True North, Strong, and Free

by Sarah B (Canada)

I didn't expect to find Canada

I met up with one of the other volunteers, an American, on the two-day train ride. As we travelled towards the Arctic circle - slowly, because the tracks were laden with ice and snow - we tried to figure out the conversion for Fahrenheit to Celsius. By the time we reached Churchill, the point was moot: it was -40 degrees, the same by either measure. Churchill, Manitoba lies farther north than most Canadians ever venture. It's a remote place, accessible only by train or plane. No roads lead to Churchill. The last full day of our train ride, we didn't pass a single town; just kilometres of vast, cold, white tundra. Despite its remoteness, the town explodes every October and November. During those two months, over ten thousand tourists descend on "the polar bear capital of the world" to watch the bears wait for the waters of nearby Hudson's Bay to freeze over. As soon as the ice arrives, the bears - and the tourists - disappear. I wasn't there for that. I came at a quieter time, when the town feels closer to its year-round population of just nine hundred. I was there in February and March, when daylight hours are short, the nights are long and dark, and - most importantly - the opportunity to view the northern lights is at its peak. The northern lights, or aurora borealis, drew me to Churchill. As a teenager, I suffered from severe depression. I bargained with myself: if I could get through it, I'd live life right - I'd travel, learn, and see everything I'd ever dreamed about. Years later, I was keeping that promise. I'd graduated university and was travelling the world, sometimes with as little as $12 to my name. I heard about a research centre in Churchill where you could volunteer in exchange for room, board, and participation in programs offered to visiting tourists. They had space that February, in their Dark Skies Program. I had always wanted to see the northern lights. I scraped together enough for the train and headed north. I didn't know quite what to expect - when travelling, you never do. But no place has surprised me so much as Churchill. I saw the lights. First as a glimmer, then a deeper green, gently across the sky. I saw them over a dozen times that month, including one memorable night when a friend and I stood on a snowy hill and gasped as the sky above us exploded. Green, pink, orange, white, all surrounding us, rushing and spinning faster than we could keep up. We weren't on earth anymore. We were in space, surrounded by the most indescribable beauty I've ever seen. For all its beauty, Churchill is also one of the harshest places I've ever been. Being so far from the rest of the world, having so few people around you, the short days and long nights - it gets to you. I felt my mood and others' worsening over time. Stepping outside to a balmy -25 degrees Celsius, I tipped my face to the sun and realized how much I'd missed its warmth. Yet within a few minutes my hair was frozen and stiff, and when I blinked, my eyelashes froze together. The flip side of a place so seemingly inhospitable is that it's pretty darn quiet. My favourite night there wasn't the light's most spectacular appearance. It was a night where I'd wandered a little ways from the centre. In the darkness I set up my camera. North of the 58th parallel, over a thousand kilometres from the nearest big city, without a soul around me: I waited. And out came the lady aurora, arrayed in brilliant green and yellow across the black sky. It felt like a gift the universe had sent just for me. For all the years I'd struggled, for the many miles I'd travelled - with frost nipping my fingers and my eyes watering in the cold as I gazed happily upwards - here was something beautiful. I found in Churchill the biggest surprise of all, and something my crazy, restless mind had never expected. Far north, far alone, but with the world's most beautiful show dancing above me - I found peace. Preferred name: Sarah B.