Darrell Greer
Northern News Services

Chesterfield Inlet (Sept 05/01) - Well-known Northern adventurist and wilderness guide Wes Werbowy was in Chesterfield Inlet recently to conduct a month-long guiding course.

The community expressed its interest in having Werbowy deliver the Level 2 Big Game Guide Training Course and Kivalliq Partners in Development agreed to fund the program.

Werbowy says the program gives a group of Chester residents the opportunity to learn how to create a career out of doing what they love -- hunting and fishing.

Guides are often referred to as the single most important aspect of an outdoor adventure.

During their training, the Chester participants began to recognize possible business opportunities which they are now one-step closer to being able to take advantage of.

Course participant Emile Poiron says the group realized before they could professionally guide paying hunters from the south, they would have to become familiar with totally different types of hunting concepts.

"I learned how important it is to have a list of things you need when you are guiding," says Poiron.

"Now I look at caribou in a different way than I did before I took the guiding course."

The guides in training spent seven days on the land doing a simulated guided hunt.

They stalked caribou with primitive weapons and learned to judge trophy antler size.

Johnny Issaluk says bow hunting offers new challenges to him as a hunter and the course helped him understand there is more to caribou than fat and racks.

"The community has lots of needs and this is one of the better ways I believe will help it grow," says Issaluk.

Werbowy says about half the Chester participants passed the course, which, during the hunt segment, required them to walk about 13 to 16 kilometres a day observing caribou and other wildlife.

"The course graduates -- Issaluk, Poiron, James Mullins and Roy Kriterdluk -- all agreed that big game guiding was a combination of fun, hard work and good exercise," says Werbowy.

"What better way to prepare for the future?"