Sarah McNair-Landry drives a dog team in Nunavut. She and her boyfriend Erik Boomer are circumnavigating Baffin Island by dogsled to commemorate the 25th anniversary of the feat her parents, Matty McNair and Paul Landry, accomplished in 1990.
- photo courtesy of Erik Boomer |
Explorers' daughter recreating journey
Couple to circumnavigate Baffin Island by dog team in honour of parents' expedition
Casey Lessard
Northern News Services
Published Monday, February 2, 2015
IQALUIT
Twenty-five years have passed since Matty McNair and Paul Landry circumnavigated Baffin Island, a trip that kickstarted their polar exploration careers.
Matty McNair and Paul Landry cemented their polar exploration careers by being the first to circumnavigate Baffin Island in 1990. Now their daughter and her boyfriend are retracing their path. - photo courtesy of 1990 Baffin Island Expedition |
On Feb.1, their daughter, Sarah McNair-Landry, and her boyfriend, Erik Boomer, headed out to retrace the 4,000 km dogsled journey undertaken by McNair-Landry's parents.
"I'm pretty excited to see it all," McNair-Landry said of the route, which runs from Iqaluit, through Pangnirtung, Auyuittuq Park to Qikiqtarjuaq, Clyde River, Pond Inlet, Arctic Bay, Iglulik and back to Iqaluit.
"We're leaving in February, one of the coldest months, and getting back in May or June, so the change in temperatures from the start to the end and the change in seasons is going to be pretty exciting," she said.
The pair are being pulled by 14 dogs, which are loaded with enough kibble to last the journey, but the pair will be looking for seal, a better food for trekking, in communities along the way.
They expect to stop every week or two, with the trip from Iglulik home being the longest stretch, about a month long.
"You're preparing to be away for 120 days," McNair-Landry said, noting the trip is self-funded. "There's always a lot of stress and gear. We're making our own dogsled, there's a lot of sewing for sled bags, and getting our gear sorted and ready."
To add to the pressure, she has just returned from a trip by tractor to the South Pole (as reported in Nunavut News/North Dec. 22) and has only had a month to prepare.
Boomer was busy with photography jobs during that time, but he seems unfazed, knowing McNair-Landry carries a lifetime of polar experience.
"This is my first long winter Arctic trip," he said, noting his background in expedition and extreme kayaking. "The past four years, I've been able to learn tons and tons from Sarah and her mom, her brother and dad. I've done 10-day trips in the winter, but this is a bit bigger. I've done trip with dogs, but compared with Sarah doing the North Pole and crossing Greenland, and going up the east coast of Baffin, I'm a newbie, so I'm learning a lot from her."
"Just living in Baffin where you step outside and it's -30 C every day really helps," McNair-Landry said. "It's like everyday training. It's so much easier to learn how to deal with the cold and enjoy being outside in the cold. This is what you do. You go camping with friends, go skiing, dogsledding. It's training for bigger expeditions."
The pair is also prepared for the worst, one possibility being a lack of snow on the way home from Iglulik in May.
"Some years there isn't good snow in May, and other years, there's great snow in May," Boomer said. "We're preparing to be doing some land cruising, going over tundra with the sled. If we run out of snow, we can keep cutting down the sled and cannibalizing that.
"Eventually, we use the material from the bags to sew up little doggie packs and load up each of the dogs with dog food and weight. We can carry some backpacks and hike with this team of 14 huskies back to Iqaluit."
"That's a backup, backup plan, if all else has failed, we're stuck on the tundra and no way to get back," McNair-Landry said.
The 1990 Baffin Expedition cemented McNair and Landry's reputation for polar expedition readiness, and gave them the confidence and skills for bigger trips.
"It was after this trip they started doing Greenland ice cap trips and eventually the North Pole and South Pole," Boomer said.
"It was probably because of a lot of things they learned on this dogsled trip."
"They absolutely fell in love with Baffin, and decided to move here, to call it home," McNair-Landry said.
Will the pair's yet-to-be-produced children repeat the trek in 25 years?
"I don't know that we've thought that far," Boomer said.
The pair can be tracked along the way at wayofthenorth.com, where they will also be recording their exploits.
