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Home Story 21 Record-Breaking Things in the Northwest Territories

21 Record-Breaking Things in the Northwest Territories

You know how, when you stare up at the stars, you feel all small and insignificant?

The Northwest Territories is the sort of place that puts everything in perspective. A superlative place, a place that’s larger than life. A place of incredible natural beauty. Like staring at the stars, it will leave a person humbled – and yet somehow, their life will feel bigger.

The greatest waterfall

With a surface area of four acres and a flow-rate of 3 billion cubic feet per day, Virginia Falls, or Náilicho, could fill an Olympic-sized swimming pool in 2.5 seconds. The centrepiece of Nahanni National Park Reserve, it’s twice the height of Niagara and is considered to be the greatest wilderness waterfall on Earth.

The deadliest passage

For centuries, the Northwest Passage – the narrow, ice-choked, maze-like watercourse across the top of Canada – taunted mariners. Hundreds were lured to their deaths here, including the legendary Sir John Franklin. Today, luxury cruise-ship travellers can relive this harrowing history, visiting such famed locales as Parry’s Rock in Winter Harbour, the Investigator wrecksite at Mercy Bay, the grim Smoking Hills, and perilous Prince of Wales Strait, as well as the communities of Sachs Harbour and Ulukhaktok.

The largest lake

Great Bear is the mother of all Northern Lakes. It’s the size of Vancouver Island, and slightly wetter. The largest freshwater body entirely within Canada, it covers 31,000 square kilometres, with enough ice-blue water to supply Canada’s current household needs for 500 years. Unsurprisingly, patrolling the depths of this inland sea …

The biggest fish

Yep, that’s right. Great Bear is alive with freshwater monsters. Here, the trophy-sized Lake Trout grow to the size of a 10-year-old child, and are significantly more ferocious. Dene fishermen have netted leviathans that approach 90 pounds, while in the lake’s western reaches, an angler at a fishing lodge caught (and released) a 79-pounder – the world sportfishing record.

The wildest lights

Clear crisp nights. Zero light pollution. Optimal geography, right under the “Auroral oval.” It’s no wonder that the Northwest Territories is the world’s top destination for seeing Northern Lights, with a lightshow that ignites the heavens more than 200 nights per year.

The Toughest Weather

If you travel to the uttermost tip of this territory, you’ll experience what may be the harshest weather on Earth. Meteorologists say the icebound Parry Islands, near the top of the Arctic Archipelago, suffer from a combo of clouds, dampness, wind and unrelenting cold that make it the most extreme, least habitable corner of Canada. Even for Inuit, this asteroid-like environment was a no-man’s-land: devoid of plant or animal life, there was no reason for humans to come here, and no way to survive if they did.

The burliest beast

The Northwest Territories’ signature beast is the mountain-sized wood bison, herds of which amble along our highways, blocking traffic and just generally doing whatever they feel like. Bigger and darker than their southern cousins, the plains bison, they can stand six feet tall at the shoulder and tip the scales at a metric tonne. This makes them the largest land animal in the Western Hemisphere. Needless to say, keep your distance.

The Deepest Lake

Not far offshore from the little town of Lutselk’e, the bottom drops out of Great Slave Lake. Toss a stone from your boat and it’ll plunge through the dark cold water for 2,014 feet – greater than the height of the CN Tower. Not only is Great Slave by far the deepest lake in North America, but its bottom is also the lowest natural point on the continent, dropping a quarter-mile below sea-level.

The loneliest Park

Tuktut Nogait National Park is so remote that some years, no one goes there. It’s perhaps the least-touristed national park in Canada. That’s just fine with the park’s caribou, raptors, wolves and Barrenland grizzlies, which are pretty much indifferent to human presence.

The Farthest Road

The legendary road trip along the Dempster Highway takes you on Canada’s northernmost motorway, carrying road-trippers across the Arctic Circle all the way to Inuvik in the Mackenzie River Delta. From here, take the new highway to Tuktoyaktuk, a coastal community right on the Arctic Ocean famous for pingos, caribou and Inuvialuit culture.

The mightiest River

With a watershed encompassing one-fifth of Canada, the Mackenzie is the country’s most significant river, spanning 4,000 kilometres from source to sea. In front of Norman Wells, the “Big Mac” is more than four kilometres wide; meanwhile, at a canyon near Fort Good Hope called The Ramparts, it chokes to just half a kilometre across. Culturally, the river is a superhighway linking together the ancient Dene homeland. For paddlers, it’s an epic pilgrimage – the greatest way to get right to the heart of the Northwest Territories.

The Longest trail

At 355 kilometres, the Canol Trail is the most extensive wild hiking path in North America. Backpackers often require three weeks or more to complete the route, and must be totally self-sufficient: You’ll encounter no communities or services of any kind, and often, no other hikers. What you will find? A million nameless peaks, glorious alpine valleys, and critters that have never laid eyes on a human being. Be warned, this is also grizzly bear country.

The Biggest Park

Wood Buffalo National Park is the largest protected area in Canada and the second-biggest park on Earth. Dwarfing many sovereign countries, it guards a great swath of the boreal plains, home to the last remnants of the great bison herds that once roamed the continent. Indeed, almost everything here is superlative – the world’s biggest beaver dam, the largest freshwater Delta, and this creature …

 


The Rarest Bird

 

This is perhaps the most endangered bird species in all of North America – but in the marshlands near Fort Smith, the elusive whooping crane has begun to rebound. Once numbering fewer than two-dozen, the world’s whooping crane population is now approaching 500, thanks in part to the protection of its summer habitat in the North. They’re easy to recognize: At five feet tall, they’re the tallest bird on the continent.

 


The Coldest Highway

 

For two months each winter, the North Slave region is home to the planet’s longest ice road – a 600-kilometre frozen highway rolling across lakes and tundra clear to the Nunavut border. Though designed for mining transport trucks, this private road also carries hunters, photographers and adventurers. The hearty few who tackle it will need guts, gas, and Arctic-grade cold weather gear.

 


The Northernmost River

 

The Thomsen, gliding crystal-clear through the treeless Eden of Aulavik National Park, is considered the farthest-north navigable river on the planet. Each summer, canoeists ride its flow of snowmelt to the Arctic Ocean, gawking at muskoxen and fishing for char, whitefish and the world’s northernmost trout. This voyage can be done independently with careful planning, but it is best done with a tour guide for those who want to be uttermost paddlers on the planet.

The most remote place

Welcome to Canada’s Empty Quarter – the vast unpopulated zone between the eastern shores of Great Slave and the coast of Hudson Bay. This sweeping swath of the Barrenlands has the lowest population density of anywhere outside of Antarctica – no roads, no homes, no Starbucks. There are a few fishing lodges here, and legendary rivers like the Thelon, plus tens of thousands of caribou, wolves, muskoxen, grizzlies and other critters. It’s a heckuva place to go if you want to get away from people.

The Richest ground

The Northwest Territories was once home to an array of hard-rock gold mines, some of the first oil wells in Canada, and a uranium mine that fuelled the Manhattan Project. Now the territory produces something even richer. Canada’s first diamonds were discovered here in the 1990s. Thanks to these deposits, the country is now the world’s third-largest diamond producer.

The strangest beast

Call it what you want – nanulak, grolar bear, pizzly, p-grizzle. It’s a part grizzly bear, part polar bear, and fully weird. The product of intermating between polar bear mamas and male brown bears that are spreading north due to climate change, just two of the hybrids have been confirmed to exist, both right here in the Northwest Territories. However, it’s widely assumed that more of them are roaming the tundra up around Sachs Harbour and Ulukhaktok.

The earliest game

Fun fact: The Northwest Territories is the birthplace of hockey. While wintering here in the 1820s, Sir John Franklin’s men played a hockey-like sport on a frozen pond near Great Bear Lake –  the earliest documented instance of what is, of course, the greatest game on Earth.

The Oldest rock

Cropping up from a mid-river island north of Wekweeti, right at the cusp of the Barrenlands, is a mound of stone from the Earth’s beginnings. At more than 4 billion years old, the Acasta Gneiss is the most ancient exposed rock ever found. It is literally the oldest thing on Planet Earth.

If you’re searching for more adventure, look no further than these 15 strange and dangerous places across the NWT. From exhilarating to inspiring, you’ll find a deep appreciation for the North.

Dreaming of Northern vistas? Explore all the ways to get out and witness the magnificent landscapes and majestic wildlife of the Northwest Territories.

DISCOVER A MOMENT THAT LASTS A LIFETIME. Aylmer Lake Lodge is located in Rocknest Bay, which is on the Barren......

Offering four-hour Aurora tours including the ice road and City of Yellowknife. Pick-up and drop-off available. Small groups. Service in......

Comfortable lodge a 20 minute by floatplane ride from Yellowknife. Guided fishing for Lake Trout (to 34 lb), Arctic Grayling (to......

Commercial air charter service providing air support for hikers on Canol Road, sightseeing in the beautiful Mackenzie Mountains, and fly-in fishing......

With over 30 years of living in Yellowknife, we offer a variety of tourism experiences for our guests. We are......

Simpson Air (and its predecessor) is the oldest continuously-operated flying service in the Mackenzie Valley, established in the early 1960s.......

At Nahanni River Adventures we outfit and guide canoe and raft trips on Canada’s renowned South Nahanni River and a select......

Book an adventure with us at Trail Blazer Tours for an unforgettable experience! Your adventure with us will create lasting......

“Unforgettable remote fishing experience” We are the only lodge located on this fly-in only lake. With only 8 guests per......

Tukto Lodge has been exceeding anglers’ expectations for more than fifty years. As the only fishing and eco-tourism lodge in......

Yellow Dog Lodge is a comfortable lodge with 3 private cabins for our guests. The lodge is a short (15 minute) floatplane ride from Yellowknife. Located on Duncan and Graham Lakes, the lodge is your hub for adventure. Choose from an additional 5 lakes for guided day trip excursions. Each lake is unique and offers unspoiled first class fishing. We are the only lodge that operates guided trips on each of these remote lakes located in the NWT taiga wilderness. Packaged trips feature superb sport fishing and safe outdoor adventure. The lakes and streams offer the finest Lake Trout, Northern Pike, Walleye and Arctic Grayling in the region. As an added bonus, our guests will enjoy the midnight sun and may even catch the northern lights later in the fall or early spring....

Peterson’s Point Lake Lodge provides you access to known waters teeming with monster lake trout. Their current record is a......

Etching popular northern designs on unique 100% recycled glass, since 1994. Visit our gift shop in Old Town or come......

Aurora Village – A Class of Its Own Aurora Village is a unique Aurora-viewing facility situated 25 minutes from downtown......

We operate a fully equipped luxury coach and offer City Tours, Aurora Tours and tours to the Nahanni National Park Reserve......

Kasba Lake Lodge is famous for providing guests access to incredible triple trophy fishing. Huge Lake Trout, ferocious Northern Pike......

Create your own story. We offer a variety of services to make your Sahtu adventure a reality! We offer everything from......

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Book this entire cabin in the remote wilderness of the stunningly breath-taking, Mackenzie Mountains. This cabin is hands down the......

We cover your every helicopter need in and around South Nahanni National Park in the Mackenzie Mountains of Canada’s NWT.......

Raven Tours is a tour operator in Yellowknife, NT, Canada. We offer Aurora Viewing, Snowshoeing, and Hiking Tours. We hope to......

Our company is a tour management and booking services company. We are located at Yellowknife, NT Canada. Our clients come......

Join us for an unforgettable experience on the mighty Mackenzie River. Day trips are available for a full or half......

Our professional tour guides will take you on amazing Aurora viewing tours, city tours, ice road tours and much more.......

World class dogsled tours! We are one of the largest professional sled dog kennels in Canada. Over 150 happy, healthy......

With Bluefish Outfitting you’ll get an unforgettable trip of a lifetime. Bluefish Outfitting offers personalized, guided fishing trips and boat tours on......

Remote private wilderness paradise on Little Doctor Lake, 100 km west of Fort Simpson. Accommodates 20 in cabins. Fishing, swimming,......

Creating Memories for a Lifetime Nonacho Lake Fishing Adventures offers trophy lake trout and northern pike fishing. Wildlife abounds at......

Canoe North, located in Hay River, Northwest Territories offers kayak and canoe rentals and sales. We can set you up for a......

Authentic Arctic Experiences Tundra North Tours is an Inuit company based in Inuvik, Northwest Territories that was established with the dream of being......

100% Indigenous owned!  We are the world’s first Aurora Hunting tour company, we know Aurora. Learn about Aurora, why Yellowknife is the......

We offer winter clothing rentals. Our winter clothing will keep you warm and comfortable for your outdoor fun – ask us......

Trophy Lodge is a fishing lodge located on the Smith Arm of Great Bear Lake. We are famous for our......

Your Dene Connection in Yellowknife. B. Dene Adventures is a Traditional Dene Culture Camp business which teaches the Dene way......

Northern and Remote Wilderness Adventures Ltd. (NARWAL) is a small, friendly, majority Aboriginal owned and operated family business. Our reputation......

We are a local Aboriginal tour company based in Yellowknife, the capital of the Northwest Territories, Canada. Our focus is on......

Join us on an Aurora hunting adventure. Our skilled tour guides know all the best places around Yellowknife to capture......

Gana River Outfitters is a family owned and operated outfitting business offering remote wilderness hunts in the beautiful Mackenzie Mountains......

Arctic Tours Canada is a Yellowknife based tour operating company that offer Aurora Hunting and Viewing tours, Yellowknife sightseeing tours,......

Come experience world-class Aurora Borealis viewing in Yellowknife, Northwest Territories, Canada. We are the only guides in the Northwest Territories......

Exceptional fishing on Gordon Lake, 100 km northeast of Yellowknife. Fish for Lake Trout, up to to 56 lbs! Fly in by......

2 Seasons Adventures is a family-owned company. Our professional guides boast a lifetime of experience enjoying the unique lifestyle of......

Great Slave Lake Tours offers winter and summer trips on Great Slave Lake, the ninth biggest lake in the world......

“Like No Other Place On Earth” We are the only fly-in lodge located a 50 minute float plane flight from......

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Ena Lake Lodge is a one-of-a-kind, all-inclusive luxury fishing and outdoors experience in Northern Canada. Come and experience authentic fly-in......

If are looking for a spectacular weekend retreat nestled in the serenity of the Mackenzie Mountains at Ten Stone Mountain Lodge. North-Wright......

Our vision is to see the Beaufort-Delta Region of Canada’s western arctic become the dream destination for motorcycle adventure enthusiasts from......

Pehdzeh Ki First Nation is located in the community of Wrigley, Northwest Territories, Canada. We are a Designated Authority in......

Best Northern Road Trip! Now you can drive all the way to the Arctic ocean linking Canada from coast to......

Welcoming and friendly with a rustic charm and all modern conveniences, Grey Goose Lodge immediately catches your eye as you......

Yellowknife Online produces Yellowknife specific articles and content for visitors, residents, and newcomers. Yellowknife Online has recently transferred that knowledge......

Aurora photography tours for groups of 25 or less, available in English, Mandarin and Cantonese. Our tours offer specialized knowledge......

Fishing and Barrenlands wildlife photography, including migrating caribou, at the Obstruction Rapids in the central Barrenlands north of Yellowknife....

To truly experience the Northwest Territories, take your camping gear for a highway driving adventure! Long ribbons of road without......

Remote naturalist’s lodge snuggled in the Mackenzie Mountains, in the largest mountain wilderness in North America. Located along the Canol......

Inuvik is located 200km North of the Arctic Circle, on the East Cannel of the incredible ecosystem that is the Mackenzie Delta. We are located within the Taiga Forest just south of the treeline and Arctic Tundra. Inuvik acts as the gateway to the Western Arctic as the Mackenzie River, Dempster Highway and Inuvik-Tuktoyaktuk Highway […]...

Fish for Trophy Lake Trout and Arctic Grayling at our all-inclusive lodge located in East Arm, Great Slave Lake. Fly......

Born & raised in Inuvik, Northwest Territories our experienced lead guide Jimmy Kalinek is ready to help you discover the......

Outfitter offering sport hunts for trophy Dall’s sheep, Alaska/Yukon Moose, Mountain Caribou. We ensure that every detail of the hunt......

Specializing in polar bear and muskox hunts for up to four people from traditional camp near Tuktoyaktuk. Also providing scenic......

Join us on a subarctic adventure! Spend five nights viewing the Northern Lights, enjoying outdoor activities, and experiencing the culture......

We offer Yellowknife daytime and aurora viewing tours. Please contact us for more information! ...

An Arctic Barrenlands trophy fishing adventure for the serious sportsman. Located on Lynx Lake (420 km east of Yellowknife) Lynx......

Call us about our exciting year-round packages and experience the best of the Dehcho region and Denendeh....

Aurora viewing tours, city tours, and hikes at Cameron Falls. We book all your activities and  accommodation....

Explore the wild splendor of the northern boreal plains, where whooping cranes call and bison roam free. Visitor reception centres......

Providing culturally based tours of Tuktoyaktuk with an opportunity to dip your toes in the Arctic Ocean! Ask us about......

The Deh Cho Travel Connection is a driving route that extends just over 1,800 kilometres from “Mile Zero” of the......

We offer: Nature and wildlife viewing Snowmobile tours Fishing tours Boat tours Polar bear and muskox hunts. Contact us for......

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