Holloway Bar Placer Mine - Picture of the Week

Although the Watson Lake airport is still located in a strategic location for those low-flying aircraft heading both north or south and needing fuel, Watson Lake is also right below the main "airways" route for large jets travelling to and from Alaska and Asia. Many times each day, you will hear a distant rumbling sound, and when you look up you can see the white contrails that mark the path of the high-flying aircraft. Although most are on a solitary journey across the sky, occasionally you can see several aircraft, usually military, travelling together.

The community of Teslin is a several hour drive west of Watson Lake towards Whitehorse. The multiple-span bridge crosses Teslin Lake near the mouth of the Nisutlin River and is likely among the longest bridges in the Yukon. Teslin's Tlingit first nations people were the builders of our favourite snowshoes, and we often packed these hand-crafted wooden snowshoes in the back of our aircraft as part of the survival gear as they were light, large with good flotation and very durable. They were well used whenever our planes had to land on snow-covered lakes or mountain meadows.

A lot of different animals and birds live in the North. Many migrate both short and long distances, but some also stay in the North for the winter. To survive a Northern winter, there must be a supply of food and a means of transportation. Scott came across these mystery tracks a couple of weeks ago and racked his brain trying to figure out what creature left them. Suddenly, the answer was clear - the wingtip marks gave it away. This is a big Raven trying to take off with a heavy load on an uphill slope. Ravens are scavengers, so will eat almost anything - a very good trait for survival in the harsh climate found in the beautiful Cassiar mountains.

Springtime! The buds are starting to grow on the trees, the birds are coming back, and the animals are moving about more in their search for food... That probably describes spring in some parts of the country - but this photo was taken just a few weeks ago at the end of March. As you can see, there's still a mountain of snow to melt before the 2007 placer mining season can get underway on McDame Creek. This spring seems to be a few weeks behind normal in these parts of the north. Even if you wanted to go mining, you'd have to wait at least another month or two for spring to actually arrive and the water needed for placer mining to start flowing again.

The charter flying business in the North was a seasonal affair with most work being done in the summer months, but springtime usually arrived with a flurry of activity. Supplies and fuel caches were often positioned by aircraft on skiis for use later in the year. This deHavilland Otter has landed on the frozen Nahanni River in the Headless Valley - a place few have been to, but even fewer have experienced in the winter. The parks branch often flew fuel for their jet boats into the Nahanni south of Virginia Falls, and then replenished their cabins north of the falls near Rabbit Kettle Hotsprings with the supplies needed for the summer season.