Northwest passage 1 Saturday August 30, 2025

It’s 3:40 in the afternoon and we’re ensconced in the Explorer Hotel in Yellowknife. All systems seem to be working. I’m going to try to put photos into this Pages document which might be an absolute nightmare when I try to put it into the blog but we shall see.

Front entrance of the hotel

Smoky sun reflected in hotel window

We didn’t get a lot of sleep last night, me because I was writing the last blog entry. Betty picked us up at 8:30 and we had a lovely drive to the airport along the back roads. We normally just hit Stoney Trail and blast through. We had no trouble getting through security except that Richard got randomly chosen to have his baggage searched. I took out my tablet and sent it through with my vest and my phone but they didn’t seem too fussed about it.

We discovered something vital about the 737-800’s: don’t pick 9A or 9B because you get a lovely bulkhead where other people have windows. I began the flight looking across the aisle out the window on the other side which, seemed to disconcert the woman sitting beside me in the aisle seat. Tough beans. Then the guy in the window seat across the aisle pulled down the shade. Rats! I discovered that if I leaned forward and twisted a bit I could see out a little sliver of window of the guy in front. That is until he decided to pull down the shade. I listened to my audio book until the woman beside me decided to go to the washroom. I thought that was a great idea since I had a large cup of tea, a Diet Coke (yes I know it’s bad for me and that Coke isn’t a nice company), and about half of my 600 ml cup of water. I followed her down the aisle but she made it back before I did so I still had to disturb her.

Trying to get a look outside

We had our snacks and more to drink and then it was Richard’s turn to wander down the aisle. I seized the opportunity to shift his stuff to the middle seat and I moved to the ‘window’ seat. By turning to the side I was able to see out a bit of the window behind me. I read all kinds of things on the engine of the plane that I didn’t know were there before. I found out where the oil goes into the engine and that you’re not supposed to stand close to the engine when it’s running.

Reading material on the engine

I also got to see the panel over the side of the engine slide back when we landed and the pilot turned on the reverse thrusters. At least I think that’s what happened,

Reverse thrusters engaged, I think

As far as seeing the terrain, I didn’t see much of that. I did get a glimpse of the ground as we started our descent and noted that there were a lot of lakes down there. As we got closer to Yellowknife the visibility became less and less and I could tell by the colour of the sun on the wing that we were looking through forest fire smoke. I didn’t see the ground until we were very close to it and by then I could smell the smoke. Not my favourite thing but I did think to bring some masks.

The shuttle to the hotels was packed with people and luggage. We were the last on and the guy beside Richard was also on the Northwest Passage trip, as were the couple ahead of me. There was one woman who looked really familiar but she didn’t acknowledge me when I tried to make eye contact. We’ll see if she ends up on the ship.

We got to the hotel and checked in and then headed out for some lunch. At the little donair place the couple at the next table said they were with Road Scholar but that’s a subset of the Adventure Canada trip so we will be seeing them again. They are from the States. I had to really ride herd on my outside voice that wanted to say, ‘I’m so sorry for you.’ When they said they would recommend Road Scholar’s trip to Africa I was thinking, ‘That’s not happening anytime soon.’

It is really windy here and it would be nice if the wind could clear some of the smoke. I fear, however, that it is just blowing more of it in. This landscape seems to be much more rocky and rugged than Whitehorse and with the wind and the smoke it has an intensity all of its own.

Smoke from our hotel room

On our way back from lunch I got all of my souvenir shopping done. I’m quite pleased with that. I wanted a t-shirt from Yellowknife and a couple of stickers. Now we can spend tomorrow wandering around seeing the sights without my having to worry about shopping.

I realize that this would be one of those times when it would be good if my phone and my tablet spoke the same language. It might be tricky trying to get the android to talk to the iPad. Oh well, I guess I’ll keep notes of which photos I want to go with which post so I can put them in when I get home.

We’re not going to eat at the hotel tonight. It’s expensive and we found a little grill that will do just fine. We will be eating ‘hotel food’ for the next two plus weeks and, while the food on the ship is good, there’s no need to start the process early.

That’s it for now. I might add to this tonight or I might not.