November: Time to tuck in

November is the time of growing darkness here. One day I noticed it wasn’t light outside anymore when we start work at 8am, and now it isn’t even light at 10am. It’s the time of year when you feel like someone pulled a big flannel covered duvet over town and everyone is settling in, warm and cozy, all tucked in.

November is the start of the community Christmas bazaars and holiday events. And a time when everyone is slowing down. Summer is go time in Dawson City. Where people are working long hours, squeezing in summer fun between shifts, knowing that the season is short and everything has to get done.

By November the tourists have left. The seasonal workers are gone. Some thought they’d stick out the winter with us, but most couldn’t find a place to tuck themselves in for the winter, so they’ve begrudgingly joined the southern migration.

The restaurants aren’t as busy. Some nights only a few shuffle in to dine. No one is in a hurry any more though, so the meals stretch long, and there is no where anyone needs to be, so there is time to catch up.

Here are some of our pictures of how our November is going:

We have very little snow so far, and it hasn’t been terribly cold. The river hasn’t frozen over yet, but is nicely narrowing into a smaller flowing channel.

One morning Jeff took Hank outside just before going to work and said the northern lights were nice. I stepped out and wow! I could see the pink right from our back door! I snapped a few quick ones with my iPhone and sent one to my Dad as a tease.

He called me immediately to tell me to get outside with my camera. I haven’t had it outside for the northern lights yet this season so I fiddled around, looking for my tripod attachment for the bottom of my camera, and by the time I had everything all put together and the camera mounted and the remote shutter button attached, I stepped outside and the show was over. Well not over, but it had moved up above the house so I missed getting some better pictures for you. Sorry!

Jeff’s been planning a caribou hunt with a buddy. He took this shot I just love from the woods last weekend while he was getting some smaller fire wood cut up for the little wood stove he uses in his canvas hunting tent. Since there isn’t much snow, the woodlot was still accessible.

Unfortunately at the last minute, his friend has been unable to kick a wicked flu/cold he’s had and had to stay home. I guess the trip is postponed for now! Too bad I baked three loafs of banana bread for them! But Jeff is pretty glad to not catch those germs.

We go out for supper at least once a week. I can’t argue that it is solely for social needs or if it is just because we don’t want to cook. Our weekly wing night has been moving around town while our usual restaurant was down a cook and unable to offer dinner every night of the week. They had to close for wing night! We started going to the Pan of Gold pizza place, which was a nice change, because I like pizza better anyway!

And don’t tell anyone, but I’ve been ordering the “Hawaiian Motherlode” small pizza. Yes, that’s right. Pineapple. I can’t explain it. I don’t know what has happened. But damn it is good!

Every week the Bonton restaurant releases their weekend menu. Always different. Always with a bit of a theme. And always almost entirely grown locally. They have two sittings a night, Thursday, Friday and Saturday. Our friend (and city councillor!) Alex is a huge fan of Bonton so he reserved a spot for the three of us one night. Alex is handy to dine with, since he tends to know what all the fancy words mean on a menu (what can I say, I’m a simple gal. I don’t know my hominy from my entomatadas.)

Here are a few of the plates. We ordered 4 dishes from the small plates menu to share, and then dove into the chocolate flan cake!

Everything was so so delicious and fancy. You just wouldn’t believe the quality of food we have here! And this restaurant is in a log cabin! Neat, eh?

Besides eating, we do a few other things when we’re not all tucked in. We’ve been cleaning and organizing as part of winter prep. Here’s a quick picture of the vehicle pile at the dump. A few weeks ago there were dozens and dozens of bald eagles amongst the usual dump ravens. Pretty neat to see them so close up. They are absolutely massive.

And here is a tease for our next little project! More on that later!

And an update on the ground water seepage. It continues! Mary McLeod is closed, from town up to the cemeteries, due to this groundwater that is leaking from the hill, forming a glacier across the road.

Some days it is wet and growing, and other it looks frozen and dormant.

It is happening all around town, and even out in the industrial subdivision where our humane society is. The building and dog yard is being enveloped by a river seeping off the hill behind it. No one seems too certain if there is anything that can be done, aside from trying to keep it off the main roads. We are concerned what will happen once it gets under our shelter’s building and around the pipes!!

I guess it caused from all the rain we had this fall? I’ve heard that this is pretty common and often in the winter this hill has to be closed to traffic because of the growing glacier that continues to build all winter. If you look up the road in this next picture, you can see several more areas where the water is seeping across.

Luckily it stays pretty rough, for ice, so it isn’t too terrible to walk across. The city also has sand put down on the streets too for traction. Jeff put our winter studded tires on already, and I just keep my truck in four wheel drive in town most of the winter. I can tell by the marks on the roads though that several people just chain up and drive on chains.

Last weekend when it wasn’t too cold, Jeff got his Christmas yard decorations placed, and strung out the outdoor lights. We don’t have them plugged in yet, but they are ready!

The sunsets have been beautiful lately. Here’s one we watched from the Crocus Bluff ball diamond while Hank and his brother had a run around.

It is so nice we don’t have to do this every day, like in their first year. I mean I love catching up with our friends, but those dogs were a handful in their first year! Man did they need to run. Now they are 5 and calmer and it is heavenly.

Today I went to the first of the Christmas bazaars, one at a church and the other at the school. I found the most perfect Christmas gift for one of my nephews! I feel like there was fewer baking available, and maybe fewer vendors all together, but there are three more bazaars over the next few weeks, so I’ll pace myself! 😀 I often wonder what it would be like to know all of these people. When I helped out at bazaars growing up, did I know everyone in our small town? Of course, then it dawns on me that I know half the people in the room already. I’m doing pretty good for someone who works from home!

Jeff was away today, in Mayo, teaching a firearms safety course, so Hank and I took a wander around town late this afternoon. It is neat how this groundwater mess is seeping out the front gate of the old Yukon Order of Pioneers cemetery.

There is a ditch in place with ice burms to try to channel it and it has filled it up already.

Well there is a taste of our November so far. I’m heading to Whitehorse later in the week for my twice a year check-up. This time I decided to fly, since the government will pay for the round trip flight. Beats all the hours driving in the dark any way. But that means I’ll be on foot while in the city for a couple nights, so I probably won’t be Christmas shopping much, but we’ll see!