I am now back in Fort Macleod after a somewhat longer than expected trip to Yellowknife, NWT. We were delayed on the way up and had to spend a night with the brothers in High Level due to the road being closed as a result of forest fires, but we were able to continue on the next day and arrived in Yellowknife in the early Afternoon.
Along the way we saw wild buffalo and crossed the massive Mackenzie river. When the river first came into view we commented on how huge that "lake" was. And then we realized it was merely a river feeding into Great Slave Lake. What kept amazing us was the scale of this region. The Northwest territories is a huge area of the world with a very small population. Towns are few and far between, often 6 or more hours drive apart, although most can only be reached by plane. I was just doing some research for a comparison, and the total land mass is 1.1 million square kilometers. That means you could fit all of central america inside the northwest territories... twice.
After going through hours of wilderness, Yellowknife itself is quite a surprise. It is a modern city of about 19,000 people. There are also a high ratio of apartment buildings, as they are more economical to heat in the winter time. Of course it was warm during our stay, the daytime temperatures stayed mostly in the high 20's. Daylight remained through the night although it did get fairly but not completely dark around 2 AM, just before the sun started rising again.
Generally speaking people here are very friendly, and in the ministry they are polite even if not interested. The territory is very productive within Yellowknife, but there are huge areas to the north that have never been worked. For this reason there is going to be special campaign in the fall to send groups of witnesses in by plane to these communities.
Anyways if you like reading as much as I don't, here are the pictures:
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| This is a river we passed near Enterprise, NWT. |
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| Mackenzie River seen from the bridge |
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| This is a real street name. |
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| Old town, at the bay where many people park their house boats |
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| Yellowknife Downtown seen from Pilot's Monument |
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| 10:00 PM Fishing trip. Orange light and haze due to forest fire smoke |
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| Cameron Falls, NWT |
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This is our service group with a Bible student seeing a kingdom hall for the first time.
He is from Taloyoak and studies over the phone, he was in Yellowknife
for medical treatment. |
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| We also got a tour of Buffalo Airways. This is a DC-3 |
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Our plan was to take pictures of the planes through the fence...
The staff had a better idea and gave us a full tour, even letting
us sit in the cockpit of one of the planes. |
We ended up being stuck for a few extra days due to the roads being closed, but we enjoyed our time in the North. I hope I will get to see more of northern Canada in the future.
