Arrived in Churchill, Manitoba, at 5:10 pm

It may have been sunny in Churchill this morning but we left Saskatoon at approximately 11:30 in heavy, wind-driven rain. The Twin Beech rose like the queen she is through the cloud until we leveled out at 5,000 feet. The rain continued for approximately 35 miles and then we floated between cloud layers to Thompson, Manitoba, where the weather finally cleared, and down below us, was a great expanse of the distinctly Canadian black spruce. Think mosquitoes in July.... Soon even those stunted trees disappeared and there was nothing but the tundra below with small lakes like ink blots to the horizon. Oh Canada! What glorious spaces! And then Hudson Bay appeared on the horizon -- a long line of ice. We circled, with a wing-dip over the old Hudson Bay Company fort, and then landed in Churchill (population 750 "on a good day") at 5:10 pm, local time. "November 5 6 5 Uniform Sierra" did her pilot proud and vice versa!

(As an interesting aside for those not in the know, the term asking for the plane's beacon to be activated for radar verification is "Squawk Ident." This is my new favourite expression replacing, "where are you?")