Canada & USA Destination Planner 2019-20 Canada Destination Planner | Page 133

Northwest Territories / INTRODUCTION 4 Day Yellowknife Aurora Discovery Yellowknife – Here you’ll find it all: Skyscrapers rearing up from the outcrops, casting long shadows over Great Slave Lake. Sailboats tacking through the gleaming waves and floatplanes looping in the cloudless sky. A festival in an ice-palace, and a music concert on a sandy lakeshore. A clutch of houseboats, bright and offbeat and rocking gently on the swells. A smorgasbord of flavors: Ethiopian restaurants, sushi joints, and wine bars that serve muskox burgers. Log cabins beside mansions beside houses shaped like teepees. Visitors from Japan, Toronto, Tuktoyaktuk. And a whole bunch of friendly, off-beat locals, making their home and enjoying their time in the biggest little city in Canada. Western Arctic – The Arctic is a land of icons: Polar bears. Reindeer. Treeless tundra, sprawling to infinity. High Arctic islands, reaching toward the pole. Beluga. Muskoxen. An ocean, frozen in place, gleaming in the nightless spring. It’s all here, along with the people who call it home – the Gwich’in and Inuvialuit, who’ve thrived here for eons along the mouth of the Mackenzie River and the flanks of the Northwest Passage. Sahtu – The beating heart of the North. Here in the trackless core of our territory, the frantic outside world has not arrived, and possibly never will. This is the home of a grand inland sea, Great Bear – nearly 500 metres deep, slithering with colossal trout, cliff-flanked, and salted with alluring place-names: Conjuror Bay, Grizzly Bear Mountain, the Scented Grass Hills. Dehcho – Dehcho means “big river” – referring to the great Mackenzie, 1,600 kilometres long and as much as five kilometres wide, sluicing relentlessly toward the Arctic sea. Flanking the current: The foothills and spires of the Mackenzie Mountains are home to not one but two national park reserves, Nahanni and Nááts’ihch’oh – jewels in Canada’s crown and destinations on every paddler’s life-list. Despite all this wilderness, the Dehcho is within easy reach. The region is accessible by air and road from Yellowknife. Moose, bison, and black bears ramble the dusty roadsides. And traditional villages thrive – outposts of Dene, Métis, traders, bush pilots and more, whose friendly faces and the low-key pace will pacify your soul. North Slave – The North Slave is a place of opposites: A vast lake and the rock-ribbed shield. Dense boreal forests and the wide-open Barrenlands. Ultra-modern industries and lifeways older than history. South Slave – Gateway to the wild frontier. It’s a place of big waters, including gleaming Great Slave Lake, home to Canada’s northernmost freshwater fishery. The South Slave is also a place of big wildlife and wild sanctuaries – especially the roaming herds of bison, endangered whooping cranes and regal wolves of Wood Buffalo National Park. Yellowknife, Northwest Territories - George Fischer Experience the awe-inspiring Northwest Territories on this four-day fully independent package to Yellowknife. Embark on two Aurora Borealis evening viewing opportunities and journey out on snowmobile to enjoy the landscape and nature of the area. Highlights (included): • Nature viewing snowmobile tour • Two Aurora viewing opportunities Day 1: Arrive Yellowknife Day 2: Yellowknife sightseeing Day 3: Yellowknife sightseeing Day 4: Package ends Package includes: 3 nights of accommodation, sightseeing and attractions as listed above. Please refer to pricing insert for dates and prices. Festivals in Northwest Territories Dance in hazy midnight sunbeams to the beat of a world-class band. Frolic among glittering ice sculptures beside a palace made of snow. Join artist-led workshops far above the Arctic Circle. Wear a classic old-time costume and hoist a beer, toasting the frontier past. Or gather as storytellers mesmerize crowds on the banks of the rushing Mackenzie. Some popular festivals include Reindeer Crossing, perhaps the most iconic event in all of Canada’s North; the Sunrise Festival, celebrating the return of the sun after 30 days of it setting below the horizon; Folk on the Rocks, an annual music festival; Long John Jamboree and Snowking’s Castle. Northwest Territories - Jason van Bruggen www.andersonvacations.ca 131