Last day in the Arctic - Kukluktuk, Nunavut, Canada; Travel woes.

September 22, 2015

Last day in the Arctic - Kukluktuk, Nunavut, Canada; Travel woes.

Time to head back to civilization - but not so fast cowboy. There are two charter flights, and Brad and I are on the second flight scheduled to depart at 11:30 AM for the three hour flight to Edmonton via Yellowknife. We taxi out to the end of the gravel runway (this is not DIA folks...they average maybe 30 passengers a day), the pilot brings the engines up to speed, and bang bang, comes the sound from the port engine. So back we go..sit in the plane for about an hour and a half while they try (unsuccessfully) to repair the engine - then off the plane for a day knocking around Kukluktuk. The locals put on a cultural show (throat singing, square dancing, drumming, etc. - a local young girl, Tabitha Stirit becomes my new best friend (see photos), and since I missed the cultural "show" back in Grise Fjord there is a silver lining at least for me. They end up flying a Canadian North jet (there are two airlines that service Arctic Canada - this is one of them) up from Edmonton. We finally take off around 8 PM, and Brad and I climb into bed around 1:15 AM, and get up again at 3:45 AM to catch our 6:30 AM flight back to Denver. Oh well, there had to be a hickup somewhere along the line.

All in all, a fabulous trip - seeing sights I'll never get to see again. The west coast of Greenland and the icebergs were definitely a highlight as were the numerous polar bear sightings, but the whole experience was great.