Day Trip Out to Crystal Mountain

One of the most popular things to do up here is to take a trip out to a nearby mountain for some hiking, scenic views, and crystal hunting. Crystal Mountain (AKA Dean Hill) isn’t really a mountain, maybe by Manitoba standards. I would honestly call it a large hill, but because it is surrounded by relatively flat tundra it really sticks out! It is called Crystal Mountain because there are a lot of quartz crystals lying around on the surface of the mountain.

The smaller lump on the left is Crystal “Mountain”, and the larger hill on the right is Mount Pullen. From the point where the picture was taken it is probably about a 30 minute BV ride, granted you can't go very fast over the tundra.

To get out to the mountain from Alert we have to drive an hour in a BV across the arctic tundra (nobody seems to know what the acronym BV stands for).

This is a BV. This is the one I got to ride in (Haven’t yet taken the course to drive it, but I will soon, hopefully!). The first ride was LOTS of fun, pretty bumpy as you can see it doesn’t really have much (any?) suspension. These BVs can go nearly anywhere, apparently they are also aquatic and can traverse across water. I don’t think I would be willing to try that though.

So after the hour BV ride over the tundra and through the valley between the two mountains we finally made it up to the top of Crystal Mountain. It was perfect weather for a day trip up the mountain and the scenery was awe inspiring.



It was also a pretty warm and sunny day. As you can see it was quite the struggle to keep my eyes open for this picture while the sun was glaring at me from my right. Behind me and to the left is Mount Poulin, which is much larger than Crystal Mountain but also much, much more difficult to climb up. Some hills and another mountain range (which is a few hundred kilometres away) are behind me to the right.

At first everyone was pretty excited to look around and take pictures, but pretty soon everyone forgot about the scenery. Once a few people started finding crystals everyone started to dig in to find their own and compare their loot among each other.



I took a few pictures of this happening and then started my own frantic search for some quartz crystals!

On the way back we stopped in the middle of the valley between the two mountains (hills…) and I snapped a few pictures. The people that were bored of taking pictures made snow-angels (pretty good ones too in my opinion!)

First Few Days in Canada's True North

Well, my summer job started out by driving to CFB (Canadian Forces Base) Trenton where I waited for my fighter jet to take me to my winter wonderland. OK, it wasn’t a fighter jet (and I’m no Defence Minister), but at least I didn’t have to take a C-130 (aka a Hercules). What was supposed to be a 7-9 hour flight in a Herc (which are renowned for being old, loud, and generally painful flights) turned out to be a 5 hour flight in one of Canada’s most luxurious military transportation planes available: a C-17. These planes are HUGE! I have been told they can transport two LAVs (Light Armoured Vehicles), but mine only had one bus, still, impressive. Unlike any flight I have ever been on this one stuck to its schedule and we boarded the plane pretty dang close to the planned time, which was 4 AM.

When we arrived at Alert one of the first things I noticed (after the cold and barren landscape) was how friendly and welcoming the people are. Everyone on the plane was very friendly, and at the entrance to the main building for the station was a crowd of people applauding for those who had arrived with the flight. This is one of the most welcoming and kind places I have ever been. After a few introductions I received a tour of the main building from the student I would be replacing, Sarah Luce, who is also a University of Guelph Engineering student!

 

My first real day of work was Thursday and we had to travel off station to get to our lab. Unfortunately (well, fortunate for me) our truck was broken and we had to take the snowmobiles out to the lab. Snowmobiling across the frozen, windswept, arctic tundra was a lot of fun. At the end of the day we also stopped by at Suicide peak where someone had jumped off and, well, committed suicide. The view here was gorgeous, unfortunately I forgot my camera! So, from now on I bring my camera everywhere.

This past weekend Cale, one of the guys that was on my flight, and I went down to the hydrogen building to launch a weather balloon with another Environment Canada employee. This isn`t really my job, launching weather balloons is more of a novelty thing that everyone in Alert does for fun. On the way down to the hydrogen building we stopped and took some pictures.

We also ran into a few wolves and, luckily, I had brought my camera!

The first wolf was much, much, bigger than I thought arctic wolves would be. I knew they would be big, but seeing them up close was really shocking. I would guess he was about 5 to 6 feet long (not including the tail), and he looked mean!

He came within 10 feet of me and Cale so I quickly hopped into the truck. We saw a second smaller wolf a few minutes later. This one looked a lot less mean and kept its distance