Media Centre - Spectacular North West Territories

Hay River commercial fisherman Shawn Buckley never fully appreciated his work until he had the opportunity to see it through other people’s eyes. “I’ve always had people interested in coming with me when I fished – and they commented how nice and rewarding it was,” he says. “They had a look in their eye and they’d say: “You’re so lucky to do it.”

Longtime bush pilot Ted Grant, president of charter and flightseeing company Simpson Air (www.simpsonair.ca), comes by his bush pilot genes honestly. His grandfather’s first cousin was legendary World War One flying ace and pioneering bush pilot Wop May. Ted’s road to becoming a bush pilot took a bit of a detour before he headed for the skies over the Nahanni River.

For those of you who haven’t seen it, “Arctic Air” is a TV series about a maverick airline based in the city of Yellowknife, NWT which airs on CBC. Three episodes have aired to date, and people are a-buzz about our spectacular scenery featured in the shows. While the plots of the episodes are revved up for dramatic purposes, the NWT has a long, colourful and close relationship with bush pilots and air travel.

Fort Smith Mayor Janie Hobart’s face lights up as she talks about participating in the swimming competition when her community hosted the NWT Seniors Games last summer. “I was finally old enough to participate,” she says like a teenager gleeful after finally getting a driver’s license. Participants in the games must be at least 55 years old. They compete in disciplines as diverse as cribbage tournaments and swimming races.

The guests were lined up in the lobby of Yellowknife’s Explorer Hotel (www.explorerhotel.ca), waiting expectantly for the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge to arrive. General manager Douglas Pears stood by nervously. He had met royalty before, but this was different. Prince William and Kate were on their first official visit to the North since their widely televised wedding two months earlier.

Chef Frankie Parker was nervous about cooking for the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge in July at Blachford Lake Lodge. But she relaxed as soon as she arrived on what has been dubbed Honeymoon Island a few hours before the royal couple’s visit. “It just fell into place and I remembered what it is I do, which is to cook,” she says.

When Maxim Bloudov moved to Yellowknife in 2005, it didn’t take him long to figure out that he had reached the fisherman’s nirvana. “As soon as I got on a boat with friends in Yellowknife, I realized what opportunities there were here,” he says. He grew up on the Black Sea in southern Russia with a fishing rod in his hand. “I would go fishing with my dad and grandfather when I was three.”