The Arctic Post

So we have finally got the official word that we can list our house, and hopefully sell quickly. I have no idea what we have gotten ourselves into. For two very big procrastinators, we have a lot of work ahead of us, in a short amount of time.

While we are waiting for the entire process of selling our house to truly start, we have been slowly starting to organize our lives.

First off, we have a weight restriction on the amount of items we can move up north with us. I do believe it is something around 4500 lbs. We do not need to bring big furniture items such as; couches, beds, dressers, appliances, etc. We do need to move all kitchen items. This includes all dishes, pots, pans, small appliances (blender, toaster, kettle, coffee pot), baking sheets, etc. This also includes all entertainment items such as; TV’s, computers, Nintendo Wii, etc. We have started going through the house and trying to sort what we want to move with us, store for 2 years, throw away and/or sell. How do you go through all your belongings and decide what you are going to need for the next two years, and what you can put into storage until we move out of the north? It has definitely been a challenge. We still have a long way to go before we are anywhere close to being finished.

Next item on our list is preparing for our Barge order.  We will order our food for a year and then it will arrive by boat this fall. There are two grocery stores (Co-Op, Northern Store) but food/items are very expensive up there. The barge order will only contain all of our non-perishable items such as; cans of soup, crackers, spices, condiments, rice, pasta, cereal, etc. We have currently taken an inventory of all the items we currently have in our house and will go through the recipes we use all the time and will hopefully have a complete grocery order. We also need to order enough food/supplies for our dog. On this barge order we can have virtually anything and everything we want shipped up there. Currently we have also planned to order a few other items on our barge order. These include large items that would not be easily moved up there via plane. We will need a “dog run” for our dog. It’s not necessarily to prevent her from running away, but protect her from other animals up there. There are quite a few sled dogs in the small communities up north and they are not friendly, socialized dogs. There also has been history of Polar bears wondering into town. We are hoping to find something that is a decent size for her to be able to walk around a bit and do her business. We are also going to purchase a treadmill and have it sent up with our Barge order. We will probably order a computer desk as well. We will need a mode of transportation for me to go to and from work (when I find a job). We have decided that an ATV type of machine will be the best for us up there. There is no need to have a vehicle up there, so this will become our primary mode of transportation for the next two years! I am totally excited to be up there and receive our barge order. It will be like Christmas x 100!

I’m sure you’re all wondering what about all of our “fresh” food? Winnipeg is our closest point of departure. We will probably have an overnight layover in Winnipeg on our way up there. We will purchase a couple of coolers and will buy our meat there. Once we are up there we will be able to order “food mail”. This comes by Canada post and we can order regularly. It is still cheaper to order this way than it is to buy local. Worst case scenario, we will be able to purchase items locally. When Etienne was in Grise Fiord a couple of years ago, he was told that what they usually do is subsidize the “healthy” food and increase the price on “junk” food. This allows the essentials (milk, fruit, vegetables) to be a little more reasonable. According to the Corporals’ wife, who is currently living in Chseterfield Inlet, told us that a twelve pack of pop is $30. What we have also planned to do is purchase a couple of “Aerogardens” This will allow us to grow some lettuce, tomatoes and herbs in our house.

And the adventure continues… !

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This entry was posted on Sunday, July 5th, 2009 at 20:43 and is filed under The Process. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.