Toonik Tyme hill climb

First celebrated in 1965, Toonik Tyme is Iqaluit's spring festival. It is such a big deal that most of the city gets Friday afternoon off. Municipal and territorial governments, schools, banks, mechanics, lawyers, accountants, pretty much every employer shut their doors allowing staff head out for some fun in the mild spring afternoon.

Blaine and I jumped on the sled and quad respectively and headed out onto the bay with the puppies for a run around. After a brief lesson I took the sled for a burn and boy does it run smooth. We messed around in our usual area then loaded up the dogs and took the new ice road over to sealift beach. The road is a temporary clearing of the snow of the bay to mark out the dog sled route for the big race on Sunday. When I say big race we are talking 3 hours, not the Ititarod by any means but it should make for good entertainment.

We got back to the house at 4pm, put the dogs in their bedroom (with the T bones from last night's steak) and headed out to the hill beside the Arctic Winter Games Arena to watch the hill climb. When I first saw the event listing I had assumed it was some sort of running event - duh we are in the arctic! It is of course a snowmobile race. Probably the most impressive thing for me was the abundance of snowmachines, not competing, but driven to the event by spectators. Spectators sitting astride their machines lined the hillside surrounding the bowl where the climb course was set out, Blaine counted 80. Given that the city has a population of less than 8,000 this is a high ratio of sleds, certainly when seen through an English girls eyes!

There are a huge number of events lined up over the weekend and I plan to visit as many as possible, and of course to blog about them for your reading pleasure!