Retail Therapy in Whitehorse

“If you can’t be assed to answer my questions then why don’t you go and get someone who will. Or perhaps just piss off and retire, you miserable old twat.”

Home Hardware, Whitehorse. Friday morning. A low point. 

Carpentry and construction is still a new language for me and I need a bit of help sometimes. Anyone who’s been to Paris will have experienced the crushing shame of attempting a few words in French only to receive a surly shrug. I was getting the Lumber Counter equivalent of a Gallic shrug.

This is my sixth year doing “The Big Fall Shop”. I aim for 9 months-worth of food in case something goes wrong and we can’t get out. My shopping list runs to 7 pages and the truck is filling up with peanut butter, flour, rolled oats, canola oil, dog kibble etc. Nothing fancy, but it will keep us and the dog alive through a worst case scenario.

Filling up

I also have 3 building projects to shop for. You know how it is when you start on a DIY job then realise you didn’t get enough 2” screws?

So imagine if that means going 20 miles in a boat and then 60 by truck. And if the river has begun to freeze, that means not having them until maybe February and the whole project coming to halt. So let’s just say the stakes are high.

Filling up more

So, back at the lumber counter, I didn’t actually say that first sentence out loud. After receiving a mumbled and surly explanation on insulation sizing, I said “What?” (Actually quite rude for a British person, “sorry” would have been more appropriate.)

Then when he started again, I walked away. Yes, walked away- no thank you or anything. There. That told him. 

The only problem being, I have to walk back today as I need to put an order in, dammit.

Stuff on top now too

Neil arrives next weekend and we will collect the order then. It's Labor Day so this is the only store that will be open. Once again, Canada celebrates our home-coming with a public holiday.

We hit a public holiday without fail, every time we come to town. Yes, I KNOW we could check but we never remember so don't even suggest it. 

And I’ve a suspicion they have them every other weekend and then randomly during the week, depending on our plans. 

Neil is finishing his contract in England but with winter fast approaching, one of us needed to be here to get supplies sorted in time. Let’s just say I’m not feeling too sympathetic about what a tough week he had in the office.

7 pages of shopping lists, writing on both sides.

Every product I need has a different brand name to what I'm used to, or simply a different name. Spanners are wrenches. Boxes are totes. Everything is in metric, except when it’s not and we are suddenly talking inches again. How long is a kilometre? 0.62 miles, apparently, but that doesn’t compute to anything I can visualise. 

Had to climb onto this dumpster to tie off the roof load. Oh, the indignity. 

On a quest for the right spray foam, I was reduced to asking, so is this the orange stuff that comes out the can like a worm then expands?

It's often called mousse here. To me, mousse means hair product not construction. Glad I found that out, I could have spent the winter sporting permanent Donald Trump-tangerine quiff. 

Terry and trailer

Two days of my time have been spent dealing with Terry, our truck. Terry didn’t want to start when I arrived so my poor Alaskan friends, who drove him down from Forty Mile for me, had to unhitch the trailer and bump start him in a very wet and dark car park by the airport at 11.30pm.

My first day in town was spent at Yukon Nissan getting that hiccup resolved. Which also revealed a cracked inner tube and so I spent another day at every tire shop in town trying to find the right tires. 

Austere government-run Liquor Store. Even shopping for booze isn't fun here

On Tuesday I will set off alone 400 miles to Forty Mile, in a very over-loaded truck hauling a very heavy trailer, as I try to get our first load as close to our home as the road system will allow (about 30 miles away.) Most of the road is unpaved, so I’m bloody relieved I’m not attempting it with a torn tire.

Downtown Whitehorse, on a Saturday afternoon. Buzzin, yeah!

So, what about the sights and sounds of the Yukon Territory capital- Whitehorse! Sadly I have no idea as I’ve spent all my time in parking lots and stores. But, in truth, they wouldn’t take long to describe. A lot of Whitehorse was built in a rush by the US and Canadian military during the construction of the Alaska Highway in the 1940s. 

Someone living in what looks like an Anderson Bomb Shelter

Most of it ain’t pretty. I went out to take pics yesterday evening but soon gave up and just wandered down to the river.

My 'hood

I’d forgotten how fast the Yukon flows. 7 mph. More in kms, but don’t ask me about that. I thought about launching our boat in that rushing, icy cold water with all these thousands of dollars worth of supplies and equipment and felt my guts tighten. The river is not particularly scenic here. I watched it circle and swirl away to the distant hills. Clouds loomed above over the city and the first few drops of rain spat onto the tarmac.

It feels like I’ve traversed the world to do something that is far easier, glitzier and fun in London- shopping. I could be stroking posh fabrics at Selfridges with cool music playing and nice young men calling me "madam" not trudging the aisle of a dusty hardware store with a reluctant shopping cart and a miserable prick to deal with.

The only interesting thing I could find to photograph locally. A raven sculpture. 

I wondered if I'd be ok on that long and lonely road. I'm not used to hauling a trailer and I'm beyond the limits of my physical strength in dealing with it if something goes wrong. I took a deep breath. My nose filled with the sweet, slightly antiseptic smell of balsam poplar. It grows all along the banks of the Yukon and it is the smell of home. I thought of the world beyond the street lamps and parking lots, and I remembered what all this shopping is about. I remembered that most people I’ve met here have been just wonderfully kind and helpful.

And then I had this cheering thought, we are all experts in something. One day, a sheepish looking lumber guy may ask me, “hey I gotta deliver a Shakespearean speech. I heard you're an actor. Can you give me some advice?”

And I will look down him, even if that means going to get a step ladder, and I will say “Ugh. (Mumble mumble) iambic pentameter (mumble) second beat. Ugh. An’thin’ else?”

Just for fun- 

A list of just some of the really kind people who’ve helped me out since I’ve been here:

My Alaskan pals who drove the truck down, bump started it and built me a fabulous trailer AND are letting me dump my first load of supplies in their yard.

Gina, the Airbnb host, who put me on her BCAA cover in case I needed a tow.

Dave and Andrew at Nissan who could have billed for a new clutch but didn’t cos it was only a switch, and gave the truck a really good check over.

The OTHER guy at Home Hardware who spent ages helping me find the right ladder then looked up a part on the internet and told me I could order it from another company

The lovely lady in the lumber yard at Home Hardware who talked me through all the insulation.

The people at Ajax who priced every welding mask in the shop for me and didn’t get mad when I didn’t buy any, and gave me a free water bottle!

The guy at Fountain Tire who did all the checking for free then DIDN’T sell me the only tires they had that would fit, and recommended I go somewhere else for a better a deal.

My pal Sarah who is going to let me stay at hers when I drive to Dawson and sends messages of good cheer.

Both of my two pals down river, who I won't name without their permission, but have offered us a lift by boat to our property when Neil gets in, so we don’t have to swim.

The marvellous Jenni who, I hear, has given Sarah some handwarmers for us.

The nice promotions crew at Food Saver who gave me a free salad and the girl who made me laugh by saying "Gee, I'm pleased someone's buying all those big sacks of oats. I thought we'd never get rid of them!"

The guy who laughed hysterically with me when we both tried to drive our trucks into the same parking space. In London that would have ended in a shanking*.

And there are so, so many more.

*Shanking = stabbing, cos I'm still street. 

Free salad. Thank you, Saver Foods