The skidoos are now running back and forth to Moosonee. They HAD been on again off again for a week or so — while things froze and thawed and couldn’t quite make up their minds just exactly what they wanted to do. For a while we even had a mini-breakup. The ice out on The River now is very rough. That means that the construction of the ice highway may be a little more complex this year.
The choppers (for passengers) are threatening to cut back on service. The skidoos have taken up most of the passenger business. A skidoo ride costs something around $10. Many of the taxi drivers have little enclosed sleds that they can pull back and forth, so they can haul that many more passengers — comfortably. Since Moose Factory rarely plows its roads — and never sands! — the skidoos can deliver door to door service. Sometimes on land, even, they seem to be the only thing that will get through. A chopper ride (one way) is $35 and extra for baggage. The freight choppers will keep working, I assume, until vehicles are out on the ice.
I, of course, will have none of it. I won’t pay the $35 that the chopper costs. And I don’t like the skidoos. That is, I don’t trust the ice under them. I will be one of those people riding in a warm Church van, behind the second School Bus that crosses. I announce this loudly and proudly to anyone who will listen. Everyone has learned by now not to listen.
But every year or so tragedy does strike. And it did, this year, at Albany. A young mother, around twenty years old, was on her way from Albany to Kashechewan — to meet up with her husband and child. There was no ride available, evidently. And, although pregnant with a second child, she decided to walk. That’s what a lot of people do. It saves money, and walking is good exercise. And if the ice is thick enough for the skidoos, it definitely is thick enough for someone walking.
The problem was that she got off the trail. I’m not sure whether she went through the ice or fell into slush on top of the ice. Whatever it was that happened, she got wet. She got to shore, up onto firm ground, wrapped herself in whatever overcoats she had, and waited for help. It never came. She may have been too far away from the trail. She froze to death.
In other sadness, Pauline died this afternoon at Moose Factory. So often Christmas is like this.