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ENTERPRISE - When Vi Bartlett and her husband moved to Enterprise from Yellowknife in 2002, the adventure turned into a business opportunity.

They borrowed a friend's pilot truck to guide a new mobile home up from Alberta, and unknowingly introduced a service that was lacking in the community.

Vi Bartlett co-owns EV's Enterprises - a pilot truck service based in Enterprise. - Paul Bickford/NNSL photo

Enterprise residents took notice of the pilot truck, Bartlett said.

"People said, 'There are no pilot trucks in Enterprise. Why don't you start a business?'" she recalled.

They decided to capitalize on the opportunity.

"We were too young to retire," said Bartlett, who is in her 50s. "This is our semi-retirement. It gives us extra income to do what we want to do."

The couple launched EV's Enterprises with one pilot truck in 2003 and now have three trucks, along with a bunch of extra equipment - satellite phones, first aid kits, tool kits, radios and more.

The couple has also become certified flag people and can control various scenes, such as an accident they once came across in northern Alberta.

Bartlett said EV's Enterprises piloting service mostly covers the area from the NWT/Alberta border to Hay River, Fort Simpson and Yellowknife. However, the Bartletts have also worked as far away as Colville Lake, Tuktoyaktuk, the Yukon, British Columbia and as far south as Montana.

They have helped move such things as buildings, oil rigs and heavy equipment.

The biggest item was a nearly 40-foot-wide log home they guided through Hay River.

They also piloted a transport truck carrying a building over 21 feet high from Red Deer, Alta., to Fort Simpson, where they had to also gingerly move it onto the ferry.

"Getting it on and off there was fun," Bartlett said.

She said they do a couple of hundred piloting jobs a year, sometimes two or three in the same day.

EV's Enterprise's busiest time of year is from February to April, when many pieces of equipment are moving for energy exploration and diamond mining.

Bartlett said the work is very slow from October to December, which allows her and her husband time to travel.

"It gives us the opportunity to take off when we want to," she said.

Plus, she said the work has allowed them to meet many people and see lots of new scenery.

The Bartletts live in sight of the weigh scale for trucks in Enterprise and have gotten business by spotting over-dimension trucks. Bartlett said the regulations for transport trucks change at the NWT/Alberta border

"A lot of southern truckers don't know that," she said.

Bartlett said most drivers in the NWT slow down and move over when they see a pilot truck approaching.

"In the NWT, the majority of the motoring public is very, very good," she said.

In contrast, she said many drivers in Alberta appear to be in too much of a rush.

"I find they don't want to obey the pilot truck."

Before moving to Enterprise from Yellowknife, she worked for the Yellowknife Catholic school board as a rehabilitation practitioner and classroom assistant at the Territorial Treatment Centre.