James Hrynyshyn
Northern News Services

NNSL (Jun 19/98) - Southern tourism outfitters have dominated the business in the Nahanni Ram region for decades.

No longer. As of this week, the first Deh Cho-owned and operated naturalist lodge is open for business on the shores of Cli Lake, thanks to more than five years of community support and what Loyal Letcher calls a lot of "sweat equity."

Letcher is president of North Nahanni Naturalist Lodge Ltd., a company jointly- owned by the Liidlii Kue and Nahanni Butte First Nations and 16 members of his family and friends.

"It's pretty hard to put a value on that sweat," Letcher said, when asked for an estimate of what the new lodge is worth.

The most precise he would be during an interview Saturday at the lodge, located just metres from site of his family's history country home on the lake, was less than $1 million.

Money is only half the picture, though. The lodge represents the realization of a family dream, first articulated by Letcher's cousin, Stanley Cli.

Cli Lake, about 120 kilometres west of Fort Simpson near the Nahanni Ram plateau, was named after Stanley and Loyal's grandfather, Joseph Cli.

The Cli family has been using the area to hunt and trap for more than a hundred years, and when it came time to choose a spot for lodge, the lake was the obvious choice.

"This is where we were all brought up as children," recalls William's daughter (and Loyal's mother) Minnie Letcher.

Almost every member of the Cli family -- except for Stanley, who has since died -- plus dozens of friends and government and Dene leaders flew out to the lodge for Saturday's grand opening.

Many of them had a hand in the lodge's construction, including Fort Simpson Mayor Norm Prevost, who helped out with the electrical wiring, and Jacques Harvey of South Nahanni Airways, who flew the guests out in his Twin Otter.

"When we were young, we always used to say what a great place Cli Lake would be for a lodge," said Loyal Letcher in a tearful speech from the deck of the new building. "And we might even get paid for what we like to do: fishing and living off the land."

Beginning this week, that's exactly what the family is doing.