Yellowknife (Aug 07/06) - You can tell when a person has seen a lot during their life; the amazing ceases to be amazing.

Simply put, nothing much phases them anymore.

That's how 91-year-old Mike Krutko can tell stories of float planes breaking through frozen lakes, near-miss car accidents and surviving alone on the barrens in winter with the ease and confidence of a man talking about an amusing trip to the post office.

Long-time Northerner Mike Krutko poses in Yellowknife with his book, Mike Krutko's Amazing Adventures. - Adam Johnson/NNSL photo

"I've had a lot of narrow escapes in my life," he says matter-of-factly.

These near-misses and more are chronicled in his memoirs, Mike Krutko's Amazing Adventures, which he promoted recently at a city market in Yellowknife.

The book follows Krutko's 43 years in the North, spent between Fort McPherson, Aklavik and Fort Simpson as a bush pilot, trapper, fisherman and store owner (among other things).

He says when he retired in 1984, an acquaintance started pestering him to put his life down on paper. By the close of the decade, Krutko relented and purchased his first computer. "I went through three computers and five or six printers," he says of the writing process, which concluded around two years ago.

Now based in Grande Prairie, Krutko has spent the last couple of years touring around western Canada in his RV to get the word out about his book. Vibrant and talkative, Krutko, who also happens to be Mackenzie Delta MLA David Krutko's father, doesn't show any signs of slowing down.

"It has everything I need," he says with a shrug and a laugh of his home on wheels.

One of Krutko's favourite stories from the book takes place during a flight to Fort McPherson in 1952.

"The wings were icing up real bad," he says to set the stage.

He had to set down on a lake 20 or 30 miles from the settlement, where the plane promptly broke through the overflow ice. After making it to shore with his gear, Krutko was still a long way from home.

"It was two long, long days of walking," he says.

Bear in mind, this was without snowshoes in waist-deep snow.

He dug out shelters in the show with spruce boughs at night.

"I had a pretty good sleep," he says simply of his time alone on the land.