It is now the end of November and I have signed on for another trip to Nunavut. This trip I will be staying in two communities within the Kitikmeot region. Cambridge Bay is first on the itinerary, followed by a new community, Kugluktuk (formerly known as Coppermine). This trip will be quite different from the last in terms of daylight (and temperature!). In June, I got to experience the midnight sun, which was wonderful at first, but eventually it takes its toll making sleep impossible, I was so tired I couldn't even write my blogs for the last week of the trip. Before I arrived I assumed it was going to be twenty-four hours of complete darkness, however, I was glad to see upon my quick stop in Kugluktuk that there are actually a few hours of twilight. I asked a local about the sunrise and sunset, currently sunrise is 10am and sunset is 3pm, but everyday they lose seven minutes of daylight. This means that by the time I leave there will be complete darkness.
On Monday, I flew into Edmonton, stayed the night with friends, then left for an 8am flight to Yellowknife, NWT. As I was signing in at the airport I was warned that we may not be able to land in Cambridge Bay due to bad weather conditions, but an attempt will be made and the pilots will decide whether or not it is safe to land as we get closer.
I met Terry at gate one at the Yellowknife airport waiting for our flight. We didn't have long to chat as we only had about 20 minutes connection time between flights. We crossed our fingers and were hoping the weather would clear so that we would be able to land safely. We had a scheduled stop over in Kugluktuk, followed by a disappointing announcement that we will be flying back to Yellowknife due to blizzard conditions and no visibility. Apparently when the weather is that bad everything is shut down in the community, even adults get snow days up North! So, great news for the adults and children in Cambridge Bay, but not so great news for me.
Our major concern was finding somewhere to stay for the night. We met a very nice gentlemen named Glen on our flight who was in the same predicament as we were. He happened to have a cell phone that actually worked in Kugluktuk (good old-fashioned 2G), so he started calling all of the hotels from the phone book in Yellowknife. Not one hotel had a room to stay in, and we were looking for three rooms! As a last resort, Glen contacted a travel agent who was thankfully able to find three rooms at the Arnica Inn.
After our lovely round trip flight we returned to the Yellowknife airport and hopped in a cab to the Arnica. We were greeted at the front desk by a lady who looked like she was straight from the eighties, which happened to match the décor of the Arnica Inn perfectly. She was probably in her fifties, with short puffed up hair, huge red rimmed glasses and a few to many layers of dark blush applied in a straight line across her cheeks. The motel was two stories and in desperate need of renovation, as I said before, it came from the eighties too. I was grateful enough to have a room for the night, but there was a reason that this was the only place in Yellowknife with vacancies. My room was relatively clean, but there were holes in the wall and someone took the case from the thermostat so there were exposed wires and I couldn't change the temperature. The heating system rattled and woke me up almost every hour. When my alarm went off at 6am I couldn't have been happier to get the heck out of there and get back to the airport.
Second attempt to get into Cambridge Bay.
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