The Search for Trudy's Collar A Snowmachine Odyssey Stony Creek journey Mile 34 The search for Trudy's satellite collar took Martin Kienzler and a group of Conservation Officers on a snowmachine odyssey through the frozen Arctic. Traveling on an ancient winter trade route, which the Tetlit G'wichin from McPherson used to get to Old Crow, home of the Vuntut G'wichin, the group followed land trails and frozen rivers to reach the site where Trudy's collar last transmitted a signal. Did they find her collar? Find out for yourself in Martin's description of the adventure! The 380 mile snowmachine trip between Ft. McPherson and Old Crow (190 miles each way) was completed between the 9th and 11th of April, 2002, by Conservation Officer's Sharon Keaton, Kevin Johnstone and myself. We were accompanied by Johhnie Charlie, Conservation Officer for the NWT for the first 50 miles, as he guided us over the most rugged part of the trail. We left Ft. McPherson on the morning of the 9th, and headed up the Peel River for a few miles, before turning up Stony Creek. Lachute River ice trail We followed Stony Creek to it's headwaters in the Richardson Mountains, where in Stony Pass we crossed the Yukon / NWT border. Dropping down from the Pass we came to the headwaters of the Lachute River. The Lachute River was mostly ice, as "overflow" had covered the snow and turned the River into one big glacier. From the bottom of the Lachute River there were a couple of overland stretches before reaching the Bell River. We followed the Bell River to Lapierre House which was formerly a Hudson's Bay Trapper's cabin- Porcupine River, 75 miles to go Trading Post - nothing remains there now. There we got onto a bush trail which we followed for about 30 miles before arriving at "Salmon Cache" on the Porcupine River. As daylight was waning and we were having problems with one of the snowmachines, we decided to camp for the night at a small trapper's cabin on the banks of the Porcupine River. The following morning, we went the final 75 miles on the frozen Porcupine River into Old Crow. After unloading our sleds, we made repairs to our equipment, and visited with people from the community. Despite the fact that it was mid-afternoon, and as we were returning to Fort McPherson the next morning, if we were to try to find Trudy's collar, we would have to continue on down the Porcupine River that day. Even in April the days are growing considerably longer north of the Arctic Circle, and we would have light until after 10:00 that evening. Sharon, Kevin, and I were accompanied on our search by Martha and Ronald Benjamin, Sharons mother and brother, both of whom live in Old Crow. It was less than an ideal day for the search, as a storm appeared to be moving in, and the sky was filled with dark clouds. Ronald led the way downstream from Old Crow to Goose Camp Creek, which is the creek up which we needed to go to reach Trudy's last transmission site. After about ¼ mile the creek narrowed and became impassible on snowmachine. On either side of the creek was thick willow growth, which made it next to impossible to walk on snowshoe. To this point we had seen only moose tracks along the creek, and no sign that caribou had passed by within the last Search team couple of months. As it didn't appear that we would find Trudy's remains on the creek, it meant we would have to search through the willow growths, which would be much like looking for a needle in a haystack. After walking up the creek for awhile, we snowmachined back out to the river and to look for old tracks made by the caribou when they had crossed the river. It became plain that with the snowfall and passage of time since mid February, we were not going to find any traces of where the caribou had crossed, and where Trudy would be lying. With regrets, we abandoned our search and returned to Old Crow. Copyright 2002 Journey North. All Rights Reserved. Please send all questions, comments, and suggestions to our feedback form