.
My daily walks with the Norwegian Elkhounds were getting longer, as the young sister pups, Ragna and Melsie, were getting bigger and stronger. They could now keep up with old Signe, but they had the habit of stopping to check out every interesting scent they came across. Signe and I would continually have to stop and wait for them to catch up.
On this trip we ventured about a half mile Northeast of home, to check out a Bald Eagle that was feeding on a carcass out in the middle of a field. I had noticed it earlier with my binoculars and thought we might find some deer bones.
Once we got closer, the Eagle lifted off. It flew to a woods a short distance away and roosted in the top of a large tree, in order to keep an eye on us. The pups caught wind of the deer and soon raced ahead to check it out. Signe picked up a little speed too, but she knew what to expect and saw no threat from the pups.
From the tracks in the dirt it appeared the deer had been hit by a car and managed to stagger out into the field before it collapsed and died. The Coyotes on their nightly rounds located it, and had stripped all the meat and hide off the bones during the last couple of nights.
During the day the Bald Eagles had taken their turn, and there was little left but a skeleton. The pups were so excited they did not know what to do. This was their first experience with a dead deer.
Signe checked the remains and moved the sisters aside with a low growl and a display of teeth that got the message across. Most of the skeleton was still connected but Signe found one entire hind leg separate from the body. She immediately picked up the heaviest bone and started for home. The long leg with the hoof still attached, dragged in the dirt behind her.
The pups took turns trying to haul away a bone, but they were in a tug of war with each other over the carcass. I used my knife to cut off the lower leg bone of each front leg, along with the hoof. When I presented each pup with a section of leg, they wasted no time in trotting off after Signe.
Once they were on their way home, I grabbed the remaining rear leg, and dragging the entire carcass remains, I fell inline behind the team. We no doubt looked like a small gang of experienced hunters, hauling the remains of our kill home.
The pups had to stop and rest a couple of times, but they refused to abandon their piece of the treasure. Signe was home and chewing on her leg bone, with sheer delight, by the time the rest of us got home. The three of them worked on the deer remains all evening, until they were too full and too tired to continue.
The pups were not big or strong enough to crack open the leg bones to extract the marrow, but they happily chewed on a hoof until it was gone. Then they went to work on the ribs. The last time I checked on them they were lying contentedly in the yard, fast asleep, with deer bones scattered all around them.
About midnight, I awoke to some serious barking. From the sound coming from Signe I could tell something threatening was in the yard. The pups joined in, but they had no idea what was going on. I went to the back porch and tried to quiet Signe down but she convinced me we had a problem.
The fearless pups kept yapping and moving towards the pitch black woods, through a small grass covered field that lay between the house and the trees. Signe kept moving forward, but she stayed close to them.
I was not dressed to charge into the black void, so I went back in the house and dressed.
When I came back out the three dogs were at least a hundred feet further from the house and the barking was getting a lot more serious. I had a flashlight but had to use it to see where I was walking in the deep grass and rough ground.
When I caught up the to pups they were barking very excitedly, while Signe had a deep throated growl and from her stance I could see she was very tense and about to attack. She was displaying a full mouth of very deadly teeth, behind her curled upper lip.
It was at that point that I used the flash light to scout the edge of the woods that lay about fifty feet ahead.
Reflected back by the flashlight I saw a pair of bright shining eyes and the face of a Coyote. Signe seemed to be concentrating on something to our left so I swept the beam in that direction and the flashlight showed three more pairs of glowing eyes.
The pack of coyotes had followed the deer carcass drag trail and were there to take back their deer!
After a short stand-off I managed to force the pups to back off and moved towards the house. They were not big enough nor wise enough to tackle one coyote, never mind four. Signe was capable of doing a lot of damage in a fight, but four to one was a little too much.
Signe stood her ground until we were on our way home and then she slowly gave way and moved back with us. Once at the house I got the three dogs in, and everyone calmed down. The pups were very pumped up with the venture and wanted to go back outside and deal with the interlopers. Signe quickly fell asleep on her blanket, having experienced just another normal day in the Minnesota Northwood’s.
In the morning, the visitors, and the main part of the deer carcass was gone.
It is not unusual to hear them howling on a dark winter evening, as they make their rounds. The den is under an old barn that collapsed, about a mile south of our place. I have visited a number of times in the winter and the tracks make it plain that the den is under the main floor of the barn. Because the walls have given way, the floor of the loft now lies on top of the main floor. Most of the roof is still intact but it is dangerous to enter.
The pups are born in the den and then when they are old enough, they spend their time playing in the loft area. They are protected from the weather and prying eyes. As they get older they venture out of the barn and onto the snow drifts that surround the barn. The tracks in the snow show where they play.
When they are old enough to hunt with the parents, they travel further and further from the safety of the old barn. This particular den has produced coyotes for more than twenty years.
We have always had two to three Elkhounds at our place and as many as five at one time. Our dogs are vocal and howl back and forth with the Coyotes so that they are well aware of each other, and keep to their own territory. Howling establishes territorial boundaries.
On the nightly hunts the Coyotes bypass our property by sneaking by to the East or to the West. On the West they have a well traveled trail on the West side of our woods. To the East they move on the frozen creek ice that is sheltered by trees on each side. It is an unwritten rule that each other’s territory is off limits. For years I have seen the tracks that established their den and trails.
On a few occasions the coyotes have bent the rules, but only after the Elkhounds have carried off deer remains that the coyotes considered theirs. The details of one of those occasion follows
The dogs loved the trails through the deep snow because they could race up an down with ease.
When they got on the track of anything interesting they would jump into the deep snow and wade about pursuing some wild beast, be it a rabbit, coyote or mink.
The particular trail we were on led us east across a field and then through a narrow woods that contained a small creek. This area was also a delight to sharp noses, as it contained lots of tracks and smells of game.er The creek was well frozen as the temperature was ten below Fahrenheit and it had been colder for a number of days.
After crossing the creek, we then followed the trail over to the pond, which was another northern dog delight. All three dogs were full grown and weighed about fifty pounds each. When they reached the pond they were able to go anywhere they wished, as the snow on the ice was only a few inches thick.
I stood watching them explore the bulrushes around the edge of the pond, as that was where the most fresh tracks were. Eventually all three dogs were on the far side of the pond and I noticed that Ragna had found something interesting. I saw her pick up an object from the ice at the edge of the bull rushes. She then walked about ten feet out onto the ice and dropped whatever she had.
She proceeded to eat what she had found, before the other dogs could get to her. I was curious, so started to walk across the pond to where she was. In the meantime she had gone back to the original site and once again picked up something and took it off a distance, as she obviously did not wish to share it.
When I got closer I saw three or four minnow on the ice, and she was eating them one at a time. Some were flopping around so they were alive. Melsie and Signe by this time realized there was food to be had and they were following Ragna when she went back to her treasure location.
By then I was very curious as I could not understand how she was getting live minnows from a pond that had at least three inches of ice on it. As I came up behind the three dogs I saw that Ragna had grasped another mouthful of minnows and the other two dogs were trying to do so.
I pushed the dogs aside to get a better look and at that second, the ice below my feet broke and I went into the pond feet first. My feet hit the mucky bottom so I was left standing in water that was up to my chest. The water around me was alive with hundreds of churning minnows.
The ice around me in the bulrushes was very thin so I turned to face the middle of the pond and tried to get back up on the ice that was thicker. I noticed the water was very cold.
All three dogs thought this was great fun and all three stood on the firm ice and tried to lick my face. They were barking and jumping about, in an excited way, as I stood with not much more than my head showing.
It would have made an interesting photo, but fortunately there was no camera man present
When I made an attempt to climb up on the ice, my weight, along with the dogs, was too much and a large piece of ice broke away, and I fell back into the water. The dogs jumped back in time and did not get wet.
I was getting colder and a little mad at them so yelled to get them to back off.
I managed to get one leg up on the ice and after some difficulty I crawled out of the water. I stood there for a few moments as the water drained off my clothes. I was wearing tall rubber boots but I had them half folded down and they were full of water. I did not dare take them off as I would not be able to get them back on again.
There had been so many minnows in the small pond, they were starving for oxygen. They gathered by the bulrushes where the ice was thinnest and their activity of coming up to the surface to get air kept the water from freezing.
The first dog had learned to catch minnows in shallow creeks in the summer so she instantly realized what they were, and started feeding. Her weight was not heavy enough to break the ice.
I lifted each foot up high behind me and allow much of the water to drain out, then headed for home. I was soaked up to my armpits and my toque was the only thing left that was dry.
Before I had walked across the pond my clothes on the surface started to freeze. I was wearing long underwear and heavy pants and jacket, and they were all very heavy with water. I half walked and half jogged home to get there before everything froze worse. The dogs of course, were running ahead on the trail and thought it was all a great outing.
It took ten or fifteen minuets to get to the house, and I had to get around to the front where I could get into the kitchen porch and get the outer clothes off. Just as I jogged around the house I saw a car in the yard and my friend Bob was walking up to the house. The dogs rushed out to greet him and his attention was focused on them.
I stood on the snow covered sidewalk as Bob walked the rest of the way towards me. After a few greetings he asked me a couple of questions, but I no longer remember the topic. At some point, as he was talking, he started to notice my wet jacket. By this time more water was draining off me and I was standing in a small puddle that was growing in size around my feet.
Bob had a puzzled look as he stared down at the water that was beginning to freeze in the ten below temperature. “What happened to you?,” he stuttered in amazement.
“Fell into the pond through the ice” I replied rather frostily.
At that moment I felt something in my pocket, pulled off my mitts, and removed two flopping minnows.
Ragna rushed over to pick them up as I dropped them on the sidewalk. A quick check of the other pocket produced another minnow.
Bob took it all in and realized I had to get in the house, so he turned, and shaking his head from side to side, left and said he would check on me later.
Once in the porch I struggled to get out of the soaked jacket, rubber boot, and pants. By now, most of the excess water had drained away. I quickly and coolly stepped into the house, and once in the bathroom I stripped down and was soon in the hot shower.
It was not long before I was dry, clothed, and much warmer. Bob phoned later to get the full story and then remarked that he always found it interesting to stop by and visit.
The next day the dogs were very excited to head off on another fun filled hike.
We went a different trail.
It was a difficult night because of the cold. I managed to get a few hours sleep off and on and Jim claimed he did like wise.
When it was my turn to tend fire again, I got up and saw the sky was starting to lighten up on the horizon. Jim was sitting cross legged in front of the fire with his bare feet as close as he could get. I grabbed my cup and poured some coffee and then I suddenly realized what I was seeing.
Jim was holding a knife by the blade and was tapping one of his big toes with the wooden handle. I was shocked to hear the wood making a solid clunk when hitting Jim’s big toe.
I dropped or tossed my coffee aside and moved closer to examine his feet. I asked him what was wrong. He nonchalantly replied, “It seems my big toes are both kind of frozen”
I felt as if my heart had stopped for a second. I had taken a lot of First Aid courses and knew the situation was serious. When I checked his big toes they were ice cold and very hard. It seemed that he had kept tying his snowshoes on tighter and tighter and this had cut off the circulation.
I could not understand why he had waited so long to tell me what had happened. He claimed that they just needed to warm up and would be fine. I knew that when they thawed out they would hurt like hell and he would not be able to walk in the snowshoes.
After a quick discussion it was agreed he had to get help in a hurry. I checked the surrounding area from the crest of the river bank and there was no farms in view in any direction. We checked the map and noted that the river flowed under a railway bridge a few miles further upstream to the south. From that point the closest town was about five miles to the west.
We had made plans that if we ran into trouble or wanted to quit at any point, a phone call would bring someone from Winnipeg to drive us home. I advised Jim to get his snowshoes on and walk to the railway bridge and then head down the tracks to the town of Vivian, which was about seven miles away, as fast as he was able. He was to leave his snowshoes by the bridge and I would pick them up. Once at the town he could phone for help.
It was agreed that I would stay behind to break camp and pack up the tent and equipment. I would load his pack board and equipment on the toboggan and haul everything myself. Within five minutes he had his socks, moccasins and snowshoes on and was heading up the middle of the snow covered river.
I had some initial trouble getting everything lashed to the toboggan so that it would stay in place. I continued to carry my pack board on my back. Before I got going, Jim was out of sight. I easily followed his tracks and that helped me while hauling the toboggan. By the time I reached the railway track he was too far ahead so I was unable to see him. It took me twice as long to reach the town as he did as it was very difficult dragging the load down the railway right of way.
When I got to the town about two hours behind him, I located him in the only store in town and learned that he had phoned Winnipeg and someone was on the way to pick us up. His feet were starting to thaw and he was experiencing some pain.
Our ride showed up shortly after I reached town, and we were quickly loaded and heading back for home.
Jim kept insisting that his feet were fine and everything would be okay. We dropped him off at his house, after explaining what had occurred, to his parents. The toes had thawed by this point and were soft to the touch but the pain was getting worse.
It was two days later before I was able to stop by. His toes were turning black and it seemed likely the toe nails were going to fall off. He refused to see a doctor and claimed they were getting better. I kept in touch by phone for a number of day then went to see him again.
I was shocked to see that both big toes were black as coal, the toe nails had fallen off along with some skin on the end of each toe. He had not yet seen a doctor but his parents had been trying to force him to go. I agreed with them and he finally said he would see a doctor the next day.
When I got a chance to check back with him I learned what had taken place at the doctor’s office. The moment the doctor saw his toes he reached for the phone to arrange an operation to amputate both big toes.
Jim refused the operation and told the doctor, “You think this is bad. You should have seen them a week ago. They are getting better now.”
Eventually Jim won the argument, but had to agree to come back if the toes got worse. In the end he did not lose his toes, but forever after they were very sensitive to cold and he had to take special precautions to make sure he did not freeze them again.
Within months both our lives changed and we lost touch when he moved out West. I am sure that he recalled his Brokenhead River experience and me, every time it got cold out.
During our hike I had noticed round holes in the deep snow, in various sections of the river. They were no more than six inches across and very deep.
I was in the lead at the time and Jim had fallen behind as he was having troubles with his snowshoes. Every so often he would stop and re-adjust them
.
While I waited from him to catch up I snowshoed over to another of the mystery holes. I was trying to think what kind of animal would make such a hole. It was a perfect hole all the way around and there were no tracks of any kind near it.
I decided to get a better look so I bent down to peer into the hole. All of a sudden the snow under my snowshoes dropped about two feet and into the river. As I fell forward I automatically put my hands out . They plunged into the deep snow and then hit something solid and I stopped falling.
It took a second or two to for the situation to sink in. My feet and snowshoes were on a large rock in the river. My hands were on another large snow covered rock and my body made a bridge from one rock to the other, while the river gurgled by below me. The tips of both snowshoes were in the running water and my knees were slowly sinking in as well, because the weight of my pack was pushing me down.
Jim by then had rush closer, still pulling the toboggan. I yelled at him to stay back as there was no point in him joining me. I realized I was not going to stay in this position much longer and the only way to get out was to step into the water and hope it was not too deep
When my knees were about six inches into the water I could feel the snowshoes slipping off the rock so I was going into the river one way or another. At some point I just stepped into the water and in about two strides I was back up again and on the snow covered ice. Jim claimed later, that my feet were pumping so fast he could hardly see me for the spray of water.
Fortunately the water was only a foot or so deep as it was a rocky rapids. Both snowshoes went in the river and before I had gone two feet, the water on them froze instantly and the weight made it almost impossible to move. I quickly slipped off my pack board and just dropped it in the snow. The snowshoes came off next.
I had to get the rawhide ties on my moccasins untied before they froze or I would be forced to cut them off.
As I worked away at the moccasins, I heard Jim calling, “What can I do to help? What should I do?”
I simply replied, “I need a fire and I need it fast. Clear a spot and get wood as quickly as you can.”
I was wearing special duck pants that were water proof so my knees did not get wet, but the water froze on them instantly. The pants at my knees were frozen stiff in a half-bent condition. I got the moccasins untied and then helped get the fire started. We always carried birch bark paper, dried grass, and small twigs in our toboggan box for just such an emergency. Jim brought that to me and I got the fire going and began to add some of the first pieces of small wood he had gathered. I continued to tend and increase the fire as he hauled more wood. We were very fortunate there were a lot of dead trees standing on the bank of the river.
Jim had dumped his backpack and left it with the toboggan on the river below. Once he had a good supply of wood he brought his equipment to the site of the fire. It did not take long before we had a good strong fire going. Jim’s used his snowshoes as shovels to move more snow back.
Once the heat from the fire started to take effect, we started to relax and discuss what had happened. It was all my fault for being too curious and I got caught. We were just lucky we did not venture too close to the other holes. We realized they each indicated where there was fast running water and no ice.
My feet did not get wet but I did change socks. When the moccasins had the ice melted off of them and they were all warmed up, I was able to put them back on. My mitts got a little wet on the outside and were covered in ice but my woolen mitts and hands did not get wet.
We got some coffee going and tried to wind down from all the excitement. Getting wet in the middle of winter was bad enough but getting wet at 50 below zero was very dangerous.
The biggest problem now was that each snowshoe was coated in ice. All the cat gut webbing as well as the wooden frames were thickly coated.. Each snowshoe weighed about twenty extra pounds. It was necessary to take the back of the hatchet and tap the snowshoes section by section against a log, until all the ice was knocked off. The cat gut webbing is strong but it could crack and break if abused. Damaged snowshoes would have been a serious problem.
After about an hour working on the snowshoes we were able to get our kit back together and loaded. We still had a few hours until dark and I wanted to get walking and get warmed up again before we stopped for the night.
Back on the trail Jim took the lead and I hauled the toboggan. He made a point of giving any holes in the snow a wide berth. I noticed that Jim was continuing to have trouble with his snowshoes. He would step aside to adjust the bindings, and would let me pass. If he were not careful, his foot would slip out of the binding and on his next step he would plunge one foot into the deep snow and fall.
I took the lead, even though I had the toboggan, as it made it easier for him to deal with his bindings. Before we stopped for the night it appeared that he had the problem solved, so we had eaten up a few more miles before it started to get dark.
We picked a good campsite that was sheltered from the wind and had lots of firewood nearby. We had used up our emergency fire starter so it took us a little longer to get the fire going. With a strong fire crackling nearby we used our snowshoes to clear a good site for the tent. In no time the tent was up and the sleeping bag were hanging from some sticks poked into the snow near the fire. A toasty sleeping bag was a must.
Working around the fire and cooking our meal allowed the ice on my knees to melt and soon they were dry. It was agreed that we would take turns sleeping while the other person kept a good sized fire going through the long night. We took turns each couple of hours. We slept in our clothes as it was too cold to take even our parkas off. End of Part 2 - See part 3.
When we reach Beausejour, we drove to the east side of town and stopped on a bridge over the Brokenhead River. This was to be our starting point on our overnight snowshoe trip up the river. Our goal was Ross, Manitoba, about 35 miles away. The snow was at least two feet deep over the landscape and the snowplows had piled up the snow high on the banks of the road. River is marked in yellow on the map.
We were anxious to get an early start and the sun was just coming up when we jumped out of the car and went around to the trunk to unload. We hardly got started when my father noticed that part of Jim’s nose and his cheeks had started turning white and were obviously freezing. He convinced us to all jump back in the car which was still running. We had no thermometer so we had no idea of the temperature.
As Jim got the blood flowing to his face, my father tried to talk us out of our hike. I had not noticed the cold but I was concerned about Jim, so we let him make the decision. He said he still wanted to go, and he would make sure his face was better protected with his scarf.
When he felt his face was warm enough, we all jumped out again and soon had our packs on our backs and the toboggan loaded. I agreed to break trail and Jim was to follow with the toboggan. Once we were down off the bridge and onto the deep snow of the river, we took off.
I started off at a good clip to get us warmed up. The snow was soft and deep, so that we were sinking into the snow at least a foot deep with every step. Everything in view, from river bank to river bank was soft white snow. We were at least six to eight feet lower than the banks so the trees along the river gave us considerable protection from the wind.
It did not take long before I was forced to slow down as the snow was just too deep for any sustained fast movement. The area we were traveling through was mixed farmland and the farms were far and few between. We saw no farm buildings and there were no tracks of any kind.
At first we took turns breaking trail while the other pulled the toboggan. Our snowshoe tracks made the toboggan easy to pull, as it stayed in the tracks in the packed snow. Once we warmed up we did not notice the cold.
The snow was so deep we could not see or hear any running water. It had been a cold winter so we were confident that the river had a thick coat of ice. Every couple of hours we would stop to take a break and check our gear. We had no trouble with our packs which were actually army pack boards with equipment strapped to them. The tent was tied to the toboggan and a wooden box containing the camping gear was tied at the rear.
As we hiked along we chewed on dried fruit. We carried sandwiches to eat when we got hungry as we did not plan to stop for lunch. The goal was to get as many miles behind us the first day before we stopped for the night.
About midday our legs were starting to get tired and we decided to take a break. We left the toboggan on the river and walked up the bank, almost to the top. We then undid our snowshoes and fell over backwards part way down the bank. This got our feet and legs uphill from our bodies and helped with our leg circulation. Just before we dropped backwards into the deep snow we noticed some farm building about five hundred feet away but there was no sign of any activity.
As we lay there munching on our dried fruit we were talking about our progress and our plans to make camp just before it got dark. We would pick a sheltered spot with lots of dead wood, and we had to get it gathered before it got dark.
It was about this time we started to hear a dog barking and realized it was coming towards us from the farm. Soon we had the dog standing at the top of the river bank looking down upon us and barking very excitedly. We tried to calm him down and called to him but he was too worked up, so we just ignored him. It was not a big dog so it had struggled through deep snow to reach the bank, but would come no further.
We were laughing at the excited dog when suddenly the big farmer came into view. At first he was shocked and actually thought we had been in some kind of accident. His first question was, “What happened? What are you doing there?”
It took us a few moments to explain that we were fine and that we were on an overnight snowshoe hike from Beausejour to Ross, Manitoba.
His next question was, “Why?”
“Because we always wanted to make a snowshoe hike and stay out overnight in the winter,” I replied.
His next comment was almost shouted at us, “Are you crazy? Don’t you know it is 50 F. below zero!”
He was obviously not as well dressed as we were and was getting colder by the minute. He turned and stomped off with his dog, through the deep snow muttering something about us being crazy as hell.
We certainly felt colder after he left.
As soon as he was gone we spun around on the hill, put on our snowshoes and plodded down to the toboggan. Once again we were back on the trail, eating up the miles and feeling much warmer.
End of Part one - See Part two.
Jim and I were passionate readers of Canadian stories about trappers and hunters of the North. While we were only sixteen we had done a fair amount of snowshoeing , and we were anxious to plan a winter overnight hike. We felt we were old enough to venture out in to the wilderness on our own.
We were encouraged to take a short overnight trip first, to organize and test our equipment, so we reluctantly agreed. Our present moccasins were not satisfactory so we knew we needed proper moccasins. So, that meant Indian made originals.
Jim’s father knew a source and arranged to order us each a pair. I can remembered the night they arrived and I first saw them at Jim’s house. The bottoms were tough moose hide while the uppers were soft deer skin. The uppers also had fancy Indian beadwork Now we would not only look like trappers and hunters but our feet would be a lot warmer.
I owned a pair of snowshoes and Jim had arranged to borrow a pair. We learned that the trappers of the North used lamp wick to tie their snowshoes on. Many places up north still had oil lamps so we had little difficulty in buying what we needed. We wished to copy the old traditions of the Canadian wilderness.
Our overall plan was to snowshoe the Brokenhead River which lies Northeast of Winnipeg and flows North west to Lake Winnipeg. It would be about a fifteen mile snowshoe hike each day and we would stay overnight.
Before we selected a date for the trip we decided to try out our equipment on a short trip along the Red River south of Winnipeg. We had someone drive us to the south side of the city and drop us off. We quickly discovered the new moccasins were perfect and kept our feet warm. We had felt insoles and wore two pair of heavy socks.
We each had a pack-board with our sleeping bags and personal equipment strapped on. We had a small toboggan to haul the two man tent and camping gear. We took turns hauling the toboggan while the other person broke trail. The snow was about two feet deep so we worked hard snowshoeing.
After a number of hours we picked out a good site to set up the tent and when that was done we built a good fire and made our supper. The weather was not too cold so sleeping in the tent was fine. We decided that we would take turns keeping the fire going all night while the other person slept or tried to sleep. Our test outing was really roughing it but we were satisfied that we had all the gear we needed to make a successful trip.
We had lots to eat and plenty of coffee so there were no complaints. The night did pass rather slowly but we managed to sleep between our duties tending the fire.
The only real difficulty occurred in the morning with breakfast. During the night all our food and water had frozen solid. . We had snow to melt and soon had hot coffee to drink while the bacon fried. The problem was with the eggs that were frozen rock hard.
We tried to peel the shells off but they were impossible to remove. Our plan of action was to use our hatchet to chop up the eggs and toss the pieces in the frying pan and then fish out the shells as they thawed.
Jim set an egg on the ground and then gave it a bang or two with the back of the axe. It made not the slightest mark. I was sipping coffee and giving advise. “Whack it with the blade of the axe and whack it hard!”
Jim’s next blow was full power and he hit the egg solidly but the blade simply skidded off and we watched amazed as the egg sailed off sideways through the air and landed about twenty feet away. It disappeared into the snow with a little pouf.
As we endeavored to find it we began to realized the egg was exactly the same color as the acres of snow that lay all around We searched on our hands and knees through about ten square feet of snow before we gave up and headed back to the fire.
It was getting daylight by this time and I stepped forward to take my turn with the next egg. I cleared the snow away down to bare ground and prepared the egg for execution. I am a little bigger than Jim so I put all my strength into the swing with the hatchet.
My aim was on target and I hit the egg perfectly. The next thing we knew the egg was sailing off in the opposite direction. We watched with dismay as the egg sailed about thirty feet and buried itself in a large snowdrift. We felt and looked like a couple of idiots but no one was watching.
We were soon digging into the drift with our hands trying to locate the egg. We notched it up a little and used our snowshoes to search but the egg avoided detection. Try as we might we could not find that very white egg.
At this point we had worked up quite an appetite so went back to the fire to eat the well cooked bacon and about six pieces of toast each. As we sat and enjoyed our coffee, we agreed that we would not take eggs on our next trip.
We broke camp and loaded up our gear and just before we continued on our journey we each took one of the remaining frozen eggs and threw them away as far as we could. No doubt they were still frozen in June.
Other than the egg problem, the rest of the trip went off as planned and we headed home to make the final plans for the Brokenhead River trip.
