Here’s a picture of the Northern Lights through the window of my Yukon cabin. Almost every night it’s been too overcast to see them, but one night last week, for just a few hours, the sky cleared. And there they were. I’m sitting by the Blaze King wood stove tonight, keeping warm and hoping for a repeat performance. Judging by how cloudy the sky is right now, it’s not likely. I’ll put a few more sticks in the stove before I turn in. Maybe sometime during the night the clouds will part again. I never get tired of gazing at the Aurora Borealis.
When he’s not flying, Lars works as a gourmet chef in town. Business isn’t steady so he cuts and splits firewood on the side. Last winter, because I hadn’t gotten my full supply of wood in, I ran out in the weeks before spring thaw. Really embarrassing. I bought a cord from Lars which made him very happy. (I haven’t told him yet that my new Blaze King wood stove is so efficient I’ll need a whole lot less wood now.)
So maybe this was his way of saying thanks.
Pilots are always looking for excuses to go flying, and it’s nothing to spend a $100 in gas just to go somewhere we really don’t need to be. Like some distant greasy spoon for lunch. That’s where the $100 burger comes into play.
Since I’m too broke these days to rent a plane, I happily agreed to tag along with Lars. At least I’d be up in the air again.
“I was thinking Braeburn,” he told me when I arrived at his place. He’s got a dirt strip behind his cabin just long enough for his 172 to take off.
“Braeburn,” I said.
“Yep. I’m thinking I need a cinnamon bun.”
Braeburn Lodge is known for their cinnamon buns. They’re as big as dinner plates. It’s not just that they’re huge—they’re also delicious in that dream-of-them-for-days-afterward kind of delicious. Their burgers are just as big, but it’s the cinnamon buns that bring in the customers. It doesn’t hurt that they have a short, unpaved runway right beside the Alaska Highway. Except for the gopher holes and the nearby mountain, it’s not a bad strip. I landed there a few times when I was learning how to fly.
My flight with Lars was very relaxing. The cooler temperatures softened the bumps so we didn’t have any turbulence. Gave us a chance to really enjoy the view. I handled the radio so Lars could focus on his landing. He wanted to see how short he could make it. We’d just touched down and he was doing pretty good when one of the wheels hit a mound of snow-covered dirt. Back in the air we went. Not sure if the dirt was from gopher activity or not, but Lars would have shot any right there if he’d been able. I was glad he didn’t have access to his kitchen knives either.
We ordered the cinnamon buns to go and enjoyed them later at Lars’ cabin in front of the wood stove. Next time we’re getting burgers too. I figure a Braeburn burger and cinnamon bun should last me about a week.
I found a video on You Tube that reminds me of watching the dancing flames inside my Blaze King Princess wood stove. I never get bored watching that stuff. It’s always been like that, even as a kid when we had a fireplace. It wasn’t a fireplace insert, just a regular old fireplace, so it didn’t heat the house very well. We always relied on the furnace for that, except during winter power outages when the furnace was knocked out of commission.
One night, my mother and a friend of hers decided it would be fun to have a fire in the fireplace. The wood they gathered from behind the house was wet so they had trouble starting the fire. The friend suggested using gasoline to get it going. My mother thought that was a fantastic idea so they drenched the wood with gasoline and threw in a match. The wood ignited great, so did the carpet and the curtains. The white-painted brick surrounding the fireplace turned black and my mother’s eyebrows disappeared that night, too.
They had to stomp around pretty quickly to get the fire out. After that, whenever we walked across the carpet it made a crunching sound.
Lots of yammering on the bush radio tonight. As usual, they were discussing their favorite recipes. I always find that amusing—these big, gruff, Yukon men living in their one-room cabins without running water or telephones, tough as can be, spending their evenings debating the merits of this or that type of shortening.
I’m a bit of an eavesdropper on these conversations. I have no real excuse for needing a bush radio since I’m fully wired with high-speed Internet and telephone, but I do listen sometimes. I bought the radio a few years ago on the advice of a prospector friend of mine. Simon pointed out that in an emergency I can always reach somebody on the radio. I think he meant himself.
Tonight they were comparing wood stove recipes. I rarely use my Blaze King for anything other than straightforward heat, but occasionally I’ll put a pot of water on the stove to humidify the cabin. It’s gets very dry in this part of the world. Even the snow doesn’t have much moisture in it. It takes a whole lot of it to make one cup of water. I know this because when the electricity goes out, I melt a big pot of snow on the Blaze King to make tea. In winter, when the wind gets nasty, or the temps drop to -25 C. (-13 F.) or more, it can knock the electricity out for days at a time.
I think I’ll try Squeaky Bob’s recipe for whole wheat bread. The new Princess makes it easy to regulate the stove’s heat so I’m game for trying. And if I screw up, they’ll never know this woman can’t bake bread as well as they do.
Larry came over today at his usual time for a cup of coffee. I had the pot sitting on the Blaze King wood stove to keep it warm. Larry and I are about 15 years apart but it feels like we’re brother and sister. Even his wife doesn’t care if Larry comes over to my place and shoots the breeze for a few hours. She’s probably glad to get him out of the cabin.
Back to this morning. I was busy canning herbs from the summer’s greenhouse harvest so Larry volunteered to pour our coffee. He knows I like milk. Without asking, he reached in the fridge and poured some in my cup. When we sat down together I took a big swallow from my mug. It tasted funny. I asked him, “Larry, which milk did you use?”
“The stuff in the bottle,” he told me.
I took the bottle out of the fridge. It was clearly marked with a pink label. “This? Did you use this in my coffee?”
Someone sent me this video that demonstrates how efficient their Blaze King wood stove is. He uses it in his shop and you can see from the demo how cleanly it burns. I’ve been thinking about putting another wood stove out in the shop to replace the furnace. This guy has already done that. He burns scrap lumber (not anything that’s been painted or treated with chemicals) mixed in with regular firewood. I love the thought of not buying oil for the shop furnace especially now that it’s getting close to $100 per barrel.
Over the weekend, I spent a night in town. It’s just easier that way. After schlepping all over the place buying groceries and running errands it’s sometimes too exhausting to make the hour-plus drive home. Plus, the roads were icy and with the snow coming down, visibility was almost nil. I just wasn’t up for chancing it. But here’s the cool thing. When I got home late the next morning, though I expected the cabin to be somewhat cold, it was actually warm and pleasant. The Blaze King Princess had been on its own for more than 12 hours but was still keeping things warm. I shouldn’t have been surprised. The wood box is larger than most stoves’, and I’d stuffed it with wood before leaving home. Because it’s so much more efficient than the old Princess, the stove burns more evenly and the wood lasts longer. The thermostat keeps the temperature consistent and I don’t have to babysit the stove like I used to.
Still no sign of the Northern Lights. At this point, I’d settle for no snow and no Lights. I keep telling myself—winter is only for another seven months…
At least I don’t have to worry about keeping warm.
I should just expect it. It’s like this every year at this time. The seasons are changing, it’s feeling like winter (even more snow since my last post) but I have yet to see the Northern Lights. The reason is simple. The sky is overcast. And it’s overcast because it’s snowing. I get that, but I feel like in exchange we should be privy to something spectacular for our troubles. (Can you tell I’m not a winter person?)
They installed my new Blaze King Princess catalytic wood stove today! Though it was sad to say goodbye to the old Princess, I’m excited about the new one. Besides the fact that it’s gorgeous and shiny, it’s much more efficient than the original model. I expect to burn up to a third less wood than with the old stove. That translates to saving myself two cords worth of cutting, splitting, stacking, and hauling wood this winter. It also means a whole lot less air pollution coming from my stovepipe. Before, I could be outside and see the thick line of smoke rising above the roof line. Now I can’t see a thing when I look up— the stove is burning most of the stuff that used to go into the air. So now I feel even better about how I heat my house. Instead of burning oil in my furnace which generates carbon dioxide and contributes to climate change, I’m burning wood in a way that doesn’t create any more carbon than would occur naturally if the wood rotted in the forest. Plus, I’m using deadfall that would otherwise be a forest fire hazard—and forest fires, as you can see from the thick smoke they create, do not burn wood efficiently.
The other reason I’m in love with my new stove is that it has a glass door. Half the fun of having a fire is to watch the dancing flames. Now I can curl up beside the wood stove and enjoy the show.
The installers were great. They work for the Blaze King dealership that sold me the stove. The two guys went to a lot of trouble to make sure the old stove and pipe didn’t make a mess of the carpet when they removed them. When they finished installing the new stove they made a test fire to be sure everything was good. I think I might have scared them with my enthusiasm about the new Princess. But hey, we all have our quirks, right?
It stopped snowing long enough for me to haul a good supply of wood into the cabin today without tracking mud everywhere. The forecast for tomorrow into late next week is snow, snow, snow. At least it’s not cold. The low today was a pleasant -2° C (28° F). After splitting wood for a few hours, I actually wished it was much colder. At around -25° C (-13° F) the wood splits with just a tap of the axe. And once you’re moving around, you don’t even notice the cold.
I’m feeling a little melancholy sitting here tonight beside my Blaze King Princess wood stove. Because the new wood stove will be delivered in a few days, tonight is one of the last times I’ll use this one. Sounds silly, but I’ve got a lot of memories associated with it. Before moving to the Yukon, I’d never even used a wood stove.
My neighbor S. is pushing 75 but looks much older. Her back is hunched over and she walks with a limp from a bad hip. All the years she lived in the bush running trap lines and chopping holes in frozen lakes for water has beaten her up pretty good. S. ties a dainty kerchief around her head most of the year but in the winter she goes outside wearing a man’s coat that looks older than she is. Wood stoves are all S. has ever used for heat.
Years ago she took a long canoe trip upriver. S. was two days away from her cabin when she stopped overnight to make camp. Without realizing it, she left her rifle in the boat. A grizzly came into camp and went for her food. Seeing her, it stood on its back legs and swiped at the air with its claws. Without the rifle she had nothing to defend herself with. S. is a small woman, but she charged that grizzly, yelling and screaming at the top of her lungs. The bear backed away, and when she got close enough to grab the rifle she fired a shot in the air and the grizzly took off.
S. is the one who taught me how to use my wood stove properly after I first moved here. I felt honored to have a real Yukoner show me the ropes. Maybe I’ll talk her into helping me light the new stove for the first time. Just for old time’s sake.
