42 miles to Aklavik: Panda, “Go haw!” Oops ... “Go gee!”

Up around 8, tents down and breakfasted and ready to roll by 11:00. We are intending to go to a point about 12 miles from Aklavik, camp for the night on the river, and then go into Aklavik tomorrow morning.

The skies are clear but there is a strong head wind. Martha takes my team out for the first few miles to settle them down. The power of 10 dogs is remarkable and even after they have run a few miles, I nearly lose the sled as I pull the hook (the brake) from the snow and we leap forward. But I hang on with a remarkable show of strength, or fear of losing the sled at take-off! Over the bumps we go, around the corners with some control, down through patches of soft snow, and the dogs just keep on pulling. Back onto hard snow. Max looks around as the sled slides sideways down a ridge – “Sorry Max!” It is a glorious day for sledding despite the wind, and we make good progress.

Buma is limping a little, so I stop the sled and Rod takes him off the gang-line. He heads off into the distance chasing after the other sleds. Going through some soft snow, the dogs lose the trail and start following an old snowmobile track. I call out to Panda – “go haw” (meaning go left), and he does! Remarkable! Unfortunately I should have said “go gee” so that he would go to the right. So now I call “Panda, go gee” and he angles the team to the right. Another call and he goes further right until we are back on the trail.

We are in a huge part of the river now – it must be close to a kilometer wide in places. Mountains are off in the distance, and there are large conifers lining the banks of the river, some waiting to fall when the snow and ice thaws. These will then float into the Beaufort Sea and be washed up as driftwood.

Further on we hit soft snow again and as the sled sinks in and the dogs pull me through, my feet are dragged off the runners and I roll off the track into the soft snow. Rod grabs the team and Martha sleds for a while. After a snack break for the dogs and lunch for us, I’m back on the sled and we decide to go all the way to Aklavik.

Steve goes ahead on his snowmobile to bring the dog truck to the end of the trail, and Buma is hooked back into the gang-line while we pass a dog yard. For a couple of miles, we wind through a trail of small trees that line the side of the river, and can see the Aklavik airport off in the distance. A snowmobile comes by to check us out. We will be the talk of the town tonight - it’s Saturday night, and in Aklavik we are the entertainment!

It's clear that we are coming to the end of this journey, and this is the last sledding the dogs will do for the season. And somewhat suddenly, the trail comes to an end, and we are in Aklavik. 170 miles (270km) of dogsledding  with 28 dogs, is behind us - in fact the dogs, Martha, Rod, Steve & David have twice that distance.

The dogs are loaded into the truck where they will sleep for the night. We’re pitching our tents in the airport parking lot, just down the road. And ours is tied to 3 heavy metal pipes to stop it blowing away in the 30 knot wind.

This is our last night camping, and we are touching civilization again. Snowmobiles and cars come by to see our camp and to meet the dogs. Sarah, the wife of the senior elder, Doug Irish, comes into  our tent to see how we are living. The Inuvialuit live in comfortable homes with all the conveniences that Canada offers, including cable television and internet. They are intrigued (as many of my friends are) by our desire to experience the wilderness in such an apparently uncomfortable manner, and to travel by dog sled.