From moderately atmospheric Vancouver to Ottawa for a week. And it had to be a week that was extraordinarily cold and snowy, even for Ottawa, well enough acknowledged as the second-coldest, snowiest capital in the world. And then, another week in Yellowknife, North West Territories.

He hasn't an ounce of spare flesh on his well-muscled-and-sinewed body which he is constantly challenging for physical endurance. But he doesn't take well to inordinate winter cold. Which makes Vancouver a very good home for him. He's out in all seasons; canoeing, kayaking, skiing, mountain climbing. Outdoor life registers as quality for him, so it's just as well his profession as a biologist also takes him to the great outdoors.

He's back in Vancouver now, where the temperature during the day has been hovering around 6 degrees Centigrade and residents look hopefully to the mountains to determine how much new snow may have fallen to make outdoor winter activities more inviting.

He stayed at the home of friends whom he's known from university days, biologists who work for the territorial government and with whom he has kept in touch, and sees when they travel on occasion to Vancouver from Yellowknife. They were absent for the first two days he was there, having sent him the key to their house, to let himself in. During that time he walked the ten to fifteen minutes each morning to the conference site, and then his friends returned home on Sunday evening.

Yellowknife/Wikipedia

Although he is a disciple of layering for warmth, it works well enough when you've also got a down parka to cover the layers; his down coat was not cold-proof enough to protect against the windy minus-35-degrees Celsius day-time highs in Yellowknife. His friends had loaned him a Canada Goose-type parka, and a pair of boots which would never win a glamour contest, but certainly served to keep him from frostbite.

On their return, things became fairly jolly, but as they explained, when showing him about the town, Yellowknifers tend to walk relatively short distances rather than rely on their vehicles to get them around, preferring to face the cold, which they become fairly well accustomed to, rather than dickering about with plugging in their vehicles and hoping they'll start when needed.

They went to the shores of Great Slave Lake to watch the fishing activities there. People drive their pick-ups quite a distance onto the frozen lake. Fishing holes axed into the thick ice of the lake and nets put to good use to bring in whitefish and catfish species, and they were ample in numbers. It's a beautiful setting, with treeline spruce forests embracing the town of twenty-thousand people.

Yellowknife/MikeSchurko