Staff Orientation: completely unlike the south

For our staff orientation, we were sent to a popular camping spot just outside of the "big city". We met with some elders who told us stories about the past. Many of them lived in canvas tents that they sewed together themselves and rarely went into town during the warm summer months.


A couple of years ago, the town was granted a tag for a bow whale. It took about 20-30 hunters to harvest this whale. Laura and I are standing in front of the skull of this enormous fish (mammal). The eye sockets were the size of frisbees and we were told that it was about 60' long when they harvested it.


Here are some fish that we took out of a net. We all were able to take one home. We had an Arctic Char fish fry that night.



Three sealskin hides that are being tanned in the sun. We thought this was a special occurence until we realized that we could count about twenty hides being tanned on our walk to school. Everyday, we see caribou and seal skins being stretched and tanned. Once, we even saw a dog being skinned!


Clearing out the nets with Dan (blonde guy) and Jeremy (with the paddle). It's hard to believe we were getting paid to do this!


A picture of Jamie holding an Arctic Char that has been cleaned. If you look closely, you can see the lines where the fish was caught in the net. Sorry I couldn't get this picture facing the proper way!