and eclectic galleries fi lled with items produced
by local Indigenous artists; art done using beads,
leather, paint, moose hair tufting, and soapstone.
Two shops appealed to us in particular: one
sold clothing made from the fur of wolf, bear,
and rabbit, along with beaded moccasins;
the other supplied locals with really warm
clothing meant for working outside in the
North. Our fi nal stop of the day was at the
Yellowknife Farmers Market. It had a few
craft, vegetable, and baked goods booths,
but most of the booths sold prepared
food, where we found delicious purchases
for dinner. We had options such as local
fi sh, bison, and muskox. One night, we ate
Arctic char nachos and could have ordered
fresh fi sh straight from Great Slave Lake.
The next day we explored Great Slave Lake
with a commercial fi sher. He took us and three
other people on a fi ve-hour cruise that included
exploring one of the many islands in the lake,
viewing the vibrantly painted houseboats in the
harbour, and catching and cooking four whitefi sh
for lunch. It was a warm day and this experience
felt like an authentic commercial fi shing trip.
We both feel that the highlight of our visit
to Yellowknife was the fl oatplane trip that we
scheduled for June 21, the longest day of the year.
There are several fl oat plane companies operating
in Yellowknife, and the one we chose off ered a
half-hour tour over Yellowknife and surrounding
area. The plane was a DeHavilland Beaver that
could seat fi ve passengers. We shared the plane
with the same three people who had gone on the
commercial fi shing trip with us, making the fl ight
quite aff ordable. The charter price was $450
whether there was one passenger or fi ve.
The views from 1,500 feet up were spectacular.
Our young pilot, Andrea, took off and fl ew north
toward Cameron Falls, turned south to the
small native village of Dettah, and then took us
Above: The plane
Right: From the air
directly over
Yellowknife.
We were
surprised to see
so many lakes
and so many
trees growing from
the rocky surface of
the Canadian Shield. The
North is truly beautiful.
We continued our day with a round of golf at
the Yellowknife golf course. We were given an
artifi cial grass mat to take with us as we made our
way around the course. Sand was everywhere!
The only grass we saw was around the greens,
which themselves were hard-packed sand,
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