The weatherman said it was going to a day of showers and a little cool. To our amazement when we open the door we were dazzled with a white carpet and snow steadily falling from the sky. A welcome surprise! It was dead calm and snow was floating endlessly downward. It was covering everything apart from the black tarmac of the airport.
Check the contrast from the afternoon previous of the core logging shed. It was a first for me bringing in trays to be logged with snow all over them but it wasn’t really cold.
The snow turned to sleet and eventually rain through the day. The white blanket turned to muddy puddles by the afternoon.
Check the contrast from the afternoon previous of the core logging shed. It was a first for me bringing in trays to be logged with snow all over them but it wasn’t really cold. The snow turned to sleet and eventually rain through the day. The white blanket turned to muddy puddles by the afternoon.
Driving all over the tarmac to the chopper and going for walks along the active airstrip is just part of a day’s activities. Yesterday we saw a chopper take off from the workshop in the open yard with people driving past.
Today, Brendo left to go back to Vancouver and then Oz. Tan and saw him off by standing 25m from the runway. The plane got fairly close to us as it took off.
We have moved rooms into a nicer one except that it was cold and the water was lukewarm. Brendo had been complaining about so we called up maintenance and it was fixed in minutes. Yay! I saw an art-house shot the other day. Guess what this is?
It’s the hinge on the dunny door complete with smoke stains. The hinge makes a perfect smoke resting spot while you are sitting on a crapper. Now that is a mod-con.
Then we had a traditional Turkey dinner with all of the trimmings followed by (again traditional) pumpkin pie! 
The food was fabulous with Kim and Judy doing an awesome job and we all rolled out of there vowing to travel back the next night and eat well again. The boys had a drink and I hung out in the girls tent listening to some music and he headed home around 10.30pm.
The photo above (also taken outside of the core shed) shows just how close we are to the planes - note the seaplane just above the propane tank).
As an aside for people who love checking out different websites, have a look 
A quick helicopter safety induction, we buckled in and took off on our next adventure. Dan got the front seat. 
This helicopter only has two blades (compared to the other one that has three) and is much more powerful. In no time at all we lifted off. Whilst the helicopter itself is noisier and not as smooth as the other one it was still awesome, particularly when Jim flew really low at around 100 feet. We picked up Derek and Matt who were doing some GPS work. Unfortunately no one seemed to know where the next set of holes were and we spent some more time in the air aimlessly looking around with Brendo giving comments from the super coach in the back seat. We weren’t complaining! At the next stop we all got out to meet Bobby and Travis, the linecutters for around 30 minutes whilst Jim did some slinging. Due to the more dangerous work involved in slinging, the helicopter pilot is not allowed any additional passengers than those involved directly in the slinging.
Thirty minutes passes quickly, all seven off us piled in and we headed back to Raven Camp stopping for a while to hover over some drill sites so Dan could take some perspective photo’s for the corporate website. At Raven, we dropped off three of the passengers and picked up Lindsay and headed back to Points North. I took the front seat for this trip. 
It was awesome, albeit a little scary when Jim showed some of his maneouvers like tilting the helicopter almost on its side whilst flying (I had to hang onto the window for fear of grabbing some of the instrumentation - the second joystick was right between my legs). It was awesome.
We got back to Raven and promptly had to put on some music “Paint it Black” by the Rolling Stones. It did used to be the theme music to Tour of Duty and this particular type of helicopter was used in the Vietnam War (a Bell 205 - Hughie Hogg or Iriquois). Brendo did his best machine gun hanging out of the side of the helicopter impersonation. An absolutely awesome day!!
We headed over to Points North which will be our new residence for the time being. Points North is around a 30 minute drive on a gravel road from Raven Camp and is located at the airport. The office is actually right next to the tarmac and no more than 20 metres from where some of the planes park up. No such thing as airport security here. When the plane is ready to leave the pilot simply comes into the room where the passengers are waiting and asks “right, we’re all ready to go then”. Dan had a man knock on the office door and ask if he would be opening the canteen once to which he replied “do I look like I run the canteen”. (note: there is no canteen here but he did have a belter of a moustache then). It’s kind of cool with the seaplanes, planes and helicopters coming and going all day and you can look out the window and see them. Again, very different from any place I’ve ever worked.
We are staying in a rather dodgy room at the moment. We share the block of rooms with lots of other men here. There are no showers or toilets for women, so Dan has to go in, check there are no men and then I get to come in. 
The boys decided to crack the 1.2 litre bottle of Bacardi we bought with us. They made it home around 12.30am from the office much worse for wear and there wasn’t a whole lot left of the bacardi either, but they had fun. They may have even squeezed in a little work in between. 
The snow stopped for a while and we headed over to Points North so Dan could give Brendan a hand logging as he is heading home to Australia shortly (there are a few Australians at the camp). 
Along the way we drove through a heavier snow drift again and stopped to shoot a video. We would post it but the link is to slow to upload the video here.
As I write this it is -3.5 with a projected low of minus 6 tonight. The heater is struggling to produce enough heat tonight!!
We got to the drop off point and checked out the river only 200m to the south. Huge shoals of fish to 60cm were swimming away and making there way up stream. They were in their hundreds and later I found they were whitefish. 
We heard Wes coming so I emptied out the cargo net of samples and sent him on his way back. Tan was out working hard, driving the massive truck and lugging samples into the truck. This is a far cry from high heels and ironed clothing in her last job. She even got mud all over her!
After the work side was finished we pulled out Tan’s new rod and she casted (eventually) in the shoal of fish. To our surprise there were no bites as the fish were busy spawning.
It was a late one trying to get as many loads out as possible. The tamaracs, a deciduous pine tree, looked nice and yellow in the late afternoon sun.
It was a nice night out. Christine and I went out for a walk taking our obligatory bear bangers and bear spray.
We had to get Judy, our night baker, to come watch.
Tan is one week down with three more to go. Alcohol free!!
Even Cookie the pug had to wear an embarrassing white sheep skin coat!!! 
The boys braved the cold to head out to West Bear again. They have a strict rehab policy around here. Burn it. So they lit the fire to end all fires.
Dan tries to tell me that they are working hard. However, they were throwing their steaks in aluminum foil on a spade and cooking them for lunch. Wes dropped by to start slinging samples and decided to join us for lunch. The steaks were good though Wes thought I looked like a homeless guy who hadn’t eaten for a week.
