"Should be an interesting flight......"

and as I walked across the dark and snowy tarmac to the 20 seater Hawker Sidley (that had seen slightly better days) the air steward leaned down and yelled to us: 'this is the first time we've flown this plane, should be an interesting flight....'. It was pitch dark at the Whitehorse airport and we were taking off for Dawson City, Old Crow and Inuvik and I guess he didn't know that part of my calm and pleasure about flying is saying to myself ' oh come on... they fly these things hundreds of times a month: for you it feels special but really this is just one more routine flight'. As we took off emergency lights flashed on and off, followed by slightly worried calls from the steward to the pilot warning them that something was odd, followed by the the lights going away, followed by them coming back on and staying on intermittently for a good piece of the flight... The steward settled back finally and enjoyed his cup of coffee, everyone around me went to sleep and I watched the white hills pass on by. Actually, my nerves disappeared pretty quickly- something about the sweep and the immensity of the landscape below just made jitters seem irrelevant.

We landed in Dawson City and Lisa was there to greet me and Barclay (the dog), and Susanne, who runs the Pierre Berton house up here, drove out to pick us up. They both had the immense pleasure of saying things like 'Cold!? Why this is only -25. It's a warm day up here!'... in fact, perhaps they met me at the airport just to have the pleasure of saying things like that. And now I'm tucked into the warmth and comfort of the Berton house.... oddly enough the house was recently redone by the a 'designer' TV show... so it's full of tasteful knicks and knacks.. honestly it's one of the most stylish places I've ever lived in: everything matches! There are beautiful prints on the walls, colorful Hudson Bay blankets thrown stylishly over comfy couches. I feel very swaddled in taste and comfort. More importantly it's surrounded by the calm and quiet of a small town living through a long beautiful winter, and I'm hoping it will be a place to regroup and reflect after a very busy year.