COVID-Distancing On The Land In The Arctic

Welcome to Arctic the Culture Cure, the podcast, all about Canada's Arctic, the climate, the animals, the land, the people, the culture, and what it can teach the rest of the world. I'm your host, Rob Fagan. Hello, everybody, and welcome to another episode of Arctic the Culture Cure. This episode, we are sitting down with Daniel and Melissa Rogers in Inuvik, Northwest Territories. And, you know, right now we're going through interesting times. This interview is taking place, you know, as the COVID crisis is happening around the world. And of course, Anuvik is. Is up inside the Arctic Circle. And Melissa and Daniel have been spending a lot of time out at their camp during this. So we'd like to talk a little bit about that. Welcome to Art of the Culture Cure.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Yeah, no, it's a pleasure to have you on here. I know you're in town for a little bit and then you're back out to your camp. Maybe you could just explain to folks a little bit more about where Inuvik is located.

Inuvik is located north of the 60th parallel, just above. Just above the 04T.

Ah, okay. So, you know, for most people listening to this, this podcast in different parts of the world, that's really far north because, you know, a lot of times people think Edmonton, Alberta, is north, but no, it's not. Inuvik is much further north. So now how would a person get to Inuvik?

There's Dempster highway that comes north on Highway 8, I believe, and there's a highway from Newik to Tuck. New Tuck Highway.

Oh, right. And so that's the new part of the highway, isn't it? The highway used to stop at Inuvik.

Yes.

Okay. And so Tuck, that new piece of highway that goes up to the. You know, that would take you right to the Arctic Ocean then. So people who are adventurous once Covid has died down and want to go for an Arctic adventure, driving up to Inuvik and then on to Tuk. That would be just an amazing trip for people to take now that they can drive all the way there.

Yeah.

Now you both were born and raised up in the delta. Daniel, were you born in Inuvik?

Yes, born and raised.

Okay. Born and raised in. Melissa, how about you?

I was born in Wordsworth but raised up in Inuvik.

Okay. And so where would maybe you could just talk a little bit about both of your heritage? What is your heritage?

I'm Inuvialuit and Banta Kwicin, and I'm also. We have some Swedish blood from my great grandfather, Peter Norberg. And I also have some Irish blood from my biological father's side of the family. So. And being raised up in Inuvik, my grandmother was a Bantu Kwachan from Okro, Yukon, who married my grandfather, Victor Al, and Inuvialuweed from the Western Arctic with. He also has descendants in Alaska. So we were raised up mostly with the Inuvialuwi life, culture, traditions. And as we got older in life, my grandmother started instilling some of her traditional practices and her language and, yeah, her culture into us. However, it was hard for her to teach us her language because she lost her language in residential school. My grandfather didn't go to school as much. He went to school in grade two, up to grade two, and then he left. And he was raised up out on the land. And growing up, they raised three of their grandchildren, myself and two of my other cousins. And so that time they had to work having three young grandchildren living in their home. My grandmother was a politician and fought for the rights of women all across Canada. She was the founder of the Native Women's association for the Northwest Territories.

And that was Bertha.

Yeah, my grandmother, Bertha Allen, she also always kept her connection with her people in Old Crow, and she helped to build the Buntokwichen nation to what it is today. And for that, we are extremely proud. She's won many, many awards in her lifetime. My dad also was an activist for Inuit rights. He traveled to Australia, to Hawaii, fighting for the Inuit rights of people. And he also was a master in the language and a master of maps. Like, you can put a map in front of him with absolutely nothing on it, and he can pinpoint exactly where people's camps were.

Oh, wow, that's an amazing skill. And Daniel, you being born and raised in the New Vic area, your heritage is Inuvialuit.

Inuvialuit, yes. Okay. My mother was born in a clavic, and my father was born there also, I guess. And I was adopted at a young age. Adopted out to an elderly lady here in Inuvik. Was adopted at a young age. And I grew up with older wife, older siblings as well, too. Okay.

And that. That was often. That was often the custom years ago, wasn't it? There was a lot of adoptions when families got too big or different things like that. That was pretty common, I think.

Yeah. My mother was a single mother, and she couldn't afford to look after five children, so she had to give a few of us younger ones up to better families.

Yeah. And that makes sense. I mean, you know, helps families, you know, financially or however they're looking after the children and so on. It makes a lot of sense. So you're. So your roots are in a Clavic and Melissa, you have Old Crow and Anuvik, and so you're both Delta people. There's no doubt you're immersed in the Delta now, Daniel, I understand a lot of your younger years, you spent out on the land.

Yes, yes, basically. Basically grew up as a young toddler, I could say, living with my sisters, my older sisters and their husbands. Yeah, grew up trapping, snaring, rabbits, fishing, learned. Did a lot of chores at a young age, so never, never did forget that. How to survive and.

Yeah, well, being.

Well, being of trying to survive out in the wild.

So would you spend winters in Inuvik and then pretty much all summer out at a camp?

No, basically, yeah. From Inuvik?

Yes.

I go trap from Inuvik or trap from here and go have a line out and take my family out fishing.

So even in winter, you rode on the land quite a bit when you were trapping? Yeah, yeah.

Traveling around pretty much.

Pretty much year round out on the land. I mean, that's kind of. I'm sure for some people from the south, that seems a little odd to be out in cold weather in the middle of winter. I mean, it gets pretty cold up there. So would you. In winter, when you're out checking trap lines and things like that and hunting, would you be in a cabin? Would you put a tent up? How would you travel? And how would you spend your time on the land?

Basically, if it's just a day trip, I'd stop and make a fire and have lunch, have tea and just continue on the line or continue fishing for the evening.

That's so interesting. And, Melissa, I know you spend a lot of your youth as well, and still you head out on the land and spend a lot of your younger years on the land, too.

Mm, not necessarily my younger years. Mostly it was in the summertime when we were small, going out to our whale camp at Baby island, but being raised by my grandparents, my grandmother was a really strong advocate for education. So she believed that we needed an education and that we couldn't get the education that we needed being out on the land. So I always called myself a late bloomer because I learned how to live off the land at a later age in life when I had my kids. As my dad got older, there was things that he couldn't do. He thought that he could still do half the stuff that Somebody my age would be able to do. So I spent a lot of time out at his delta camp with him, which he called Alakasek. And my son, who's now 15 years old, was raised up out there for the first few years of his life. So my dad was able to teach both of us how to hunt, how to fish, how to trap, how to survive off the land. And he made sure that we knew that had anything ever happened to him or if we had broke down, we'd know what to do. And being raised up at the whale camp, every summer I raised my kids up out there. I used to cut muktak with my kids on my back.

Maybe you could explain what muktuk is. What is muktuk?

Muktuk is beluga whale. Like Daniel. Daniel is a hunter in our family now. He goes out every year. We go to his camp at Whitefish Station and we harvest beluga whales. And from that we eat what's called muktak. And we also, with the meat, we make mipku, dry meat. And not very many families now go out like they did long ago. With the high price of gas and groceries, it makes it pretty hard for families to go out there. And a lot of families can make it out for a weekend or for a few days here and there, but we've been lucky for the last few years to make it out for at least two or three weeks and harvest for year round winter.

And I understand that the population of beluga whales is doing really well, that there's a pretty large number,

but lately they have stopped it. But in the past few years they've been doing tagging of the whales to keep track of them, which made it pretty hard for some of us who go down a bit later to harvest bluegaws because they've been, you know, chased and tagged already. So harder for us to capture them. But they've stopped that taking program, so hopefully things will be better. And we usually go down in August when the herring are running at Whitefish Station so that we're able to make dry fish and whatever while we're there to basically kill two birds with one stone.

Now that might sound strange to some people eating that muk, the muktuk, but that's quite nutritious, isn't it? I mean, that's a very healthy food.

Yes. For those people who have never heard of muktuk are wondering how it tastes. It's almost like squid, if they've ever eaten squid. It tastes like, not that I've eaten squid, but

the Texture of the calamari, Like. Yeah, something like that.

Okay. Okay, that's interesting.

When Daniel and I, we have friends who are non indigenous that come over and visit us and want to try muktak, we usually try to give it to them cooked because the cooked tastes a little bit better than the raw. A little bit softer than raw mak duck.

Is the raw muktuk chewier?

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yes.

Kind of chewy. Which do you prefer? Do you prefer it raw or do you prefer it cooked?

Cooked.

Cooked.

Like it either way, cooked or raw.

Okay. No, that's. That's really interesting. Again, a lot of people just have no idea about muktuk and what it's like. And now I know that since the COVID crisis, you have headed out to a camp and I guess a little earlier than you usually would. Maybe you could describe where that camp is, what it's called, and how far away from Inuvik it is and how you would get there.

Yeah, it's north, north of Inuvik, roughly 40 km. 40 something kilometers. Maybe two and a half hours can do ride depending on the terrain of the land. It's not too snow drifty or there's no snow. Sometimes the tundra is quite rough on the machine, so sometimes we'd have to take our time. And it's located in the Husky Lake region, south of Husky Lake here. And our camp is located in Ration Bay in Husky Lakes. It's called Ration Bay Camp. It's this tenting out canvas tent.

Okay, so you're in a canvas tent

and for most post camp. Yeah. Spring.

What have your temperatures been like since you've been. You've been going out there for close to a month now, haven't you?

Yes, we were out there for roughly 30 plus days and we took a break last week. So this is our second time coming into town to do some laundry and clean up. And we're just. We're just on our last little bit here to head back out and head out for the rest of the spring temperatures.

What have the temperatures been like?

Temperatures were pretty cold at the first. The first week was like minus 30, 30 with minus 40 wind chills.

And you were in a tent for that, all of that?

Yes, for one week. One week. We roughed it in the high winds, up to 80 to 90 kilometer hour winds and the temperature was well way down in the -20, 30 area with the wind chill. So we kind of roughed it for the first week, but we adjusted. It took us a little time to adjust to Back to getting into the groove of trying to get used to the weather again after being cooped up in the house for all winter. So every year, we always have to try to gear ourselves up to get used to it again.

And what would you use to heat the tent? Like, what do you have for heat inside?

Wood stove. We burn wood. Okay. We burn wood. And yeah, there's. There's a good supply of wood up there for. To keep us warm.

And did you head out that early specifically because of the COVID virus?

Yes, we did. Yeah.

Yeah, we went out early, Rob, because as soon as we. The public health orders came out for the Northwest Territories, having my elderly mother, who's 63 years old, staying in the same house, a child under 18, and, you know, me being a social butterfly all my life, it was kind of hard for me to be cooped up in my home in Inuvik. So, you know, to keep my mother safe and our son safe, we thought, well, you know what, we're gonna pack up and we're gonna go. And we left on a moment's notice. You know, we were. We.

We didn't plan anything, really. We just up and left, basically got our provisions, and then we were out for. For the. Up until now.

Are there. Are there other people doing the same thing? Are there. You know, are you.

There was quite a bit of people up here that own cabins out in the Delta area. Yes, the Delta region here. And a lot of them took refuge out at their camps as well, too, to over this Covid crisis. So, yeah, a lot of people are inevaluate and Inevaluate Regional Corp. And stuff like that are helping beneficiaries with provisions to go and spend the rest of the spring out at their cabins.

Well, I think that's about the. What I would call the ultimate social distancing. I mean, you talk about a safe place and a healthy place, you know, to be out in your tent. And so how do you spent most of your time when you've been up at the camp?

We've been busy hauling wood. Hauling wood and fishing. Doing a lot of fishing this time of the year? This time of the year, we're basically out there too, fishing for lake trout and stuff.

So that'd be primarily lake trout you're getting?

Yes.

Daniel was actually lucky. We ventured around and found a few new spots that I was able to catch fish. And just before I get into that story, I usually tease my husband or when other people are asking how I catch so much fish, because I'm normally The one who catches a lot of fish. And this year we caught like over 90 fish. And I think out of that 90 fish, Tyron and our son Tyron and Daniel must have caught maybe about 40. And I caught the rest. And so I usually joke with people and say, my husband doesn't need to buy a hooker. He's got his very own, the fish hooker. Anyways, we went out venturing for a new spot, and I was able to catch a fish there. So we marked it on. On Google Maps where that spot was, and Daniel was fishing with us, and both of us got a nibble. But this nibble was different from lake trout, because when lake trout nibble, they tug.

Right.

This one was a pulling, like, right down. And I kept looking at Daniel and I said, this doesn't feel like a trout. Maybe it's something else. And he said, yeah, it's nibbling on my hook. And then he goes right there, and he pulled it out, and it was a big loss.

Oh, a loss. Yeah.

A burbot, as people would call it.

Yes. Yeah. So there's a lot of lush in the river, isn't there?

Yes, Lod in the delta here.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Okay, so lots in the lakes as well.

Now, would there be. Maybe it's the wrong time. I was thinking, would there be caribou up there as well?

Yes. Yes. We were lucky to run into a herd here. The first couple of weeks we've been venturing to this place, overseeing rest of the middle of the middle Husky Lakes area to see the big lake. And we were not quite fortunate at the first because we've been missing them and they were traveling into the. No hunting zone. We have a hunting zone here. We have to follow regulations and stuff, too, so. And the first few times, we were unlucky to meet up with or catch them at the crossing so we could herd them back to the hunting zone. So, okay. Last time we were. We were on Sunday. We were. Sunday, we were coming back to the. Coming back to the highway to come back to Inuvik. And we've been lucky to spot some caribou crossing the big lake. And we just happened to stay out for one night, and we were lucky to harvest a couple.

And that was actually Rob, my very first caribou hunt.

Oh, wow.

My very first in my life. Growing up, we traveled to Old Crow a lot with my grandmother, and after she passed away in May of 2010, she wanted us to keep that connection. So I started traveling there a lot with my children, and I was fortunate enough to get, not see. Like to see caribou, but not to hunt. And we always came home with meat. And a few years ago, I started bringing my husband to Old Crow with me. And during one of my visits, I was able to get him rights to hunt on Bantu Kuchen land so that he is able to harvest caribou with our son without having to rely on anybody else to help them.

Okay.

Okay.

So I was looking forward to actually going on a caribou hunt in Old Crow with my husband, but it happened a little sooner than actually neat to see. Like, now I know what my uncles went through, what my dad went through to harvest caribou. People think that, yeah, you go and you can get caribou meat and then bang. But no, it's not. It's a lot of work because it's not a one person job.

Mm. And that'd be barren land.

Caribou be a really skilled person to harvest more than two or three animals. So, yeah, pretty smooth at it. Yeah.

I was actually quite mesmerized with Daniel at how fast he worked. The first caribou we got, it took him Maybe an average 15 minutes to cut skin and cut up the whole caribou.

Oh, wow.

And then we ventured. We were on our way home by one of the trails and we followed some fresh caribou tracks. And lo and behold, it took us right on ration bay. That caribou, we saw it, so we had to follow it into the hunting zone and. Which was not far behind our camp. And he got that one which took another half hour for him to skin it and butcher it all up. And I felt kind of like guilty standing there watching him. I was just the wife who was passing the knife or doing this or doing that and watching and was asking a lot of questions. Then I thought I better not ask too many questions because he's got a knife in his hand and he's getting caribou.

So you could be pretty self sufficient then up at your camp. I mean, you got fish, you got caribou not too far away. So really, I mean, what else would you need up? Maybe some flour and things like that. Would that be pretty much all you need?

Yeah. Flour, sugar, coffee, soup mix. Yeah, yeah,

yeah. That's so amazing. I mean, again, to be able.

Birds and stuff. Yeah.

Oh, that's right too. So, I mean, would there be geese coming back now and things like that that people would start to hunt too?

Yep. Should be here anytime soon. In the next couple weeks or so.

Yeah.

Here they're Piling up down in the southern parts of the nwt. So hopefully in the next two weeks or so, if the weather cooperates and stays nice, we should be seeing some birds in the air.

Yeah, you know, they're on their way now. I heard that there were some people from the south, you know, talk about, you know, going to a place where there's. There's less Covid. But I heard there was people from the south actually trying to get up there to places like Old Crow and that.

Yeah.

Really?

Yeah, I heard about that, too. One of my relatives had messaged me on good old Facebook and said that there was people trying to get in there, but the community of Old Crow, along with chief and council, stopped them from coming into the community, which is good. I'm glad that people are taking these precautions because it is scary. It's pretty scary. And I remember when my grandparents were alive, my dad used to always tell me to prepare for, you know, the world's gonna change. And he saw. He managed to see a bit of it when he was still alive. He died tragically in 2008. And, you know, I was actually as sad as it was. I was actually glad that, you know, him and my grandmother are not alive today to see all this that's happening, you know, especially my dad, to see everything that's happening on his. On his homeland, you know, the land that he loved and the land that, you know, brought him plenty. And if he was alive today, he wouldn't be a very happy camper.

Yeah, I mean, things are changing. It's interesting you mentioned that. I've talked to some other people in different communities about what they're seeing as far as climate change. And I know, you know, Daniel, with your experience and amount of time out on the land, are you seeing many changes when you're going out on the land now compared to, say, five years ago, 10 years ago?

Yes. Every year since. Yeah, it's been changing a lot here. The delta erosion, a lot of erosion up in the hills area, see the permafrost coming through. And not far from here, a few years ago, the river collapsed.

Oh, wow.

The river collapsed. And you never, ever think a place like that would ever melt. And there's lots of slumping and stuff like that over all of the tundra and the delta too, now. Yeah.

So the land is changing for sure.

Yep. The rivers are with all that. I guess some of the rivers are getting shallow now, too, once the fall time comes.

Yes.

It's at the lowest, lowest tide or whatever, so a lot Of. Lot of, lot of change in the last 10 years or so.

Yeah. And I mean, some of those channels to begin with, quite a few years ago aren't, you know, super deep. So if the water levels start to go down, that'll make travel more difficult and things like that.

In the summer, you can't access most. Some channels too, so got to find another way around.

Wow.

And a lot has changed for, for Daniel too, in terms of trapping. You know, we've been living together for four years now, and when we first started living together, he did good, you know, he. He was. Managed to supplement our income a bit by trapping and then he taught our son how to trap. And the second year they did that. They did a good job. But the last two years they've been lucky to catch a few, you know, animals are not as plentiful as they used to be. And even, even when we're out whaling, you know, there's lots of sandbars. Sometimes the water drops and makes it. Making it hard for us to get out there in the boat and.

Yeah.

And get those whales.

Yeah. Now you. When you're up at your camp, what do you do? I mean, you hunt and you fish and how do you ever get bored up there or I mean, what do you do to spend the time?

Never, Never a dull moment. Always got to try to find a way to entertain my wife, so always gotta joke around, piss her off some way just to get a good laugh. Do a lot of. We play a lot of cards.

Oh, okay. I think you're being a little, you know, you're not bragging at all, but you're quite a musician, aren't you? I mean, do you take guitar and fiddle with you at all up there?

No, no, not in the.

No, it's too cold. But if white fish. We do sometimes when we go out to the coast. He does.

Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Just a little bit too cold to keep in the tent. So. Yeah, because we're away from. Way, way away from our tent. And soon, as soon as breakfast is done, we're packed and gone for the day. Spend the whole day. Yeah.

And earlier we. Daniel forgot to mention. I just want to touch up on, you know, when, when he first started taking me to Husky Lake four years ago, we were going by the Ski Doo Trail, which took two and a half hours. And now we're a bit spoiled by the nitty Tuck highway because it takes us 40 minutes to get there by road and then another half an hour, 40 minutes to get into our camp. So.

Okay.

So we usually go, take our truck and drive up the highway to a place called Hans Bay, unload our skidoo, load up the toboggan and start crossing. And, and I, I was telling him at the camp the other day last week, I said I missed coming by the trail.

Yeah, no, it's different, isn't it? It starts to change when you can go part of the way by truck and part of the way by skidoo instead of going by ski doo all the way.

Yeah.

And even going to Whitefish, we're able to drive to Tuck and It's just a 20 minute boat ride. Where we go from Inuvik, it's four hours.

Right? Right.

Yeah. I mean, it all depends on how, how calm the ocean is.

Yeah, yeah. I mean, change. Some things about change are good, but then you miss some things that are different, you know, that you don't do anymore, like you say. I mean, some of those skidoo trips, you stop, you have tea, you're able to talk for a while and things like that, and it changes. I mean, it's nice, you get there quicker, but you likely do miss some of those other things, I think a lot.

Because two years ago, Rob, when we were traveling up to Husky Lake by the trail, we got stuck smack dab in the middle of a reindeer herd there was crossing, so we had no choice but to stop our machine and wait for the herder to come and herd them across. And I think we were stuck in the herd for maybe about an hour, an hour and a half. And I'm sitting there in my skidoo with a bunch of reindeers grunting at me and staring at me and trying to sniff me, and I was trying to light a smoke and trying to hold my, my, like my cool. And then the reindeer herder came and herded them across and we weren't able to start our skidoo until they were so many feet away from us so that we don't scare them back to us, basically.

How big is that herd?

I'm not too sure. There's a few thousand. Few thousand animals?

Yeah, yeah.

So the number, but rough estimate anyways, 3,000.

Wow. And that, that, you know, we, that herd has quite a history in how it came to that area too, doesn't it?

Yes.

Yeah. Yeah. It came from Alaska, 1930s era. Yeah. Okay.

Yeah. If you're traveling out by skidoo, you can see some of the reindeer herder cabins. Even when we're out at Husky Lake, we see some old reindeer herder cabins and Corrals where they used to herd the reindeer too. So it's actually quite interesting. And I actually love going up to Husky Lake. I look forward to it every year. But in the modern world, you know, there's bills to pay and you have to keep your power on, you have to pay your rent. And so, you know, we have to stay in town the majority of the year to make money. And I wish it was so easy to just live in the land year round. But now with this Covid and all this finance and support that we're getting from our invaluable organization, we are able to do that and we are actually building my family's rebuilding my family's Delta home at my dad's camp called Alekastic. We're gonna rebuild there and have a camp in the Delta. And then we plan on going down to Baby island where my family whale camp is, and rebuilding a smaller camp so that my family is able to go down there and use it as they, as they please and it's not going to go to waste.

You say rebuilding the Delta camp, What happened to the first one?

My dad was given support through the NWT Housing Corporation a few years back and was able to build actually a nice two story house out there. And like I said, he passed away in 2008, so nobody knew what was happening with the camps, what's gonna happen? So it was taken down, which was actually quite hard, and, and just nobody with being busy working and other family members having medical issues, some living out of town, just nobody kind of took the role to say, okay, well, I'm gonna, you know, rebuild daddy's house. And so we, I thought, you know, now I'm set. I have a husband, we have a family. We like to be out on the land. Let's rebuild and let's call it our own. But it's not going to be our own. You know, we're going to share it gonna, you know, because my dad always told me when, when we're leaving the camp, always leave the camp open because somebody might be stuck and need to make a fire.

Yeah, yeah. No, that's the northern way.

Yeah. Some people still live in that still believe in leaving their camps open to people for emergencies.

Oh, that's, that's fantastic. So, you know, if you had any advice to give people in the south, you know, who are dealing with COVID and, you know, you're living a particular way right now to, you know, stay safe from COVID and keep it from spreading, what would you say to people who are out there about COVID and what they can do.

Yeah, take the. Take it. Just take serious and stay home. That's safest everybody can be. I guess nothing, nothing much I could say about that, but just safe distancing and stuff like that.

So you bet my word of advice would be, you know, like Daniel said, stay home, practice that self distancing, wash your hands, stay away from. From gatherings, from this and that. Recently in the Mackenzie Dalta, it's been tough on a few families because there's been a few deaths. And you know, when somebody dies in the community or in the region, the whole region pulls together for that family. But we haven't been able to do that because of this Covid. We're not allowed to have gatherings. So you know, the more that we self distance and take these necessary precautions seriously, the faster life will be back to normal. And for us in Inuvik it's different because like I said, my grandparents went through the flu. Flu pandemic. And then for us to be in a pandemic, we thought, you know, this will never happen to us. That will not happen to us. We just thought we were 10ft tall and bulletproof. And now here we are right in the middle of a pandemic and we had no idea. So that's why we took off out in the land.

Yes.

Yeah. And it must be particularly hard right now up there because aren't we kind of entering the time of year where people are having jamborees and things like

that usually every communities. Yeah. Was a big, big, big upset to a lot of the communities over that. But everybody's now there's Internet and everything. So everybody's doing everything through Facebook now.

Yeah, there's a lot of online Port McPherson started their online events. Tuktuk Tuk has started their online events. Inuvik's gonna start pretty soon. Speaking about the jamboreeze being cancelled, Daniel took a big hit this year. You know, being one of the main musicians in the McKenzie Delta. He usually plays at the jamborees which like I mentioned earlier, helps supplement their income. Yeah, I know it was for the safety of the region and other people to cancel the events. However, you know that that left a hole in our pocket and behind on some bills because we usually depend on that that helps us get out on the land. Is that extra money. And he wasn't able to make that this year. So it was kind of hard on us.

Well, hopefully once all this settles down and life gets back to as normal as it will be again, there'll be some special events that, you know, maybe some celebrations when people can finally get back together again. That would be pretty nice.

It'd be pretty neat if something like that happens. Yeah.

And maybe one last question for you again. A lot of people, when I'm talking to them, they go, you know, someday we'd love to go north. And where would you tell us to go north if we were going to travel north? And Inuvik and the Delta is, you know, one of those places I always mentioned. What would you tell people around the world about why should they come and visit the Mackenzie Delta when it's safe? Again, why should they come and visit the Mackenzie Delta?

There's a lot of historic sites up here, A lot of tourism stuff happening here, too. So we're not isolated. Our town isn't isolated.

We don't live in igloos and we do have running water.

We live in houses. There's a lot of sightseeing, lots of fishing, lots of sport fishing you can do here.

Well, I guess with the road all the way to tuck now, too, that's a little extra place that people can see easier.

Yes. Lot of good view of talking about Husky Lakes. They could come and view what Husky Lake looks like from the highways. Yeah, that's neat.

Well, thank you both of you so much for making time to be on the podcast. And I wish you all the best. And you guys are heading back out

to camp, that's where tomorrow, rest of the month of May.

Well, you have a great trip back and I wish you all the best.

Yes. Thank you, Rob.

Thank you very much, Rob.

Okay, thank you. Bye bye. Thank you for listening to this episode of Arctic the Culture Cure. For more information about my novels or to inquire about my presentations, please Visit my website, www.robertfagan.com. we'll join you again on the next episode of Arctic the Culture Cure.