Whitehorse and the Yukon

We finished our fabulous visit to Yellowknife and then flew to Whitehorse, the capital of the Yukon Territory.

Whitehorse is still a wilderness city, but much more tourist oriented than Yellowknife.  Almost the first thing you notice, after the mountains, is the plethoria of coffee shops.  Barbara and I instantly fell into the habit of beginning our morning with coffee and scones at Baked.

So far, we've spoken to the Toastmasters, presented at the Whitehorse Library, given a workshop at the library in Haines Junction, driven to Skagway, Alaska for a presentaiton at the Klondike Gold Rush National Park and signed at Skagway News Depot, and also had a signing at the famous bookstore Mac's Fireweed in Whitehorse.  It makes for a lot of driving and action packed days.

Including the flat tire after our event in Haines Junction!
But the excitement never ends and we still have a mystery lovers panel in Whitehorse, an appearance at the MacBride Museum, and another book signing. Plus a trip to Pelly Crossing to speak at the library and then to the Dawson City Museum.

Gosh, I'm tired just typing all that.

But it's been all fun too, and tonight the university students who are staying in our B&B prior to heading out to a dig, had a BBQ in the back yard.  Barbara and I were invited and had a great time.

Enough chat. Here are some pictures.

Yellowknife

I'm in Yellowknife, NWT, with Barbara Fradkin attending the NorthWords Literary Festival. What a wonderful city, and fantastic festival.

As a picture is definitely worth more than a thousand words, here are some pictures.

Houseboats in Yellowknife Bay. Ice still on Great Slave Lake
 



Mystery Panel at NorthWords. With Barbara Fradkin and Giles Blunt

Refreshment break

The bay

Bullock's Bistro Restaurant. Best fish I've ever had.

Houseboats on the bay

Midnight from hotel window

Going North. Way, way North!

I get excited about all my travels, but this one looks to be something really special.

I've teamed up with my good friend and outstanding writer Barbara Fradkin to tour the NWT, Yukon and Alaska from May 29 to June 15th.
As you know, I write the Klondike Gold Rush books. I've been wanting to go north for a long time to talk about them right where some of the events in the books happened. When Barbara published her newest book, The Whisper of Legends, which takes place mostly in Whitehorse and on the Nahanni River in the NWT, we knew we had a great opportunity.

And so we began to plan.

The trip is now a reality.

Our first stop is the Northwords Festival in Yellowknife, at which we are delighted to be two of the invited guest authors.  Then on to Whitehorse, Skagway, Dawson City and points in between.

For the details of dates, and what we will be doing or talking about please go to my ON THE ROAD blog: http://vickidelany.blogspot.com 

If you happen to be in the north in the beginning of June we would love to see you. We'll talk books and why, as southerners, we were so audacious as to set books in the North.

And a picture!

The books I brought to South Sudan from Rapid Reads.

That Dog Won't Hunt by Lou Allin, Orchestrated Murder by Rick Blechta, The Goddaughter by Melodie Campbell and, of course, A Winter Kill by Vicki Delany. Among others not shown.

An AE Nomination!

Colour me pleased.  I found out when I got up this morning that A WINTER KILL, my book for reluctant readers from Rapid Reads has been nominated for an Arthur Ellis Award for best novella.

The news is timely as well, as I'm in Juba right now and working on the next book in that line, JUBA GOOD, which will be about an RCMP officer with the UN here in South Sudan.

Education is a priorty here, and the good people at Rapid Reads donated a stack of books for me to bring.  I handed them out to what I hope will be eager readers.  I wonder if they will quite be able to understand the signifigance of the fact that the dead body in A WINTER KILL isn't wearing gloves in the snow.

Probably not.

The AE awards will be presented in Toronto on May 30th.  I am so disappointed to have to miss it, but I'll be in Yellowknife at the NorthWords Literary Festival. (http://northwordsnwt.ca).

Barbara Fradkin, who I am travelling to the north with, has been nomiated for the same award. It sould be a lively evening in Yellowknife.

Want a peek: http://www.amazon.com/Winter-Kill-Rapid-Reads-ebook/dp/B007QZBJNY/ref=sr_1_1_bnp_1_kin?ie=UTF8&qid=1366363087&sr=8-1&keywords=a+winter+kill Only $2.95 for Kindle, special offer.

Juba, South Sudan

I'm spending three weeks in South Sudan visiting my daughter.  Long time readers of this blog will remember that I was here in November 2011. 

South Sudan is the world's newest country having achieved independence from Sudan in July 2011. It was a long, hard struggle - about twenty years of civil war.

The war meant that South Sudan is, essentially, about 20 years behind the rest of East Africa in terms of development and economy.  It's either the world's poorest country, or pretty close to the bottom. It has the world's highest maternal mortality rates.

Juba is a busy, busy, place. People are flooding in from the countryside in search of a better life; the UN and NGOs are here to help.

You might have heard of the attack on a UN peacekeeping convoy last week, which killed a substantial number of UN soldiers and civilian staff.  But that was in the countryside, far to the north. We're pretty safe here in Juba.

There have been some changes since I was here last. Buildings are under construction. I think in 2011 there wasn't one building over two stories tall.  Now there are some of five or six stories.

The potholes in the road are now trenches, and there is more garbage. Largely because the governmen tran out of money. Because of conflict with Sudan, the oil fields were shut down for several months. The oil is in the South, and the pipelines go through the north to the sea.

Just this month the oil was turned back on, and everyone is hopeful it will stay on!

I don't take a lot of pictures here. The concept of a tourist is completely unknown (I like to say I am the first tourist) and many people are suffering from severe PTSD, one of the consequences of which is paranoia. You're not allowed to take pictures of anything militarily sensitive. And they will decide on the spur of the moment what's sensitive.  A lot of people don't like to have their picture taken.

Today, I snuck out with my little camera and tried to act nonchalant. Here are my results.

These pictures were all taken on the street where my daughter lives. So, if you think diplomats live a life of luxury - think again.

Klondike Friday. Juba, South Sudan: 2011; Dawson City, Yukon: 1898

I'm in Juba again.  In the year and a half since I've been away, the buildings are taller, the pot holes are deeper.  I thought I'd reprint some of the blog posts I wrote last time.
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Juba, South Sudan: 2011; Dawson City, Yukon: 1898
While I’ve been spending the last few weeks visiting my daughter in Juba, South Sudan, I’ve been working on Gold Web, the fourth Klondike Gold Rush mystery novel.

Seems like Juba would hardly be an inspiration, doesn’t it?

But the two places are surprisingly similar.

Take the streets. In Dawson the town flooded so much in the spring of 1897 that the Mounties needed a canoe to get from one building to another across the parade square. The town was built on a flood plain at the joining to two rivers. When it rained the streets turned into muddy passages so deep that the mud might come up to the top of a waggon wheel or to a horse’s knees. In Juba, the streets are mostly unpaved, and unmaintained. Potholes the size of a small car, open manholes, rocks and garbage and debris. I haven’t been here in the rainy season, but I shudder to contemplate.

The people. People from all over the world poured into the Klondike in search of fortune. Most of them were ill-equipped, to say the least, to live in an arctic mining town. The only ones who really made money were those who ‘mined the miners’: dance hall owners, shop owners, etc.

People from all over the world are here in Juba: aid workers from NGOs and foreign governments; people from other African countries setting up business large and small. Kenyans seem to have a monopoly on the car rental and taxi businesses, Eritreans on water delivery; Turks are building the new road to Umulei; Ugandan and Kenyan women staff restaurants and bars. White 4*4s stamped UN fill the streets along with most of the major NGOs. I have met people from Canada, UK, US, Holland, Botswana, Kenya, Germany, Ethiopia, France, South Africa, Sweden, Australia. Most of whom seem to get along in a joyous muddle.
The City. The Klondike was a rough and tumble mining town carved out of the sub-arctic wilderness. People lived in shacks made out of green wood or in canvas tents (in the winter!) and what buildings there were, were constructed with more speed than skill. This city isn’t much different. It was just a garrison town for the Northern forces for the years of the civil war. Only with the CPA in 2005 and the subsequent independence did the city start to grow. And growing it is. Construction is everywhere. Housing is a problem as people are pouring in, not only from other countries as mentioned above to take advantage of the new economic opportunities, but from the countryside. Most housing is still in tin shacks or traditional mud huts.

Environment. Cough. Hack. In Dawson sawdust covered everything, all the time. They were cutting down the forest as fast as possible and turning all that wood into boats and buildings and firewood. In Juba at this time of year not only is dust everywhere, but the farmers are burning their fields and smoke is thick in town. Neither were places for people with breathing difficulties. In Dawson there was one or two public toilets (depending on my sources) for a city of 30,000. No plumbing, no electricity, no telephone (They got electricity and telephone in 1899). In Juba, I don’t know how many public toilets there are but I’ve learned not to leave home without using one. The ‘western’ style houses have private garbage disposal and sanitation removal: the shanties, nope. What do you do without garbage collection or running water? Think about it.

The Wildlife: Zip. Nada. What else happens when the wilderness is destroyed and the people move in.

The future. There was no future for Dawson City. The gold rush ended abruptly in the summer of 1899 and everyone fled for other prospects. The era of the great gold rushes was over: most mining would be done by companies now, with industrial equipment and scientific innovations. By the early 20th century the city was pretty much a ghost town. It’s revived today, but the population is about 8,000 (it had been 30,000 in summer 1898) and it’s mostly a tourist town, reliving its glory days.

For Juba? There are difficulties to be sure: Crime is on the increase; war with the North still threatens; there are ethic and regional disputes. But everyone is optimistic and the energy is fantastic. I’m looking forward to coming back in a year or two and seeing how it’s progressed.