Mackenzie Delta Sunset

Description

This image is 60 x 20-inches (152 x 51cm) in size. Canvas prints are sold stretched or un-stretched. Stretched prints are available for pick up only in Vancouver. Addresses further afield will get unstretched canvases and paper prints rolled up in a tube for shipping. Instructions for stretching/framing will be included in the shipping tube.

I took this photo on the second last night of my big canoe trip to Inuvik. We had just come into the Mackenzie River delta. A few hours earlier we stopped in the little town of Arctic Red River where the Dempster Highway crosses the Mackenzie.

We were several days’ paddle north of the Arctic Circle. This far north, the sunsets last forever, it seems. The orange light goes on for hours. On this night, with Alaska off in the distance behind that mountain range, the sky was particularly brilliant.

I took a break from setting up our camp for the night and took out my camera. I thought I had the shot so I put the camera back in its waterproof box and went back to setting up.  Then I realized the light was getting better. I took the camera out again and shot some more. Then back to setting up. Then the light got better still. Deeper, juicier, more vivid and brilliant with each passing minute. This was like some kind of gift from the river gods.

Over the next couple of days as we negotiated the zig-zag passages of the Mackenzie Delta we had a rare tail wind behind us. Normally, that far north, the prevailing winds are from the north -that is, in your face, if you’re going where we were going. But instead we received a much welcomed parting gift from the river gods of the Deh Cho.