Yesterday started out a typical mid-winter Tuesday. These February mornings, the sky lightens noticeably earlier than at winter solstice and we follow suit.
Second cup of coffee down, the bright ball of fire is above the hills and on this day an energetic conversation started, discussing the need to get a load of groceries in really soon. Each small bush plane charter costs us more than $1,700, and so it is a delicate game of getting the timing exactly right so this fresh food would last us until June, after break-up. When we had our last grocery order in September we hoped it would last a full six months and we were coming up on that now.
There are a lot fewer small bush planes available these days to bring supplies out to Reliance, and we didn’t need enough to warrant a Twin Otter. Everyone who has a small plane is booked with wildlife survey work and we were going to be lucky to find someone who was free right now and could bring us 600 pounds of groceries. We could have scheduled sometime in March, but by then we would unhappily be drinking black coffee and also would have run out of both onions and potatoes.
Libby Whittall Catling/NNSL photo
Living in the remote bush, mental health is number one, and the thought of completely running out of important stuff felt more depressing than I wanted to deal with this winter. I put out a few calls and emails and found out there was one small plane available, YK Open Water Charters, and that was for the next day! I called the Yellowknife Co-Op office to see if they could put an order together for me on such short notice and Joe said yes! I called the pilot back to confirm the charter and just like that, suddenly we were in business! I didn’t even have a grocery list prepared, but since we generally order the same things we mostly have it memorized by now.
Within 25 minutes I had the list typed up, we discussed sizes and quantities and then added more items to the list. I was having a hard time visualizing how everything would fit into this plane and what the weights of items would be. To be safe I figured we should go light on some things. Better to be light than having too much weight or bulk and having to leave things behind on the tarmac.
The whole of the day was busy on the phone and with emails, confirming items and arranging with a friend to get us two gallons of beautiful poppy-red floor paint and our mail. Roger went out by snow machine and hauled six empty oil drum barrels down the end of Police Bay to indicate the landing strip. The online weather forecast for the next day started to look bad and we went to bed not knowing what Wednesday would bring, weather being such a fickle thing.
The day dawned earlier than most, excitement proving a better stimulant than coffee. The weather did not look good at all. The groceries were all packed and waiting at the Co-Op for pilot pick-up at 9 a.m. The Environment Canada web site for Yellowknife is updated every 30 minutes and we watched the visibility go from 3 kilometres to 2 km and back to 3 km, then hold. Here in Reliance the visibility was 15 km. The question was, what weather was in between us and Yellowknife? Hard to know and it was up to the pilot to make the call if he thought it was safe to fly. He had gotten our stuff to his truck and was just waiting for the scattered flurries to clear, but it wasn’t looking good. Trying to figure out a back-up plan for the groceries if he couldn’t fly sent me into a bit of a panic, both loudly cursing and praying to relieve the stress of having zero control over the weather gods.
The email came at 12:30 p.m., he was on his way! We could see dark grey snow clouds to the west, towards Yellowknife and sent powerful positive energy towards the little yellow plane, we wished the snowy fog to clear so it could make its way safely to Reliance.
The groceries should be half way to us by 1 p.m. We three dressed up in our winter gear and Roger started the skidoos. Around 1 p.m., we started to head down to the end of Police Bay, Roger going first and putting up a plastic windsock on one of the barrels. I was the last one following, and as I got close to the landing strip, I felt the plane swoop over me! Good for Peter! A true northern bush pilot, he had tackled the challenge and come through for us!
As fast as I can type this paragraph, we unloaded the plane into two sleighs. Our greetings and farewells were so quick, that a good pat on the shoulder was all the time we had to express our gratitude. The sight of yellow bananas exposed to the -20 C air caused us to cut all conversation short. “Gotta save 5 kilograms of bananas! Thank-you! Thank-you!” was the last good-bye as we zoomed off to make the fast 2 kilometre trip home. Unloading the sleighs even quicker, we just saved the fresh produce that almost froze, but didn’t quite.
Except for the popcorn I forgot, we are good to go with fresh food now until break-up and the first tourist planes in June.