Photo: Ferry incoming

Ferry incoming, originally uploaded by Extended sojourn.

This is a shot from the Fort Providence ferry heading south across the Mackenzie River from Yellowknife. Because there is no bridge across the river, Yellowknife is not accessible by road from the rest of Canada for about three weeks each spring when the once-frozen river breaks up. Despite the thick, slushy, icy waters, the ferry often keeps running all through December until they can set up an ice-crossing a few kilometres downstream. While the winter transition is often seamless, there are times when the ferry passage becomes too choked with ice and stops running a few days before the ice road gets going. As a plug for checking the conditions of your route before travelling, let me say we were almost stuck on the same bank you see here, waiting to return to Yellowknife. We crossed Friday; the ferry stopped running the next day.

During the uncertain breakup period, stores bring in stacks of tractor trailers and gas stations fill up reserve tanks of fuel, hoping to have enough stock. Crates of fresh goods are actually ferried across by helicpoter during this time. A helicopter ferry ride across might cost about $300, regardless of the number of passengers; something I unfortunately never had the chance to do.

And cars do drive over roads made of ice for part of the year in the NWT. Many of these roads cross over frozen bodies of water. It's not as scary as you think, though people who don't admit to an element of fear are probably lying or don't have much to live for. The whole of the territories is connected by a series of winter roads for part of the year. We'll save this topic for another time.