Recently, in a great burst of unexpected excitement, we had two young people from Norway stay with us. Like most of the Norwegians who pass through Reliance, they were following in the steps of Helge Ingstad by spending a winter on a small barren land lake in the hinterlands of the great Northwest Territories.
Near the end of February, we had heard they had decamped and were skiing our way with two weeks before we could expect them to round the corner of Station Point. We left our phone turned on in case they called for assistance. On the dawn of a balmy -10 C morning, Roger thought we should take a drive up Pikes Portage to the barren lands to check for them. It was a beautiful drive, but there were no signs of them anywhere in the fresh snow.
A few evenings later, the phone rang and on the other end was a faint voice with a strong Norwegian accent. The static on the line made it difficult to understand, but we soon learned Ingrid, 23, and Hakon, 22, had made a crucial mistake which was too bad, because they had such a successful winter. Rather than staying on their planned route they had followed a hunter’s snowmobile track away from the hard packed snow of the barren lands down into the boreal forest and were now stuck in the deep soft snow of the Snowdrift River Valley. The river ice was bad and Hakon had gone through up to his waist and now had two black spots on his toes from frostbite. They were forced to abandon the fabric canoe they had been pulling with all their gear. They transferred what they could to a couple of small hand sleighs, but were now having to make two eight-kilometre trips back and forth each day to move their stuff. Their food supplies were very low as they had expected to be in Reliance by now. It was too much. They asked if we could come and get them, if it wasn’t too much trouble.
Libby Whittall Catling photo
The next day when the travellers phoned, we gave them co-ordinates to Iris C's tent for travelling hunters and said we would meet them there in two days, if they could make it six kilometres through the tangle bush.
I decided the snowmobile rescue mission was a step above my pay grade and opted to stay home. Eight hours after I waved them off, Roger and Gus were back home alone. They had made contact and replenished the traveler’s food supplies, but it was going to take another day for them to get all their gear up from the inaccessible river valley. The plan was to rest a day and go back.
The second rescue trip was quick and successful. After showers, the young people spent the next four days at our kitchen table eating. Between mouthfuls they told us stories of their winter on the barrens and of their lives in Norway. Ingrid had recently spent a year with the Reindeer Sami and the Ocean Sami in Finmark before hiking down the entire spine of Norway and she gave me a coveted pair of curved toe Sami reindeer boots, while Hakon gave me soft woolens his grandmother had knitted to keep him warm on the barrens. I did some first aid on his frostbite, hoping for the best and the last I saw, there was no infection.
Learning firsthand about Norway was a wonderful late winter gift and we are the richer for it. Hakon is going home to take over his uncle’s sheep farm on an isolated ocean fjord and this will not be the last of Ingrid's fantastic Northern adventures. We were sad to see our new friends leave, but after all the conversations, I am glad to get back to a quiet place where I can think my own thoughts again, listening to the songs in the wind and pass the time looking out the windows for returning spring birds.