Upon arriving in Ulukhaktok, Dan and I were given a ride from the airport to town by the local Royal Canadian Mounted Police detachment. I was excited because it was my first time in the back of a cruiser, but as you can see it isn’t an ideal spot to take photos from.

West of the bay where the town is lie the so-called “three hills”: old and worn out piles of rock from which you can get the best view of town and out to the open ocean.

This is the old Anglican Church that lies in the centre of town. It's pretty derelict now, but sometimes nothing looks nicer then an old weather-beaten building whose paint is cracked and stripping and whose shingles are falling off.
Not too long ago, Ulukhaktok's residents used dog teams as their main mode of transport during the long winter months. Now, only three dog teams remain in town. Everyone else uses the snowmobiles. This particular team, located in the centre of town, belongs to a well known polar bear hunter Pat Ekpakohak. With spring in the air, and not enough snow on the land, or thick ice on the water, all they can do is sit on the shore where they are chained, and wait to be fed. When we loaded up the sledge to go out to Mashuyuk, they thought they were going to get to run, and they were yelping with urgent anticipation - poor things! However, they are not cuddly dogs, most sled dogs only respect the person or people who trained them, or feed them, if you're anyone else you'd best steer clear.

A polar bear skin hung out to dry at another house in town. There are many people in town who hunt polar bears, and several of them, like Pat, are hired out by hunters who come up, usually from the United States, to bag one for themselves. A pretty expensive endeavor.

Did you hear about the American who came up here to shoot a bear, and ended up shooting a half polar, half grizzly bear? They were calling it a "grizzlor" in the news. Anyway, there was some confusion because as the bear was a hybrid the Canadian authorities wouldn't allow the it over the border because the American had a tag for a polar bear, not a grizzly. The hunter was pretty miffed because he had spent something like $50,000 to do the deed. Eventually, he did get it back. It's good to know that there are some bears that are taking their dwindling numbers to heart, and doing something about it - i.e. procreating. However, there is some concern by people who think this is indicative of global warming as the grizzly bears' rage is coming further north, while the thick sea ice that the polar bear call's home is also disappearing.