March 19, 2018
Hi all, back from a bit of a hectic hiatus. Towards the end of February I applied for a part time job supply teaching at the school, just a little something to keep me busy in the winter. I got the job and have been teaching periodically when the school is short staffed, as well as helping out coaching basketball and badminton. It has been a very different experience compared to what I’m used to but it has been a lot of fun.
While I was in my first week of teaching, we received some bad news. I took Bella to the vet for an eye infection on a Monday and while we were there the vet examined a lump I had found on her back as well. It turned out she had cancer and it seemed to be spreading pretty fast. We put her on steroids to keep her comfortable and slow down the cancer but unfortunately that Friday we had to put her down. We are heartbroken as I’m sure you will all be as well, but she had an excellent life chasing squirrels around camp and getting love from each and every one of our guests. As her last week progressed she was starting to go downhill so it was sad to see her go but we were relieved she was no longer suffering.
On a more positive note, last weekend I went to Baudette, Minnesota with some friends for my bachelor party. We stayed at The Sportsman Lodge to do a 3 night 2 day ice fishing trip. We had an absolute blast and the staff at Sportsman were very welcoming and helpful. We were there in a kind of limbo for ice fishing as the walleye were moving off the reefs but not quite staged up yet, so fishing was sporadic. 5 of us caught 10 fish the first day keeping 5, and the second day we caught around 30 fish and kept 11. The size was near the smaller end but great numbers and we had a ton of fun. It was interesting to be on the other side of a tourism operation and to not have to worry about anything.
Lastly, I got picked up for some part time work by a local guy who travels doing water treatment at various northern Native Reservations. Hali’s brother Tyler was already working for him part time and they needed another guy so I got some work. Last week Tyler and I drove about 30 miles shy of as far north as you can drive in Ontario to deliver supplies to 2 different communities. We were travelling on ice roads across frozen swamps and lakes and went about 500 miles north of Ignace. The round trip took 3 very long days as the roads are beginning to deteriorate. We blew a tire on our trailer as well as got our whole rig stuck for about 3 hours. We had a 3/4 ton pick up towing a twin axle 16 foot trailer loaded down pretty heavy. The roads were so rough at one point it took 5 hours to drive 60 miles.
All in all it was a really good experience and we had a lot of fun. Although a few things went wrong and we ended up banging up the trailer pretty good we completed the trip and got all of the gear dropped off without anything serious happening. It looks like I will have some more work going with them in the next few weeks as well as there is a lot of work to be finished repairing some water treatment plants and sewage plants. We will be flying in now though to save time and wear and tear. Usually the company does fly in but this time we drove as we had about 3 tons of materials to bring up and it would cost too much to fly it all in.
The weather is starting to warm up pretty significantly and we are losing a lot of snow. Ice levels are still really high but I’m hoping the road to camp will melt off and dry out and we can get into camp early. I will be sure to keep everyone updates.
Ryan