Yukon bush life

Heading in last fall, boat and truck loaded (London) It might be easier to plan an invasion of a small Central American country than get ourselves, the dog and everything we need onto our property before freeze up.  I’m good at planning. I’m a future focussed person. The past is dead to me (sorry, old friends), I don’t have time to notice the present and I’m usually racing through the future at full tilt like a teenage lout on a stolen moped. On my way back to Canada, pocket full of stolen phones That means I’m good at planning but less good at relaxing. Neil arrived home from working in Cumbria last Friday to find me hysterical. “I can’t find the list of parts we need for the snow machine! They won’t deliver hide-tanning crystals to Dawson! We must order a box of handwarmers!” It was a balmy summer's evening in South London. He slowly lowered his suitcase and looked around our little council flat, as if to check there was no dead moose that needed imm...

(Lou, Yukon) Don’t wash squirrels. I learned that this week. They don’t come out well. The amber, feather-light tail never quite recovers and the fur has the look of rat skin. That’s sewer rat, not muskrat. Washed, tanned, oiled and drying Au naturel We’ve been trying to ignore our squirrel problem at the old cabin all winter. After fixing the roof and stuffing it with some old insulation this autumn, we are now using it as a storeroom and, perhaps optimistically, guest cabin. And here's the master bedroom... Our plan is to keep the insulation in the roof to prevent heat escaping, the squirrels' plan is to take it down to the cold cellar to make nests and use the space above the floor as a toilet. The original roof was insulated with a tonne of mud which we had to remove before we could rebuild it  My understanding was that squirrels fiercely defend their territories so we could only have one, or possibly a pair of them, using the cabin. No. We got ...