drove too slowly up hills, you just need to go fast so you can get up and over them. We saw the sunset which was really nice over the pingos on the way back, and were back when there was still some daylight left. My new goggles worked out splendidly, and you really couldn't survive without them in the wind.. it's horrible. Between them and that new hood thing, none of my skin was showing, which is imperative, or it will freeze.
Well, I think those are all of my tales right now. Next week it's Monday-Thursday at noon in Inuvik, Thursday aft-Monday morning in Yellowknife, and back to Tuk that day by 6pm *fingers crossed*.
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