(wind whooshing)
ANDY BASSICH: This one looks like it kind of wants
to go where I want it to go.
I’m just gonna put this on to help it.
I think it’s gonna go pretty much
where we want it to go anyway.
It’s not leaning hard like some of the other trees have been.
A lot of logging is all about picking which tree,
where to fall it,
and which order to drop the trees in.
(revving)
Denise has helped me a little bit with the logging,
but she’s never really done a lot of it.
She’s been kind of a helper,
and this year, I want her to take
a lot more responsibility
for dropping trees.
Now, I’m gonna start the back cut,
I’ll get us started, and then I’m gonna go over,
get the winch going and then when I give you a signal,
you can start doing your cut.
Once you’re in far enough,
then you can get the wedge in behind you.
Do that, okay.
DENISE BECKER: Oh, this makes me nervous.
ANDY: One of these days, I’m gonna croak,
and Denise needs to know
how to do this stuff by herself.
I mean, really, honestly, it’s that simple.
(chainsaw revving)
DENISE: It’s off an angle!
It’s off!
ANDY: Right on!
DENISE: It goes so fast.
ANDY: Right where we wanted it, that’s good.
DENISE: Oh man.
ANDY: Now, all the work begins.
It’s just a lot of work, logging.
So you gotta drop your tree.
Hopefully, you can get it to fall
where you want it to fall.
Then one of the biggest jobs
is limbing the tree,
and that’s where it works really well to have two people.
One person starts at one end, one starts at the other,
and you just start knocking the branches down.
It’s a jungle, you’re buried into them sometimes,
and the branches are big,
a lot of these branches are ten foot long
and fanned out like a giant fan,
and they’re not easy to pick up.
It takes a lot of leverage to pick them up
and toss them into a pile.
(chainsaw revving)
Let’s get it bucked up
and let’s get all these logs hauled out.
DENISE: Yeah.
SUE AIKENS: When I’m driving Big Red,
get on the big girl panties, we’re gonna go explore.
I’ve got a little bit of fog,
some blue trying to break through,
and I’m supposed to get 30, 40,
50 mile an hour winds coming in.
Kind of one of the last hurrah storms of the winter.
Time is starting to be of the essence.
Before I lose the last of this winter,
I’m taking Big Red out.
I’ve got a chance I can get a little bit more meat.
If I can get my full complement now,
I’m gonna be ahead of the game.
I probably get some of the most joy
from the way that I live
seeing the animals.
Oh, I turn into a two-year-old.
But it’s what I like, so why not?
There’s something there, what is that?
Is that a rock, is it a something?
It is... looks like a big rock.
(chuckles) Watch, I’ll go past it, and it’ll run away.
Well, dammit.
There’s some tracks there.
Oh, there’s some bigger tracks there.
I noticed there’s all these ptarmigan prints,
which you expect, it’s willow ptarmigan.
But then, there’s bigger prints here,
and I’m not sure what they are.
If you look at this, that’s a hell of a stride, man.
Yeah, this is looking more and more bearish.
This is a respectable big print, and there’s a few of them.
What could it be?
And I’m just hypothetically guessing?
I’m thinking a bear woke up,
probably a smaller sow.
May or may not have a cub with, those would be the smaller ones.
But... I can’t really read it too good,
it’s too decrepit.
But you can kinda see stripey, stripey, stripey.
There’s some nails, there’s some claws.
I don’t need to push a female bear
that may or may not have a cub and a den
that I don’t know about.
If she charged me,
could I shoot her in defense of my life?
Yes.
But did I cause the issue because I pushed it first?
Probably.
Better to just back out of it,
get back in Big Red, and continue my journey.
Your interactions are always your choice.
AGNES HAILSTONE: We go with the weather.
We all say weather or not, every day is different.
CHIP HAILSTONE: Wanna walk down to the boat with me?
-AGNES: Yeah. -CHIP: Bring your ax.
Maybe I should bring a shovel.
NARRATOR: Chip and Agnes Hailstone
must haul their inoperable boat back to the village of Noorvik,
where it can be properly scrapped.
They have only a short window
to transport it over land before the spring thaw.
But first, they’ll need to free it from the ice.
AGNES: Today, Chip and I are going
to be digging out our, um, boat.
We parked it this summer after it started to freeze up
and, uh, we’ve never touched it since.
CHIP: This is gonna be something else.
This is hard packed.
It should be up on sticks and rollers though.
I’ll start at the front if you want to start at the back.
AGNES: Yeah.
Well-used old boat.
CHIP: Yeah, this poor boat’s been,
been down that road a few times,
built and rebuilt and rebuilt again.
Been a lot of great memories, lot of adventures.
Lot of crazy (bleep).
AGNES: What the (bleep)?
CHIP: It’s a good boat. I really like it, but it’s worn out.
So, this boat’s time is over.
We’ll take it to Noorvik.
If somebody doesn’t want to rebuild it for another time,
you know, let’s properly dispose of this thing.
This land is pretty much owned in common.
Everybody accesses it and uses it.
And the last thing I wanna do is have somebody see my old boat
sitting like a derelict piece of garbage
out in the middle of nowhere.
Trash has its proper place. We take our trash home.
AGNES: You know what, I hit ice.
CHIP: You hit ice?
AGNES: Overflow ice. It might pop.
CHIP: It’s cold, it’s windy. It’s part of living here.
That’s just part of the weather.
Nothing’s ever the same. It’s always changing.
Always a challenge to it all.
And there’s always a comfort to it all.
You’ve gotta do what you gotta do
and I’ve done it for so long,
this doesn’t bother me, not a bit.
AGNES: Getting there.
CHIP: Yeah.
Here’s where the ice is
that we have to deal with, Agnes.
Let me see your ax and I’ll see how deep it is.
AGNES: Almost got the bottom of it.
(gasps)
CHIP: Where? A hole?
-AGNES: Yup. -CHIP: Let’s see.
AGNES: I knew it went through.
I had to pull my hatchet out of it.
CHIP: Don’t worry about it.
One little hole is nothing in this boat.
Oh yeah.
-AGNES: Oh, you got it, yay! -CHIP: Right on.
I got the inside, you got the outside.
AGNES: We’re halfways there then, huh?
CHIP: Halfways and then we’ll be halfways to Noorvik.
(laughs)
RICKO DEWILDE: Once you have the knowledge to survive out here,
you have the ability to be comfortable,
eat good in the harshest elements in the world.
Oh, snow-go sound good.
I’m gonna take my two daughters with me,
go on a little excursion out here,
look around for small game.
We look for ptarmigan, okay.
MAYA DEWILDE: Ptarmigan?
RICKO: Yeah, ptarmigan.
Those are white birds.
They’re good eating.
Maya’s never really been on much hunts with me before.
She knows her siblings has,
so she feels like she’s missing out
so she’s more than ready to go.
You never saw one before, huh?
Skarlett’s a real hunter, she’s gotten ducks before,
spruce chicken, muskrat.
She’s never got ptarmigan though,
so it’s an exciting day for me to bring her out
to teach her to hunt a certain animal
that she’s never gotten before.
Oh, look at that.
Look at that, ptarmigan tracks.
Maya, look.
Ptarmigan tracks. You can’t see them? Look.
See, this is from today. There’s ptarmigan all over.
You can tell if animal tracks are fresh by touching.
If it’s soft, that means it’s just there,
and they’re going up and they’re eating.
You see where they pick that, this?
You see where all those little rips are?
SKARLETT (off screen): Yeah.
RICKO: They’re eating these willows.
MAYA: Bok-bok-bok-bok.
(Ricko laughs)
RICKO: Yeah, that’s how ptarmigan are.
They’re kind of like a spruce chicken,
but spruce chicken eats spruce, ptarmigan eat willows.
We’ll try to find them.
They always run in a whole bunch together.
Lot of willows around here.
Might even see ptarmigan if we drive over that way.
Whoa, oh, oh, oh, oh. Oh.
-(Maya grunts) -RICKO: You’re okay. You’re okay.
Roll over. Oh, I got you, My-My.
-You okay? -MAYA: Mm-hmm.
RICKO: Good thing you’re tough.
Sorry about that. Here.
Ugh, damn.
I didn’t see this big old drift right here, you see.
You okay, My-My?
That’s part of life out here.
Any time you move around, there’s a lot of hidden dangers,
no matter how experienced you are.
But luckily, I was going slow enough
where we all kind of jumped off or moved out of the way
before the snow machine landed on us.
This is a good learning moment for the kids to understand
that it’s not always just fun and games out here
no matter what you’re doing.
Alright. Good thing we have the winch.
Here’s what you always gotta have with these big machines,
I’m gonna take this coat off.
Okay, we’re gonna try to winch it up now.
Okay, you see it moving?
While we have our winch, we should be okay.
If I didn’t have this winch with me,
it’d take me all day
to literally dig my way out of this situation,
With this winch, you don’t even have to have no help really.
It’s no problem.
And that’s why we’re out here prepared, right?
Without this winch, I’d be in a bad situation.
And a lot of people have lost their lives out here
because of not having a winch
or not being prepared enough
to come out of situations like this.
(engine revving)
(beeping)
Whoa.
Hi.
Okay, you ready, My-My?
Okay, let’s roll.
No more flipping over. I won’t go on no more drifts.
There’s a lot of willows out there.
Maybe there’s something out there.
CHIP: There’s a fine balance here in the Arctic
between not freezing to death and not breaking a sweat.
(wind whooshing)
(sighs)
CHIP: So, I’m gonna use this sled over here,
the big one, I’m gonna make a cradle
out of, like, six poles.
AGNES: Good poles, so they don’t make no holes in the boat?
CHIP: Yup.
AGNES: So Chip and I are getting the sled ready.
Earlier, we dug out the boat,
and, uh, we’re just gonna load up the boat on this sled
and we’re gonna make a cradle,
so the boat won’t be dragging in the back
because this sled is shorter than the boat.
CHIP: So we just tie ’em down,
and then we’ll throw a boat on top of it.
When I was young,
I thought no matter what I do in life,
I’m gonna have a job that’s adventurous.
And then I became a caribou hunter
and a fisherman and a gatherer.
I’ve been shot, stabbed, black eyes,
busted teeth, broken noses, frostbites, cuts.
Wild, man.
It’s a great life.
(engine revving)
(Agnes laughs)
AGNES: Woo-hoo!
Yay!
CHIP: Me and you will lift this front end,
and then we’ll try to rotate the back over, huh?
One, two, three, lift!
(both panting)
CHIP: It’s cold, it’s windy, it’s part of living here.
That’s just part of the weather.
Alright. She’s looking good.
AGNES: Yeah.
-Yay, we did it. -CHIP: It’s centered.
It’s sitting where it’s gonna pretty much sit
until we get it home.
AGNES: Now, we just gotta hope
for a beautiful day and the wind to stop blowing.
CHIP: Yeah.
AGNES: The long, slow route to Noorvik.
It’ll be nice.
ANDY: Everybody thinks it’s peaches and cream
when you live out in the bush.
It’s nothing but sweat
and sore muscles.
DENISE: Well?
What do you got your sights set on for the next one?
ANDY: Biggest tree we can find.
Which looks like that one right there.
DENISE: Oh, okay.
ANDY: We’ll just take our time on it
and see what we can do, and...
DENISE: And that’s definitely worth it.
We’ll get a lot more lumber out of that one.
ANDY: That tree doesn’t taper
until you’ll get about 55, 60 feet up.
I bet that whole tree would easily do
our whole porch system around the house.
-DENISE: Really? -ANDY: Yeah.
DENISE: Wow.
ANDY: Trees, just like animals, give themselves to us
to become what we want to use them for.
And the beauty of it is
both of them are renewable if you take care of them.
I’m gonna take the cable off and tie that to the tree
and then this other end’s gonna have a loop in it
to go to the winch.
DENISE: I feel like the more I know,
the less I know what to expect.
ANDY: Yeah, but every day in your life is different,
and you never know what to expect but you adapt to it.
And I have the utmost confidence
that you are now proficient at dropping a big tree.
So let’s do it.
DENISE: Every day, it’s a countdown
now spring’s here.
Trails are gonna start melting away.
It goes super-fast.
When the trails are gone,
access to our lumber is gone, and that’s it.
We can’t just pop down the street
to the local lumber yard to pick up what we need.
This really is a two-man job, and it’s really important
for Andy and I to sync in with what’s going on.
So I’m learning a lot all the time.
He’s taking the lead and anticipating
and knowing what could happen,
but there’s a lot of things that are gonna just happen.
(chainsaw revving)
ANDY: You’re gonna have to go in
and then cut more over here
and then come back over this way
and finish making the cut that way.
DENISE: Right, ’cause that tree’s just
so much bigger, yeah.
(chainsaw revving)
ANDY: Keep hitting ’em!
DENISE: (bleep)
-(wood creaking) -Okay. Here it comes!
(wood creaking)
(chainsaw revving)
(revving stops)
ANDY: Good job.
Alright.
And what I was trying to holler at you about
is when I’m pulling on it...
...and I give it a tug, it opens up.
So the wedge loosens up, so it’s a timing thing.
’Cause it’s gonna go like this.
Every time I pull on it,
the top of the tree’s going like this, right?
And so when I pull on it this way, you get the wedge in.
And then it’s gonna come back
and it’s gonna tighten up on the wedge,
but it’s not gonna tighten up so much
that it can pop the other way.
That’s the whole reason for the wedge.
’Cause the most dangerous thing in the world
is for this tree to be standing up,
you go like this, it comes swinging back
because that’s the way it naturally wants to stand
and then all of a sudden the hinge pops out
and breaks that way.
And that’s a really important part
of getting the tree to go where you want it.
-Like we did. -DENISE: I see that.
ANDY: It fell perfectly.
DENISE: Everything, yeah.
ANDY: But the last thing I wanted
to point out to you is,
you see why you always go away from the tree as far as you can,
’cause where’s the butt right now?
Lot of people go like this, "Timber!
Okay. It’s falling."
Well, where’d that end up?
If you were standing right here
it would’ve just taken you right out.
Right? So that’s why you always gotta get back
and out of the way.
DENISE: I mean, you couldn’t ask for it better.
ANDY: Yeah, so it was a success.
DENISE: (sighs) Okay, wait. That’s gonna hurt.
(laughing) Ow.
ANDY: Alright.
We’ll pull out a tape measure,
we’ll measure out the length of the logs I want,
and then we’ll go through and we’ll buck that tree
up into those lengths.
(chainsaw revving)
Once you get into the really big trees,
when you start cutting them more than 12 foot long,
it’s pretty darn tough to get them out of the woods.
It’s tough to load them on the sled.
So that just seems to be the optimum size.
Let’s get all these logs hauled out.
DENISE: Yeah.
Oh, these are gonna be
something else to load.
RICKO: When I was growing up in the woods,
we always observed the animals we captured,
and that was a big part of survival,
was really understanding these animals
and appreciating these animals.
Whoa. Look at all these ptarmigan tracks.
A lot of ptarmigan in here.
-MAYA: Ah! -RICKO: My-My.
We’re gonna put some ptarmigan snares right here.
MAYA: Okay.
RICKO: You know what ptarmigan snares are?
RICKO: Yeah, it’s like traps.
If there’s ptarmigan tracks in areas
where there’s a lot of willows,
that’s a good place to put up a ptarmigan fence
and hang some snares.
We’ll make a big pile of willows,
and then we’ll start standing them up in the snow.
You guys can play for a while, I’ll get the work started.
SKARLETT: What are you doing, Maya?
So boom, boom, boom,
whoosh, sss, and then...
SKARLETT: So you’re gonna trap a bunny and keep it?
MAYA: Mm-hmm.
RICKO: Coming through.
Load of willows.
RICKO: Oh snap. Okay, hold on. Let me back up.
(beeping)
Can’t mess up her construction.
I’m out here trying to teach the kids survival,
but Maya, she’s a little young.
So, all she’s thinking about is that she’s gonna make
these homes for bunnies to come around.
That’s fine with me.
It’s good for my daughter to enjoy herself out here,
and she’s learning things
without even knowing she’s learning it.
-Maya, you’re okay? -MAYA: Yeah.
RICKO: Since you’ve got a bunny town,
do you wanna make a ptarmigan food house?
MAYA: Okay.
RICKO: Here, you poke it
into the snow, okay.
Beautiful fence. Looking beautiful already.
Something like this is like eye candy to the ptarmigan.
And even rabbits come by these places
and eat off of them, they can get caught too.
RICKO: Oh, you don’t want to kill rabbits?
MAYA: Yeah.
RICKO: Okay. Let’s get the snares.
Okay. So here’s the noose.
You just go straight through
that little circle you made.
Okay. We’ll go around and tighten it up on that.
SKARLETT: I never caught a ptarmigan before,
but my dad’s gonna teach me
how to catch a ptarmigan in a snare.
I’ve seen a lot of ptarmigan tracks,
and I think we’ll get one.
RICKO: We used to have ptarmigan snares
like this around our cabin when we were growing up.
Because that’s how we ate when I was growing up,
we had to have fresh meat all the time.
Geez, it’s cold out. Okay, you girls, let’s go.
Good job. Thanks for helping.
MAYA: Where are we gonna hide?
RICKO: Oh, we’re just gonna go drive around,
and we’ll come back and check them.
MAYA: Okay.
RICKO: Whoosh. Whoosh!
Oh, you’re like a bunny.
We’re gonna have these snares hang
while we go out for a while, look around, come back later,
and check these snares and hopefully, come away
with some fresh meat.
Every small game that’s edible out here
is a huge part of our Athabaskan culture.
It’s not all about moose or bear or beaver,
all these bigger animals
that put a lot of food on the table all at once.
But every day you have opportunity with small game,
and that’s how we survive out here.
RICKO: Okay. You better check your snares first.
We’ve let these ptarmigan snares soak,
so maybe some ptarmigan went through
and maybe we got a ptarmigan or two.
Okay, nothing there.
MAYA: No.
RICKO: Nothing in that one.
MAYA: No.
RICKO: Maya, keep checking the next one.
RICKO: They’re white, and they’re about big
as a spruce chicken, they’re hard to see though.
-MAYA: Ah! -(Ricko gasps)
RICKO: What the...
ven saw that.
RICKO (off screen): You didn’t. So white, huh?
MAYA: Uh-huh. I didn’t even saw that.
-RICKO (laughing): That cool? -MAYA: Uh-huh.
RICKO: So pretty, huh?
MAYA: How did I didn’t saw that?
RICKO: Because they’re camouflaged, see?
Look, the color of the snow.
Always we say anaa basee, ptarmigan.
SKARLETT: Anaa basee.
You got to say that, Maya.
MAYA: Anaa basee.
RICKO: Yeah, that means thank you.
MAYA: I want to hold it.
Ah.
RICKO: Don’t be scared.
MAYA: I can’t hold it. It’s too big.
Wow.
RICKO: Now that we’ve got a ptarmigan, it’s time to teach them
how to take care of this animal.
That’s key to Athabaskan culture.
You catch something, you’ve got to take care of it.
And by take care of it, we mean dress it out,
butcher it, cook it, eat it.
Nothing goes to waste.
SKARLETT: How do I pluck it?
RICKO: Just like that.
Try not to grab too much feathers
so we don’t tear the flesh
’cause that’s where all the fat is on the skin.
(Maya yelps)
(Ricko laughs)
SKARLETT: How’d you pluck it so fast?
RICKO: I grew up plucking animals.
-All different birds. -SKARLETT: Oh.
RICKO: Ptarmigan are probably one of the first ones
I ever hunted was a ptarmigan
or a spruce chicken.
You want to see what they eat?
MAYA: Yeah.
RICKO: Okay, look.
See, this is willows.
MAYA: Whoa.
Wait, I see those little red things.
RICKO: Uh-huh.
MAYA: Wow.
RICKO: Try and smell it. Just smells like willow.
It’s real clean.
MAYA: Hmm.
RICKO: I’m telling you, this is a real clean bird.
You don’t have to worry about no germs with these.
As soon as Maya seen this ptarmigan,
she was super engaged, she was really involved,
and she kind of forgot about bunny town for a second.
-Tasty? -MAYA: Yeah.
(Ricko laughs)
RICKO: Okay, let’s go.
We’ll cook it up.
Being fascinated by it, it helps you understand it
and helps you appreciate the animal
and the food that it provides.
MAYA: I want to eat a ptarmigan.
RICKO: Okay, let’s go.
MAYA: Mm.
-RICKO: You hungry? -MAYA: Yeah!
RICKO: Let’s go eat.
SUE: It’s not your stomach
you need to feed, it’s your soul.
I’m not seeing any caribou.
The fact that I’m still not seeing any sign
is pretty unusual.
Caribou change their minds
on where they go at the drop of a hat.
The old wisdom says,
if you try to figure out the mind of a caribou,
you’d figure out your wife’s mind first.
In other words, it ain’t gonna happen.
They’re gonna do what they want.
But I don’t give up easily.
What the hell is that?
It’s a pretty damn decent find.
We call these tundra blossoms.
These are old oil barrels.
This is the US Army Corps of Engineers survey marker.
And it even has on it 1955.
We became a state in ’59,
so this is before statehood.
Kavik would have been here in its prime.
But you had your helicopter, your plane.
You would drop barrels of fuel.
I see a whole bunch more barrels over there.
They drop, and this is freaking great.
One snowstorm, where the hell are the barrels?
Imagine trying to find the needle in the haystack,
quite literally,
to tell you, yup, this is it.
Now you can get on your phone, pff,
and see exactly where you are, GPS coordinates, on the planet.
But when they were originally staking the surveys,
here’s a marker.
This is gonna be a pivotal point.
Also, I’m gonna need some surveyors.
Got to get out here and tappy-tap-tap.
Make this permanent survey mark.
And he stamped his name, Sal.
Of the thirtieth (bleep) new guy, FNG.
That’s what that is.
What a cool find. 1955.
And his name was Sal.
Thanks, Sal!
I got some willows up ahead.
And you know what likes hanging out in the willows?
Ptarmigan.
Hold on, hold on.
Alright, there he is. There he is.
Alright.
Dammit, he’s gonna get away.
(bleep)
(gunshot)
(bleep) this is deep.
I got one!
Oh god, I almost lost it too.
There were a lot more over here.
But, uh, heck yeah.
The small game gets a bad rap.
Like, it’s the low-hanging fruit,
and you have to get something large each time.
There is no low fruit of the food chain.
You respect what comes at you.
You respect what’s there
and if you need more, you hunt more.
Okay, I see some ptarmies over here.
There’s just, like, open ground,
so I’m not sure how successful I’m gonna be here, but...
(gunshot)
(grunts)
SUE: I know, bud. I’ll help you out.
There we go.
What was I doing? I’m popping his neck.
’Cause he’s a dead chicken sitting there.
But like anything, it goes against my moral compass
to let them suffer.
Yes, they’re getting shot. Yes, they’re getting killed.
But the suffering part is, is not necessary.
But here we go.
Another birdy.
That makes Sue two, ptarmies none.
I didn’t find any caribou.
But I saw plenty of ptarmigans.
You don’t pass up an opportunity.
This whole area, I consider my backyard,
my front yard, my side yard.
And you’ve got the sun doing this amazing stuff
and big rainbows.
I keep saying it doesn’t get any better,
and then every day it does.
(laughs)
ANDY: I’ve learned that if you take shortcuts,
shortcuts always end up being long cuts.
Okay!
NARRATOR: Andy and Denise have bucked up a massive tree
that will provide lumber for them
to complete their wood projects this coming summer.
But they will need some ingenuity
to load the heavy logs for the three-mile trek
back to Calico Bluff.
ANDY: Let’s see if we can roll it over
onto the toboggan.
DENISE: Okay.
ANDY: Logging’s just nothing
but a whole lot of work
and a whole bunch of technique.
DENISE: Huh, that was easier than I thought it would be.
ANDY: Let’s see if we can winch this thing on
in a little bit, okay?
(revving)
When you’re in a forest, you’re in a very limited space.
But sometimes, you just start getting jammed up.
So what I’ve learned is
you take your old dog sleds,
and you make what’s called a skitter toboggan.
It kind of floats the log on the snow,
and it makes that chainsaw winch
work a whole lot less.
I think most people that live out in the bush
get pretty creative and very inventive.
It’s just a, a natural trait
for people who live out in the Bush.
And it’s the difference between people making it
and not making it a lot of times.
I don’t think I can take another log.
DENISE: I don’t think so.
ANDY: Since it’s such a big log,
we’ll just take this one by itself.
DENISE: Okay.
(engine starts)
ANDY: When you see a big load of logs on your sled,
it’s a sense of pride.
And it’s the payback for all the hard work
during the day that you’re doing.
If there isn’t a payback,
I’m not gonna put the effort into it.
It’s been a lot of work to get the trees that we got.
Both Denise and I like going to bed at night
feeling like we got something done that day.
And we know we got a lot done for our future.
CHIP: Take it as it comes.
That’s my philosophy, every day.
Take it as it comes.
We’ve got a jerk rope, we’ve got my parka.
We got the gas, got a couple wolverine skins, got the trash.
You’re all packed to go.
What do you think, Noorvik, here we come?
-AGNES: Yeah. -CHIP: Right on.
We got a long route today.
What we’re looking for is the softest, flattest, smoothest route,
’cause the last thing I want to do is pound that boat to death.
I don’t want to take it over big embankments
and chunks of ice and through the willows, none of that.
I’m gonna take the long way. I’m gonna take the river.
I’m gonna take every bend in the river.
But we’ll have fun.
(engine sputtering)
(shuts engine off)
What’s up with you?
CHIP: Doesn’t look overheated.
You did the right thing.
If you think you’re gonna overheat
or something like that,
you can shut down.
-You know what I mean? -AGNES: Mm-hmm.
CHIP: I think she blew a piston.
Not she as in Agnes, I mean, like, the machine.
The only option I have is to tow the machine, and that’s what I’m gonna do.
I’m gonna take that machine right along with me,
and I’m gonna try and get it to Noorvik
in as few trips and save as much gas as possible
and as much time as possible.
Since we have the ski on this side,
we’ll put the rope on this side,
the snow machine will ride over here.
So whenever we need to stop,
we need to stop and turn a little bit
so that the snow machine doesn’t get
to the back of the boat.
-You know what I mean? -AGNES: Mm-hmm.
I’m doubling up with Chip, and he’s gonna be towing
the boat and my snow machine,
so pretty much the way we got to go.
CHIP: Snow machine’s made to go over all the snow and ice,
and it’s made to haul loads but not a heavy load
and another snow machine being drug behind it.
I’m kind of taxing this machine,
taking it to its limit.
When you’re in the wide open, it’s a lot of fun
to just toddle along, put your mind somewhere else.
You don’t really pay attention to where you’re going.
There’s no other cars, there’s no merging traffic,
there’s no stop signs.
It’s kind of a cool way to pass the day.
You can see something for a long time
before you get to it.
(engine revving)
Holy (bleep), look at my (bleep) exhaust.
CHIP: This was glowing cherry red.
My whole exhaust tube, everything, it’s just glowing.
I’ve never seen that before.
(shuts engine off)
That’s how hot it is, check out that glow.
CHIP: No, look. It’s, it’s so hot.
It’s still glowing.
CHIP: It’s not gonna explode, it’s the exhaust pipe.
(laughs)
I think we blew out a baffle in the manifold or something.
That’s the smell you were smelling right there.
That got really, really hot.
AGNES: So we’re just gonna wait for a little bit and see
if somebody comes by, huh?
CHIP: Now that it’s getting dark, anybody that’s off
on the lake fishing will stop by.
AGNES: Yeah.
CHIP: Don’t, don’t fret.
Trail etiquette says that if I don’t show up,
my kids are gonna wonder about me.
Most search and rescues usually start
with your family looking for you.
AGNES: We could always sleep in the boat if we had to.
We could always go break willows
and make a fire if we were freezing.
CHIP: Oh yeah, if we had to.
And if we get cold, we can walk down this trail.
AGNES: And there’s camps along the way.
CHIP: Yeah. There’s your grandpa’s camp.
There’s even Melagivik if we really walk,
you know what I mean?
(inaudible) you got this off?
(wind whooshing)
AGNES: Look, the snow machine. Yay.
CHIP: At the very least, we’ll be able to send a message.
At the best, we’ll get out of here.
AGNES: Carolyn! Yay, it’s the girls!
Wow, Idi and Michelle!
Woo! Yes!
CAROLYN: You guys are closer than we thought.
You guys took too long.
CHIP: Your mom broke both the machines she rode on.
-AGNES: Yeah. -CHIP: No, I’m joking.
She was, she burned up the one ride,
and then we were doubled up on this one.
And it, uh, the power valve is broken.
Are you guys able to tow?
CAROLYN: Yeah. We could pull up
right in front of you right there.
IRIQTAQ: I’ll pull my snow machine
up to this one.
AGNES: Yee, hee! Hee, hee, hee!
Yes.
CHIP: The girls knew we were on two machines
and had a big sled,
and they deduced that if we didn’t show up
on at least one machine,
that three things would need to be towed in.
So that’s pretty cool. (laughs)
Right on, perfect.
-CAROLYN: We made it, eh? -AGNES: Yeah.
CHIP: How you doing? Hi, Mom.
CHIP’S MOM: Hi, Chip, how you doing?
CHIP: Yeah, we brought lots of stuff.
Look, we’ll bring the boat. Oh, Adelyn, too.
And Ting, you made it home.
-WOMAN: Hi. -CHIP: Let me give you a hello.
WOMAN: Hello.
CHIP: We broke down
in both of our machines,
and then these guys came and picked us up
because we were four hours overdue.
-AGNES: Yeah. -CHIP: Well, kiddos,
let’s all go inside and visit.
-TINMIAQ: Okay. -CHIP: Now that we’re all wound down
and everybody’s cooled off,
let’s go talk, Mom.
We’ll go have a cup of tea.
RICKO: To me, that’s what culture is all about,
is being out in the woods,
doing what our ancestors did,
enjoying ourselves, being one with nature.
RICKO: Ooh. Strong wind.
Okay, this looks like a good spot.
See, it’s not too windy right here.
I’ll dig a little shelter for you guys.
Do you want to make a big bunny house?
Knowing how to build a snow shelter
is really important to survival out here.
And this is a good chance for me to teach the girls
how to build a snow shelter.
And there’s ancient knowledge in my people
on how to dig down into this snow,
create a place nice and warm to get you out of the wind
and wait out in a situation until help comes along.
That’s why it’s always good to have a big shovel with you.
But if you had to do it by hand, you could do it by hand.
SKARLETT: Wait, by hand?
RICKO: You don’t have to have, like, a roof over your head.
Even if you just had someplace
to lay down out of the wind right here.
It’s nice and calm down there.
A moment like this is a good chance
for me to teach my kids
how do you build a shelter out here?
It’s blowing, storming, windy weather.
Are you gonna lay down and die
or are you gonna dig down and survive?
See, this is the thick part right here.
The drift back here.
So we come in on the soft spot, we get under here.
And this roof is solid.
And we got it big enough to where
if you had to stay in here,
you’d survive in a big storm.
But we want to put spruce down
’cause when you put your arm down,
you’re putting it against snow, and that gets cold.
It can melt onto you and it can freeze you,
so what else do you need?
A good floor.
RICKO: Oh, it’s not big?
Well, it isn’t like a mansion.
Don’t have to be all in one spot.
You can spread it out.
Here, I got the snow cave built.
Start cooking up the ptarmigan.
This is what we used to do when I was a kid.
(fire crackling)
We always made campfires.
This is what we called having a picnic.
Let’s see.
You want the heart, Skar?
RICKO: She always eats the heart on everything.
Maybe when she’s older, she’ll be a heartbreaker.
Ptarmigan heart.
Here, My-My.
MAYA: Mmm.
RICKO: You like it?
Maybe someday when you’re big,
you’ll teach your kids how to do this.
Today, I’m doing the same thing as when I was a kid,
but time went by so quick, like the blink of the eye.
I look back, and I’m like, "Dang,
I’m getting old."
I’m taking the role that my parents had
when they taught me.
So the torch continues to burn
generation after generation.
We don’t want that fire to go out,
because that’s the fire of life out here.
Captioned by Point.360