Trans Canada Expedition - Day 15 & 16

July 28, 2013 – Day 15

Locations: Inuvik, NW; Arctic Circle, YT; Eagle Plains, YT

This morning we woke up to the sky raining. Due to a majority vote yesterday, we will be climbing Tombstone Mountain instead of Mt. Edith. We started packing our gears and loading everything into the vehicles. But before that… we got scolded by Billy for our recent behaviours, especially yesterday. We hadn’t been doing our jobs properly, and yesterday night we were too loud. Even this morning’s clean-up and pack-up took a lot longer than it used to be.

It is passed the 14 day mark, so we had our reshuffle again. Now everyone now gets to do a job for at least one day. The jobs are: Navigation, Cleaning, Cooking, Vehicle Assistant, Discipline, and Tent. When we had finished up everything, we started our journey again – back towards Toronto. Along the way we will stop are various different places to see more, learn more. The road back on Dempster Highway is completely different than before. One, there are more up-hills; this means a lot of gas usage. And two, we drove during daylight; the scenery is completely different. Gone were the clouds spilling over the mountains, instead it was just luscious green mountains and blue sky. Gone were the horror movie valley we passed through, but instead it was rocky mountains, with a stream streaming through. Then all of a sudden, only telling the other vehicles, Billy stopped the car, took out his empty water bottle, got off the vehicle and disappeared towards the stream. Minutes later, Billy came back, demanded (not in a mean way) all of our water bottles and off he went, along with several others to the stream and started filling up water bottles. Gotta say, the river stream water tastes absolutely fabulous! Very fresh Northwest Territories Arctic Water. Soon we continued our way, tried to look for bears again (but failing), stopped at the Northwest / Yukon border, took a group photo, continued our way again, finally stopping at the Arctic Circle for a late lunch/early dinner.

Dining at the Arctic Circle, who woulda thunk that? The afternoon scenery and midnight scenery at the Arctic Circle is completely different. We ate to the blue sky, white clouds, and green, blue and brown rolling mountains, and nice and warm breeze. Afterwards we relaxed a bit, wrote our blogs, and was given a lesson on how to know if an area is safe from bears or not. When that is all done with, we drove to Eagle Plains for a diesel refuel and ended up camping there for the night. By the way… Eagle Plains is a small area on top of the mountain! Walk a little out and we can see the view down, skies and greenery as well as the Arctic Circle! We found out that Eagle Plains, technically is also on the Arctic Circle. So this meant that we are sleeping on the Arctic Circle for the night!

Animals spotted: Ravens (2x the size of Hazel)

Tiffany Ng

Its been 15 days in the camp. Our ultimate challenge, Trans Canada. Well, those two sentences says it all. Quite frankly, I’m not happy with the results so far. Everyone has stuck together, done good, done bad. Been through easy and hard, simple and confusion. Maybe its simply my fear, my fear of going home empty-handed, my fear of screwing up again.

I feel like I’ve enjoyed myself in the past days, but hid away my true potential; at least what I’ve been told.

Where is that cheerful, happy Tiff? Where is the Monticle self recognized a year ago?

I’m simply reflecting on my past behavior and find myself somewhat dissapointed. I hope with the help of the twics and team caps I will be able to better myself and consider the benefit of others, smoothly. As mistakes can only be made once, second times are simply by choice. Today we drove and drove until dining on the Arctic.

Grace

Today we start to return back from Inuvik, it was raining last night and this morning, so packing was more difficult. We are now driving on the Demster Highway, the road is built on the mountains, so we can enjoy the beautiful view in the car. We also took some water from a small creek, it is so clean that you can see the rocks in the creek clearly, and the water tastes nice. After we took some pictures on a Arctic circle Information board, we have dinner. The place we now stop has many wild animals’ track, Billy shows us a foot print of a bear. there are many plants and we can find two kinds of berries, one is dark blue, another is red. The blue ones look like blueberries, but all of us won’t want to taste them.

Edwin Chan

Today we had a bad start right before we left Happy Valley in Inuvik Many things had happened right before we left but no matter what happen we still made it through the packing. When left we just kept driving until we reached the river by the rocky mountain and filled our water bottle with the mountain water. After we left the river we went to the Arctic Circle for lunch and blog. Have fun.

Calvin

Today was the best of days for everyone. Last night was basically a wake up call for me. Hopefully it will be the last one. I have yet again failed to correct meet the expectations of Billy. I did not expect that the leap to an assistant Instructor would be so stressful. I hope I can actually actually meet Billy’s expectations. Hopefully I can do better in the future and learn quickly.

Edwin Cheung

Today is the time we leave Yukon. We woke at 6:30am morning. We quicky package our belonging to the shelter to cover our stuff. We then have chicken noodle soup with mackerynie, ham and egg. We then pack up and head to Wason Lake. At about 6:07 we stop at Arctic Circle for dinner. We had rice with core and tomato source for dinner. Later we head to campsite. I trip end really quiet. I have a lot happy and sad, streeday. I am good Mom and Dad Miss you <3 p="">

Mireille

Today we are leaving Inuvik, we’re in the road to go back to Toronto. Inuvik’s town is very small but people’re very nice. I keep a good memory of this town. Also I’ve to notice that everything is very expensive there and there are any bus any subway. Moreover there are purple, green, yellow and red houses and in almost each house there are dogs. People are like “american/indien”. The road is not paved yesterday I can’t sleep because it is 24 hours day light and I was not tired. I think I fall asleep at around 1:30 am.

We woke up at 6:24 am, start to pack up the tent at 7 am. For breakfast, we ate noodle with jam, egg and bread. It was raining. We leave at around 11am. We ate lunch/dinner near from the Artic circle. We have rice, tomato sauce, corn beef. Now it’s 7:14 pm and we are leaving Artic Circle. I drunk spring water taking from the river it’s good.

Ryan Hoang

Disapointed was the first thought that came to me when I thought about today. This is mainly because of what occurred last night.

Last night while I was typing up the blogs many of the leaderships were being really loud. It got so loud that Billy came to tell us to be quiet and go straight to bed. It seemed to have been really bad and we were really loud because we got a lecture about how we deserved to be called a “f**king Chinese”.

Another thing I felt was the annoyance of the many bugs that were there. My bug bites practicly multiplied and the itchyne has become really strong and tempting.

Howard

Today marks the start of our return trip from Inuvik to Toronto. After a democratic vote over where to go and visit next, we decided to go to Tombstone. However, we will be using maps that we drew on our way here to find and navigate our way back. So far, I haven’t had to navigate yet but I am uncertain if I would be able to later do so well enough.

Currently, here ate the Arctic circle, we just had a meal and Billy had just given us a small lecture on survival in Arctic regions. I am actually surprised that we have not so far had a close encounter with wildlife. Now that we’re returning from Inuvik. I doubt but still hope for an encounter with a bear or something.

Kendra

Teamwork is super important when it comes to big groups. The team has to be coordinated to get the job done fast and well. We were lacking this morning. IT took us two and a half hours to pack our tents and brush our teeth when usually we should take one hour to one hour and a half. That took us all morning and delayed our time. When we finally set out it was driving again, because of the delay, we decided we wouldn’t be camping at Tombstone Park. We drove and drove until… WE got some fresh stream water. Then, we reached the border of Northwest Territories. At around 5:00, we had lunch. That was it.

Matt

Awesome! Having lunch/dinner near the Arctic Circle border. IT was a really great food, looking at the beautiful scenery and feeling the nice winds as if they are blowing away your stress and fatigue. Another interesting thing that happened today was the new job roles. Everyone gets a chance to show their leadership. So it is not just the 2 IC’s and Instructors leading the teams, the students can lead as well. My job right now is discipline. This job requires me to make sure everyone sleeps on time, make sure people and doing their work, and maybe doing guard duty at night. I’ve always wanted to try sentry duty at night, you know to get the experience. I really hope I get a chance to shoot the shotgun but not at something. Well now we’re going to find a place to stay for the night.

Jason Wong

Today we couldn’t sleep in  because we were heading back to HQ. I felt tired even though I slept most of the drive. We stopped at the Northwest Territory welcome sign to have the there group photo there. Then we continued driving to the Artic Circle, where we had lunch/dinner. We didn’t cook the canned food so we ate it raw. By the way it took us long once again to take down all the tents and didn’t leave until 10:30 which was 1 hour behind our expected time to leave Happy Valley. P.S. Mom if you read my message about the login username number, can you email Billy the username number if you haven’t send it yet.

Lemuel

Woke up and did the usual pack up and clean up. We then proceeded to make our journey back to Toronto. Our destination today will be Tombstone mountain. Hopefully, we will make it there but will all the hold ups we had so far, we most likely will not make it. Currently, we are right at the Artic Circle writing my blog, 300-400 km south of Inuvik. We are about halfway to our destination, so if we do make it to our destination past midnight.

Crystal

After staying two nights in Inuvik, it was time to return home. We had packed up everything though not in the most efficient time. Then, we were served a warm and hearty chicken noodle soup breakfast, but we ate quietly since there were other campers. Soon after a bit more of drizzling rain, we loaded up and headed out of Inuvik back onto Dempster Highway.

We passed two ferries before reaching a small creek near the road. Quickly, we filled up our water bottles with fresh Canadian H2O. Thinking about it, there’s not many places left in the world that has fresh water for us to drink. Later, we reached the border between the Northwest-Territories and Yukon. A group photo  was taken and we rushed back onto the Sprinters and drove towards the Artic Circle.

When we arrived at the same information board in the circle we saw just a few days ago, Billy quickly set up “kitchen” and cooked a super-fast dinner for us to eat. Even though the food was not hot it was still very delicious. Soon, we had a small lecture nearby about winter/ arctic survival.

After this past 14 days in this expedition, everyone has learnt many things. Either from mistakes or from lectures. I’ve learnt many new things from different people. I feel that everyone has gotten closer as friends even if we don’t sit in the same sprinter, or sleep in the same tent. Even though we’ve gone through some hiccups and mistakes, we still successfully made our way to Inuvik, past the Arctic Circle, travelling more than 7000km – A place I never thought I would ever be able to go in my lifetime. As we tour and explore while travelling back home, I hope to gain more experiences and because an even better leader.

Roman

Today was another day in the car! We left Inuvik at 10:15 am and started forward toward Tombstone. We will be climbing Tombstone tomorrow, I haven’t hiked in a long time. And when I say hike I don’t me a trail in the park, I meant real, wild hiking! It’s Sunday today and it feels so weird not going to church. I am now writing my daily blog at Arctic Circle once again, but this time the scenery is completely different. Last time it was really misty and cold, this time it is blue clear sky. The sky, mountains, and clouds look so perfect and clear it looks like it was generated by computer. Billy gave us a lesson on survival in the Arctic Circle. He taught us what berries we can eat, where we can stay, and how to watch out for animals. I just realized that my hiking boots are a bit snuggy. I hope I won’t get blisters. I am ready to climb Tombstone. I miss you all so much. I have learned so much from my leaders and instructors. I have also learned a lot from Billy. I’ll write to you tomorrow.

Owen

So said to say that but, We needed to leave Inuvik where many nice people can be found here. After breakfast, we left the campsite Happy Valley and stepped back on Dempster highway again. I was chosen to do the navigator today, so I can’t sleep until I had finished my work. I was so tired since it is boring and I couldn’t sleep at all for a few hours. But, I still learnt a lot from Billy and captured many beautiful sights.

Today’s dinner was beef and rice. Although the rice was quite hard, we all felt happy because we weren’t having rice for about 6 to 7 days already.

Since we have been together for about 14 days, we all knew each other very well. I hope this friendship will last forever, even we are separated in the different places in the Earth.

Justin

After one day of rest, today we once again on our vehicle, continuing the rest of our journey. Not heading north, but south, back to Toronto.

The past fourteen days was full of challenges and adventures, sorrow and happiness, tears and laughters. IT is the best piece of education we could ever receive. However, I believe the best is yet to come. There are more quests for us to conquer and more things to be discovered.

Tomorrow we are going to climb the mountain of tombstone, though I do not like its name I believe it will be a great adventure.

JJ

Today is the literal point of our “Trans-Canada 2013” expedition. Today, we left Inuvik at about 1110 and started heading back towards Toronto. We spent most of the day on the road. We began the day at around 0700 when we began packing up and taking down the tents, follwed by breakfast and new job assignments. At 1110, we were on the move from “Happy Valley Park”. The trip today was essentially the same as the trip here, but at about 1625, we stopped to fill our bottles with fresh spring water. Right now, we are once again at the 66^th parallel and we will be trying to push towards Tombstone mountain for tomorrow’s hike.

Kathy

Today was the fifteenth day in Monticle. We started to went back to Toronto. Now, we had already get to Arctic Circle. This morning, we spent 2 hour to put down the tenp. That’s so terrible. There must be some mistake in our teamwork. After lunch, we started our back journey. On the way, we get some creek water, it is very tasty, much better than pure water. When we finish our dinner, Billy taught us some skills maybe we can use when we stay in the wild. That is very useful. This night, I will try to be a navigator, this is the work I never try before, so I am very excited about it.

Mike

Currently, I am at the Arctic Circle enjoying my lunch/dinner while holding my 7-up can which I am sharing with Michael Fung. Today’s trip so far was fine, except for someone in my vehicle who was most likely constipated and spent a while in the mosquito-infested grass.

Compared to the first time we arrived at the Arctic Circle, today was a lot hotter with some wind, which is weird considering how north we are. Also, Billy just gave us an Arctic survival tip. The tip was to look for paw prints and berries, as these signs show that bears are around the area. He also told us how red berries make us crazy/high, while black berries are edible.

Today was also the day we picked our new jobs. My job was vehicle assistance, which means I have to help with gas fill-up, windshield cleaning etc. The other jobs include navigator, cook, tent, set-up, vehicle cleaning and more. We’re changing jobs everyday, and I’m really looking forward to being nav just cause of shotgun seat. (Co-driver)

Jenn Wang

I didn’t get the milk I wanted, but we had a lovely lunch/dinner at the edge of the Arctic Circle. Today was another terrible, horrible, not good, very bad day for me. I’m getting sick and it hurts to swallow, and there’s really little point in complaining about mosquito bites anymore.

Billy, if you believe we’ve broken your heart, know that I’ve broken my own many times and that you’ve broken my own many times as well. I know that you are not cheered by this fact on top of your disappointment, but know that we are equally, if not more disappointed.

Tiff and I stayed up yesterday to discuss some important matters which we brought forward to the rest of the leadership team in the morning. We’d even prepared alternate schedules for the day in case our discussion with Billy lasted for longer than we’d anticipated. Some of our questions were left unanswered, but I feel like the captain and 2IC meeting afterwards came to better and constructive conclusions and even some plans we can begin to implement.

Quince said some terrible things to me today, but it was a bad day for him too. My company was quick to defend me though, so I guess I am better now. I will keep looking forward to tomorrow.

Marco

Back to the dirty Sprinter. We went back to the place with the Arctic Circle sign. We are heading to Tombstone Mountain. We are going for a hike there. I don’t know why but I am really excited. I wanna see the Grizzley bears and the black bears. Just now, Billy showed us some berries that bears may like to eat and we also saw a bear’s paw. From Billy’s prediction, it is about Billy’s size. That made me really want to see a bear. I hope I will see one tonight. I think we will go more father later. We will see.

Alan

Today is day 14, we left Inuvik today and is heading for tombstone mountain. We are going to camp at a area on the way. then on the next day we will finish the ride to tombstone mountain and then we will hike the mountain. After we left the camp we started driving to the our next camp ground. On the way, we stopped for dinner, we had rice, corn, beef and tomato sauce it was really good after that we started to move towards our campsite again

Mickey

Today we will go back to Toronto. But is too far, today we even didn’t eating lunch. When I writing this it is 6:12! We was start to eat dinner. I don’t drive how many hours. I think many people feel tired. When we sitting anywhere is a hill and greenworld! We drink the water is come from the hill! It tease so sweat! Hope tomorrow is we will go the climbing the hill. And, thank you Billy and HQ. I miss you, mum, dad. In fact, I want now I have computer now. so I can internet. HaHa, just joking!

Quince Lee

tired, a meaning of stress and sleepy. Today we woke early and set off. We didn’t do a lot of stuff today, so we stopped at the front of the sign that said Arctic Circle. So that is the day.

Michael Fung

Late lunch at the midst of wilderness, at the right latitude and longitude of the Arctic Circle, with condiments including the energizing sunlight, the refreshing breeze, the black bear pawprints, the red and black berries, the Windows XP desktop background… Late lunch with the mother nature, worth it!

Despite having a late and delicate lunch of corned beef, pre-cooked rice (ah what an amazing time management done by Billy this morning!), corn and tomato sauce, the natural landscape just compensates the simplicity and coldness of the food, or even decorates it and make it flourishing. Honestly, I just learned this from Billy: after cleaning the dishes, just get your shoes and socks out, then lay them on a small bush in order to let it dry in front of great sunlight. What a pity that we couldn’t camp right at the Arctic Circle! Billy screen-surveyed the area, on which he found bears’ favorite berries and even bear footprints. Bears… *sigh*

Thios morning we six leaderships had an urgent meeting about the behavior last night, as well as that since the first day of the camp. So glad that Billy didn’t decide to punish us. He even terminated all the evaluations done to several students in order to make it fair. Right now, full of hope again! Thanks Billy.

Feeling a bit fervent right now… tomorrow we are heading to Tombstone for hiking! It’s more natural, less populated and more beautiful. Billy told us that he longed for hiking in Tombstone for almost a decade – mostly because of its invincible and almost flawless natural sceneries. I bet that even photographobias will initially begin to dig out their cameras and take nice pictures like those appear on our computers’ monitor screensavers!

Right now we are settling in the Eagle Plains Campground and RV Park, nearby which locates a hotel that charges almost 170 bucks per head. Billy suspected that the owner of the hotel might have troubles with Chinese visitors in the past, which caused her irremovable hatred towards other Chinese visitors… Anyway, one amazing thing again to share about this place is that there are truckdrivers who are willing to drive 5 loads of water from Dawson City or even Whitehorse up to here by using 3 hours and supply us water! Despite time and fuel consuming for the water and sewage treatment, the owner only charged us $68 for all. Billy asked us to respect the water and thus not to take a shower if possible. Canadians are really nice here! Hope that the ones in other provinces and cities could follow such a great example (even though it seemingly is impossible for the majority to follow this). Anyway, happy!

July 29, 2013 – Day 16

A lot of us had our tent flaps opened throughout the night, since the breeze was so nice. However, this early morning, rather than rain, there was a giant sand storm! The wind was blowing sand all over the place! And so our early morning wake-up has been pushed back an hour for the wind to die down…

We had a really quick breakfast, packed up and continued on our way. To get to Tombstone Mountain, we need about 4 hours’ drive. With the thought that maybe we can stay the night at a campground if there are campsites in the area. We headed there. We arrived at the Tombstone Interpretive Centre on schedule and everyone got off, went inside, and learned about Tombstone Mountain, the environment, and animals that live in the area. It was all very fascinating and we all learned a lot. There is also a campground at the area and so we set up our tents and everything and had lunch before our hike.

Since none of us had ever been to Tombstone Mountain before, we didn’t know what to expect or where to go. Everyone geared up accordingly, prepared for possible bear sightings, and started following a trail (as we were told at the centre before). One by one, we walked in a line on the trail, helping each other as we go; as it rained we still continued following the trail, until we got ‘lost’. So we detoured, walked down the path towards the river area, walked over rocks of various sizes, and arrived at another destination! Glaciers! Or what’s left of them… It is saddening to know that by next year, these ancient glaciers will most likely be all melted. As soon as we saw the glaciers, we noticed that there are double rainbows behind us! What a rare sight!

We had a bit of free time afterwards and almost everyone tried to cross the streams of river by hopping over the rocks. Many of us fell and got really wet; in the end, we didn’t care anymore and just walked over the glacier river streams. After that was done, we walked back to camp, made dinner, wrote our blogs, tried to dry our shoes and socks, made our schedule for the next day, and called it a night.

Calvin Su

I did not expect to be camping at tombstone tonight. It is a really nice place to stay abd the scenery was wonderful. Many people got out of their own comfort zones and I am happy to see that we got off the Dempster Highway tomorrow and a long way until we got home.

Quince

Today we drove to tombstone. First we ate lunch. Then we sat up the tents. Now here come the fun part. We start hiking from the campsite to a path where there water and I am soaked. I fell down three times and I found some stones for a suvanoir. Now here comes the great news, we sat glaciers. That is the first time saw snow in real. Not like the small pieces, BIG ones. That was a sight to see. The special thing about tombstone is that the path is not man made. It is mother nature which is unual. Tomorrow we are going to hike on mount edith which is very exciting. Oh one more thing. I took some picture of wild mushrooms.

Mirelle

Today we woke up very early that’s why in the vehicle I slept until 1 pm. Then we visited a place with bear, rabbit, bear fur. This place was free and the I saw a hug dog with a lot of fun too. Then we set up our tent next to this place. We’re living in Tombstone. Then at 5:15 pm, we went to hiki9ng, we walk to rock and to the mountain, It was funny because under the rock there ware water like river so some of us fall into water. My shoes and fall of my pantwas wet. For dinner, Billy cooks something special that I never trie, noodle(mixte) with chicken powder, chicken and mushrooms.

Ryan

Today we completed a feat north talking about. This feat was that we walked the Tombstone trek and saw the remains of the ice glaciers. It was a very increditble scene but saddening to. It showed the effects of global warming amused and how future generations will no longer be able to see it no more.

If you could not tell by now the events that happened today has made me quite happy with being in thiss expendition. The only thing bad occurred today is that a piece of burning wood chip hit my Monticle shirt and burned out a hole right through. I am sorry mom and dad you always tell me to take care for belonging and I messed up.

Funny enough Billy told us that is we wanted we could pick up a piece of rock, luckily I remembered that mom told me that there is no need for soveniors so I did not bother to waste my time finding one.

Edwin Cheung

Today we woke up at eagle plains civil camp. We have a quick breakfast , cookie, Juice with cracker. Late we have a long hour drive, which is quiet silence. Later, we have a few peestop. Then we to a stop North territorie visiter center to have a visit about the place. Wee then unpack and sittle down. When went down for hike down north terrist glares to have a look, this will the only time I can see glaries.Ever, I might not see it. Next, I time with my love and family. This will last long in my memory. lAter we went to the glarice ice to see. We all so try to cross over the other side. The rock are wet and slipperies. Our shoes are wet and solk. It was funny, mom and dad. Leave me a message…. Love you <3 p="">

Jason Wang

Today started at about 0600 with students and leadership all taking down tents, cleaning and packinig their gear. At around 0825 we were on the move from the Eagle Plains camp site, having towards tombstone mountain, We finally arrived at tombstone at around 1300 where we visited the “Interprete center” where we lemuel general information about the mountain and the surrounding area. We also managed to get a campsite at the foot of the mountain . After setting up camp, we headed out on a hike down to a local glacier. That was a very wet experieicne with a glacier stream and a pathway full of very slippery rocks. Suprising enough I managed to keep my balance, though my shoes did take on quite a bit of water. Besides that, this was a very enjoyable experience that I wish to have again in the near future. Tomorrow we will be trying to push all the way back to Watson Lake again. Good luck drivers.

Edwin Chan

Today our destination is to head to Tombstone Mountain. It took us about 5 hours to get from Eagle Plains to Tombstone Mountain. When we reached tombstone we went to the information center to figure out some information campsite. Once we all settled in and got our tents set up we end up having lunch. After we finished our lunch we finally start our long waited hike that was about 2 hours long. As we hiked it started to rain but that doesn’t matter. We finally met our destination and that was to see the glaciers. As we had our free time we all tried to make it across the river to the other side. While we all tried more then half of us fell into the river but at least it was shallow. That’s all I can think of but today was an interesting day.

Crystal

Today is the second last day of July, meaning that there’s only 12 more days in our expedition. After leaving Eagle Plains, where we stayed last night, we drove for around four hours before reaching Tombstone Park. Upon arrival, we quickly visited the interpretive centre located nearby the park. We found some information regarding Mount Tombstone and even some real animal furs & skeletons.

We left the centre in the mid-afternoon and started building camp in the nearby campground. After a quick lunch, we finished cleaning and packing up for our nature hike. We started hiking on the trail in the late afternoon and after passing many bushes and trees, we reached the glacier area. The once-grand glaciers have now melted into a small river containing now melted into a small river containing just mere ice patches.

We crossed the “lacier” water by skipping on large rocks. However many of them were very slippery and we all walked into the water, though it wasn’t the best idea. After slipping multiple times on my knees, my hands and even my face, I decided that I have to reach the other side of the water. I walked (skipped) most of the time and finally with strong perseverance, I reached the other side.

I quickly “dried out” my socks and treated my blisters before returning back to the trail. I learnt that if at first you don’t succeed, you mustn’t give up and you have to try try again. Thinking about that quote, I persevered and got across the river and was so happy that I didn’t give up. As we were walking back, I collected multiple stones as souvenirs. I enjoyed Today’s hike very much.

And hope to hike again soon. It also the last day (or at least I think) in Yukon. I’ve had a great tiem in Northwest Territories & Yukon and I hope to come back and visit again.

Jennifer Wang

We’re camping out in the Yukon again. We hiked up Tombstone Mountain which is beautiful. There are plants that whack you in the face when the person in front of you walks on, slippery rocks that could smash your brains out, and swift currents in the glacial runoff that can bring back bad memories of rafting. I’m exaggerating a little bit; it really is a beautiful valley we’re camping in. we’re in a rain shadow so it starts raining every so often- geography in action! I used to want to be a biologist so the information on the formation and composition of different types of mountains in the Tombstone Mountain Interpretive Centre.

                I really love the softness of rabbit fur and it makes me so happy to touch soft things so I’m in a great mood right now!

                I gave up on the “floor is lava” game halfway through the glacial riverbed because I was so scared of slipping like I had before when I was rafting. I then just charged right through the knee-level water. It was fun to get to the other side of the valley soaked and exhausted to share crackers with my friends.

                The organization today was a bit shaky, but we pulled it together by the end of the day. And Mahisa. I’m eating well, okay?

Kendra

                The highlight of my day was getting soaked from the waist to my shoes. Even though I got wet, it was the one of the most memorable moments so far on this trip. The hike was tough bit I don’t think anyone can say they’ve done it. Just finding a rock in theat stream and sitting down and just look around and make you feel like you have entered a different world. Every step you take, its like a whole new different game. You have to find which rock is slippery and which one is safe to step on, but in the end everyone slipped so everyone gave up choosing rocks. This was an accident but I’m glad it happened because this was way more fun then hiking up the mounbtain. Another thing that made this accident a good one is, since we didn’t hike up the mountain, we’re going to try to push all the way to Edeth tomorrow. So we end up visiting both places. That was it for now, I wish that this adventure will never end…

Michael Fung

                If you want me to brainstorm a mind map of Tombstone Territorial Park, I will mention: interprecetive Centre, Glacier/Ice, S.T.O.P acronym, rock-passing ups and downs difficult pegging and soaked shoes and stick charcoal at the bottom of the pot for spaghetti..

                Before heading to the Tombstone Territorial Park, I want to mention about this morning’s rundown in the Eagle Plains. Even though Billy told us to difer the calling time from 7 to 8 because of the rain, but despite the morning wind (,the rain luckily ended early), we still meant to down the tents at around 06:40 thankfully, JJ’s sports tent team (JJ,Mike,Justin,Owen,Alvin, Mickey and me) downed their own tent with around 10  on to minutes! As long we keep sleeping together within the same ten for a longer period, comradeship and the link between each other (especially on handling tents) should be refined for sure. Keep going, JJ’s roots tent team! Not to mention that, I can’t believe that I could upgrade from a novice to some sort of apprentice in handling tents. Hopefully I could reach another standard similar to JJ, Ryan; HQ team, Billy and any there excellent tent set up peers.

                Tombstone Territorial Park made we so planned (again) today! The first stop at the Territorial Park is the Interpretive Centre. The initatior of the Interpretive Centre has begun a very honorable mission since the 70’s. The Dempster Highway has been his greatest concern since it’s benefit because sophisticated civilization damged the nature. The interpretive service, together  with the Inte5rpretive Centre building, began in 2009. Its purpose is to let visitors know more and be more aware of the natural environment. By knowing more about it, environmental unsevation and related activities might be taken. As I was reading through the information presented on the workboard, many co-workers of the initiator extremely appreciated the working experience with the initiator.

The enthusiastic project is colourful-it includes personally information services ( having an interpreter guiding you for horsing around the centre, defending replicas of animal fossils) calling posters of wildlife, elemental souvenirs among some of which are edible…  Meaningful education everywhere in Canada! If ther5e are similar educational insitutions settled around every key campsite and hiking trails, Hong Kong people might be so aware of preservering the enviroment as well.

                Right after the browsing, we had a hard time doing the peggings for the tents. Despite most of us knowing the rundown of setting up the tents well; the grounds and pebbles just gave us and the pegs painful experience-we bent a lot of pegs because the pegs were not giving in. Darn… Anyway as leadership is almost adaptability and flexibility, so I just tie the ropes to nearby brances and the bench chairs. (feeling unfortunate for the people staying in the poorly pegged Algonquin tent)

                After a hefty lunch of tomato hot sauce with dried tomato & spaghetti, we hiked to he nearest river in which you see glaciers and iced water. The natural landscape as expected, is fascinating! What a life-time experience of breathing fresh air, accompanied by double rainbows and iced river. Even though we could not play any snowball throwing, we ‘enjoyed’ ‘throwing’ ourselves into the river. I personally passed the rocks and the river so badly at first. When I met Micheal the Senior, he implied the acronym S.T.O.P again. Yeah, S for stop, T for think, O for observe, P is for planning. You literally stop first and then think observe for the best route possible. Planning… duh. Whenever there are multiple challenging results for you to choose, take the rock-river-passing as a micro cosmic example! You need to keep calm and eareful, but at the same time not to hesitate and ponder to much. This is kinda hard to believe, but that’s reality. So as leadership, sometimes you are a dealer of hope and the good come of your teammates benefits, but you also need to maneuver their behaviors by giving straight and poor comments. Add oil on discovering the optimal scales and preparative of leadership traits through this trip!

Howard

Wet. That one word can describe a general summary of what I am currently feeling. Today we made our planned trip from Eagle Plains to Tombstone, a beautiful national park on the top of a Yukon mountain. After setting in the campground, we took our anticipated hike into the trail, we hiked through narrow passages, over rocky terrain, on wooden wooden platforms, past a dammed reek and with outstretching branches trying to hinder our path until we reached an open area with melting glaciers, these ancient ice monuments are thousands of years old and were ten times a humans size. However with the heat of the sun and global warming, the glaciers have began to melt and barely reach my feet. In a few years they’ll be completely gone a truly sad thought.

Later Billy gave us permission to just wander through the open area. However, the entire place is basically just water from the glaciers flowing down stream. With rocks to stand on. With these conditions I was able to show off my parkour skills honed by many image trainings I have done while videogaming, while others tumbled and slipped, I remained relatively dry… until Marco fell and dragged me down with him. I will be exacting revenge.

Marco

Nooooooo! My camera broke from the water in the hike, but I did not regret going to that hike. Even though my whole body is wet but it was really fun. it is also my first time seeing a double rainbow. I’m lucky that I took a few pictures. But I’m not sure if my SD card broke or not. I also ran through the glazer, that is how I got so wet. I also fell a few times. I hope I could go there again and stay longer. I already saw enough though. I never thought that the world looks that good. Now we are waiting for dinner. Bye for now!

Lemuel

unfortunately, my prediction was correct. We ended up being unable to reach Tombstone Mountain. Rather we camped out at Eagle plains which happens to be the highest camping ground and the exact coordinates of the edge of the Arctic Circle. At around 8:30 we made our way to Tombstone Mountain. Once we arrived, we began our setup of our camp and started hiking. we made our way to a creek with some glaciers. Because of the difficult footing, we all ended up getting wet. At least I got some souvenirs on the way…

Roman

Today was and interesting day! We drove from Eagle Plains to Tombstone. We went to hike after lunch. I was expecting to hike for 5 hours but it was a different kind of “5 hours”. We hiked for like 30 minutes to one hour and the trail ended. we were all like: What? Where do we go, now? Then we realized that we could go off the trail and onto t\he river. There were sapose to be glacier and snow, but because of global warming most melted. And we all know that when snow melts it turns into water, so when we reached the “glaciers” it was dozens of streams, We walked from one side to the other. Along the way many of us fell into the realitively bigger streams, and that includes me. Even though my boots are Gore-Tex, the water level reached over my boots and my boots became leather water buckets. My boots and socks are still not dry yet (it’s been 2 hours). I ate crackers before dinner so I wasn’t hungry and did not eat much. I missed the food at home. Moticle’s food is  “good” but it’s a different kind of “good” from dad’s cooking. I miss sushi, Korean BBQ, and 5 guys. I miss you guys too.

Mickey

Today we go to climb the hill! my leg all is water! But it is so funny. I can feel teamwork is in our team. tomorrow we will visit some hill. I feel tired in the car. I just sleep in the car, I don’t feel nothing. I won’t do that again! Sorry. And I feel today lunch and dinner are so delicious: Hope tomorrow food will like this! Thank you. I miss you mum. I feel tired, sorry. I don’t want to say any more.

Owen

my fate is full of trouble . This morning, I was one of the team that in charge of today’s breakfast. Although we only got biscuts and juice, I still broke many of them.

Today’s main dish was hiking in Tombstone national park. But, it was delayed by out team since we have used a lot of time to clean the dishes, forks….etc. We almost late for an hour.

Finally, we started our main dish. After hiking about five minutes, the shy started to cry. My black jacket was totally wet. Oops, raindrops is falling on my head!

We then arrived a small river. Wait a minute, I saw ice! Billy told us that those ice had been existed for about thousands year already. Because of global warming, those ice will be gone in couple of years, What a pity!

Crossing a river wasn’t fun at all, I had fallen in the cold water for about ten times. My feet were all wet. Although my feet were painful, I learnt what is “fearless”. When there were only five minutes to reach the time limit, we didn’t care about the water and just cross it over without stayying on a rock. This scene made me laugh a lot. Go ahead!

Alan

Today we got to mount Tombstone. We first went to the visitor center to see what is around, we saw many skulls of different animal. After that, we set up our tent and had lunch. we had spageti for lunch. Then, we went hiking. After a while of walking, we hit a dead end so we went back on the way back we saw lakish thing but it has rock inside so we dicided to cross it most of us got our socks wet. when we findly got across, we went back to out camp and ate our dinner.

Matt

Wow today we’re finally leaving and going back to HQ, 250 Shields Court Monticle. But luckily going to stay one more night in Yukon at Tombstone’s campground. The reason why we stayed here was majority of the group chose to hike Tombstone Mountain. Last night we stayed at a Campground/motel in Eagle Plains. I never knew that Eagle Plains had a population of 8 people. Apparently the lady at the motel hated Asian’s. But luckily Billy talked it out and we stayed their for the night. It takes about approxiamatly 4 hrs to get from Eagle plains to Tombstone HTN. We arrived around 1:00 pm and we visited the Visitor Center in the area. Later we had an awesome tomato sauce and not sauce in it and I like hot sauce a lot. We began our hike at around 5:00 pm. The path was relatively easy to hike but it did have some up hill and downhill. Than everything changed when path suddenly ended and we just began to walk off path. We walked where there used to be a big ice glacier but now there is a small stream of ice glacier but now there is a small stream of water with some small patches of ice around the area. Unfortunately all of us slipped into the stream and some fell down. All of our feets and shoes are soaking wet as well. Another interesting thing some of us saw where two people holding hands. Not going to say who, all of us saw it coming. Now we are waiting for another awesome creativity cooking from Billy.

Grace

After about 3 to 4 hours drive, we arrived at the park in tombstone we started hiking at 5pm and came back at 7:50 pm. The hiking trail can only let 1 person pass through, the road is really rocky and we also needed to be careful of the trees roots that come out of the ground. The road become more slippery after the rain, and the shoes made the trail not easy to walk. We saw a creek after about half an hours walk, and there are still ice remain in the middle , they had been here for more than hundreds of years and are melting because of the green house effect. We went across the creek by stepping on the rocks, but the rocks are very slippery. At first we all were very carefull and tried not to step in the water, but after I fell into it more than 3 times, I just walked in the creek to go back. The creek is surrounded by mountains so we can see a very good view, and also we saw double rainbow. Now we are having dinner, we had lunch at 3, but we are now hungry again. We are all tired , but it was worth it.

Kathy
Today was the sixteenth day in monticle. WE got to the Tombstone mountain park at noon. Afterlunch, we had a hiking at the park in the afternoon, we started at 5’oclock, I was very excitied about it, because I had never try it before. We walked on the small road in the mountain, and across the forest. At last, we get to a creek, there was still some ice on it. That’s so amazing. Because of the rain, we saw the double rainbow between two mountains where we arrived at the creek. We had a free time there to enjoy the view, all of us try to across the creek then, the rocks in the creek are really smooth, they are so easy to make people fall in the creek. It was lucky that I hadn’t fallen in it, but my socks and parts were got wet, so finally I didn’t try to walk on rocks any more, just walk in the water. It is doesn’t matter, I’m very happy today.

Justin

Today we approach tombstone, as soon as we arrive, I was stunned by the beauty of the mountains. Theye stand with pride together like huge green barrier, guarding the land we took a small little pat, venturing deep into the wilderness and the brace of mother nature. A little stream lie just beside our path, separating us with the deep mysterious moods of tombstone. WE left the path and walked along the banks of the river. Carefully we stepped on the shiny and slippery rocks. ON the river are glaciers, we were told that they are hundreds of years old, lying there peacefully for centuries. They were once ten stories high, over the years they gradually melt and now we see are only thin sheet, of ice, at the imerly of the blistening the power and beauty of mother nature. Compared to her, we are all tiny and unimportant.

Jason Wong

We were supposed to wake up earlier but everyone slept in one hour. We packed up our luggage and tents faster than the rest of the week. We divided in to hiking groups. So we rode in different sprinters with our hiking groups. We drove until Mt Tombstone information center. Inside they had fur and bones of animals. Before we went to the campsite I was reading Angles and Demons for one chapter. We went to the campsite near the mountain and set up the tents. We had spheghety for lunch which delicious. We hiked but not the mountain we stopped at a river and had a break then went back to the campsite. By the way I got my hiking boots wet and my socks but I had a change of shoes/socks.

Mike

Glaciers and double rainbows!! Today was the day of our Tombstone hike. and we already had problems when we woke up. Bad weather stalled us for 2 hours which meant most people could continue sleeping. However, as I already packed everything up, I just sat there and read books.

During the first half of our hike, the conditions were fine. It was cloudy with light rain with moderate wind. The hike was surprisingly light, with short up’s and down’s and straights. When we arrived, I saw a close up of glaciers and a double rainbows

(First time saw rainbow = single rainbow

Second time saw rainbow = Double rainbow

Third time see = Triple rainbow?)

We explored around the area and tried not to step in water and failed horribly.

Now I’m back at camp and our job is to dry our socks and shoes (yes, everyone got them wet) and to write our blogs. Billy also mentioned about a Mount. Edith hike, if we go, hope it’s a lot more dry!

Tiffany

Well, my mood changed a lot today. From devastated, disappointed, I somehow managed to go back to the standard, cheery tiff. I wonder why. As today was “Hiking day” we, of course, went hiking. But first making our way from the Arctic circle to Tombstone, we spent 4 hours catching up on the several hours we missed, well, of sleep. I stood awake half of the time and began planning of today. As more responsibility and trust was given to the team, we grew more and more confident. No more screw ups! No more I don’t knows! No more I thought..s! As we’ve learnt from the past 16 days, experience brings wisdom and knowledge, and I trust that my team and I have done a pretty observing job. Considering that we’ve done so much bad and partially good. Yes, I have to admit. We were a bunch of mess ups, screw-up’s and quite frankly, inexperienced. But it’s a brand new day, a squeaky clean record, why not do our best?  We woke up at 6:00 but due to the weather, our schedule was pushed back 1 hour, to 8:00. So as everyone didn’t mind the windy weather, and already freshened up and woke up, began to do all the tent take down and increasing the efficiency of the entire Monticle student, leadership system.

We left right on time, with a few confusion and organization stops, left at 8:25, not bad!

Arriving at Tombstone, we had several informative talks, lectures, and “tours”. Afterall, we really went to the Interpetive center of Tombstone. I have to say, the people on the front desks are really well prepared, backed up, and awesome at presentations. We had a brief break before setting up our equiptment (tents) then packing up for a hiking trip! We had a wonderful spaghetti lunch, and did several preparation works for the hike. Billy asked for a leader of the day, as in, whos in charge, but as everything was organized as a group, the leadership team put me in charge as their leader of the day. I finally feel appreciated, I hope it not simply my name popping up first, but my true ability that made their judgment. We are going to hike along the Tombstone path! Excited as a little girl on chistmas morning, I gathered our preplanned teams and groups and headed out. We hiked and hiked for about 1 hour, until reaching a point of confusion. Standing on the (almost) back of the line, I didn’t know what was happening, so we carried out several message transferring. I found that very helpful as we wouldn’t disturb others, while carrying out what we were aiming for.

But as we came to a conclusion that nobody has any idea what was going on, Billy took the initiative of leading us to the glaciers. As we excitedly went ot the glaciers, we stepped across the melted glacier water, also the streams to leap from stone to stone. All just to get to the other side. Everybody enjoyed the experience, from the leaping, to the tripping, from the laughing to the yelping, from the dry to the wet, from jumping to the other side, to horsing around the water.

Seeing glacier first time in my life was amazing, the thought of the years spent to melt it somewhat saddened me, rose my affection to global warming, and reminded me that the future generations may not be able to experience the beauties of mother nature. I wish for the best for our environment. As I quietly walked across the rocks, I thought about the past times as a leadership.

Along the way, there were many different kinds of stones. Wet slippery ones, and dry ones. Just like the life experiences. You see many choices, many decisions, some may seem obvious some may seem unclear. Then, when you begin to walk on them, you experience the surprising falls, or roll overs that cannot be predicted, but you simply have to resolve it yourself, suck it up, and go on. That is the unknown and surprise events that happen. Maybe your stock market dropped but 50%, maybe your business lost a big client, maybe you broke your knee as a professional runner. Many many reasons, but all you can do is stand up, stay strong, move on.

As you are focusing on the tiny rocks, and details in life, you also have to see the big picture, how are you going to get to the other side? how are you going to walk? If you take the wrong path while only focusing on the small details, you have a big risk of losing your direction, ergo arriving a dead end of getting somewhere irrevelant (failing in a way) Just like life experiences, you have to see the big picture.

Also, while you’re walking you have to lead the others, think of their benefit, think of to transfer them from here to there. Will they drop? Will they not be able to catch up? So on so forth. Just like a group, you have to consider how to move on as a team, instead of simply an individual.

Concepts of leaderships came all over my mind, past learnt ones, new ones, and interesting ideas. But all I have to say now is: When youre in troubles, or you fall, simply stand up, stay strong, move on.

P.s. Thankyou Billy, for giving us this chance to change, to improve ourselves, and a change to prove to everyone we are able.