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Tourists from the cruise ship MV Bremen were taken on a bus to visit the wreckage of Roald Amundsen's sunken ship the Baymaud in the old town area of Cambridge Bay last week. - photo courtesy of the Kitikmeot Heritage Society |
Busy with cruise ships, TV shows Cambridge Bay plays host to tourists, magazine writers and reality TV film crew
Miranda Scotland
Northern News Services
Published Monday, August 26, 2013
IKALUKTUTIAK/CAMBRIDGE BAY
Cambridge Bay has been a hot spot for visitors this month with the community hosting reality TV show stars, a documentary film team, adventurer writers and more than 200 cruise ships passengers.
Last week, Vicki Aitaok, manager of Qaigguit tours, guided staff from Canadian travel magazine, Outpost, around the community.
She planned to take them on a town tour, elder visits, ATVing to look for wildlife and to Mount Pelly.
"They'll be on the go steady. All four roads that this town has, they'll be going to the end of every road," said Aitaok with a laugh.
The team will be using the photos and information they gather for an upcoming spread on Nunavut, Aitaok said.
The adventurers, she added, had already visited communities in the Kivalliq region and on Baffin Island before arriving in Cambridge Bay.
"It's nice that they're seeing all the regions of Nunavut because we are so different ... A lot of people go to Iqaluit and they think that's Nunavut but Nunavut is so different east to west, north to south," said Aitaok.
"If you want the real Nunavut experience, you have to go to quite a few communities."
Yvonne Angohiatok, the Arctic Coast Visitors Centre manager, said she's excited about the attention Cambridge Bay has received so far this season.
It's a chance to inform a greater number of people about the community and the more people who know about it the more visitors the area will get, she said.
"It creates more of an opportunity to provide tourism services," Angohiatok said.
Earlier this month the community also received a visit from the cast of Dangerous Waters, a TV show about five men travelling "some of the most, extreme, most beautiful parts of our
planet."
The crew spent a couple days in the community before setting off on their personal watercraft.
Around the same time, Tanya Tagaq Gillis returned to town to be part of a documentary being made by Toronto-based production company, Primitive Entertainment.
During the shoot, Gillis said, she was asked questions about climate change and the environment.
Plus, they took shots of her and her band performing the soundtrack they've created for the silent film Nanook of the North, which was filmed in the early 20s by Robert Joseph Flaherty.
On Aug. 15 Gillis took time out of her day to participate in a cultural performance for the passengers of the European cruise ship MV Bremen.
The tourists also received a guided walking tour around the community to see the cultural centre, the visitor centre and shopping spots.
They were then loaded on to a bus to visit the old town area where they saw the Baymaud, Amundsen's sunken ship.
The cruise ship visit, Aitaok said, created more than 20 jobs in the community.
Residents were hired to guide, perform, clean up the community centre, model in a fashion show and more.
Local businesses and artists benefitted too.
"The tourists buy a lot of things around town and the Northern Store told me this year that, that one ship spent more in the one day than all the cruise ships last year put together," said Aitaok.
The community is expecting a total of five cruise ships this season, which is on par with last year's
numbers.
The second ship was set to arrive Aug. 25 followed by another on Aug. 29.
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