July 15, 2019
Today was going to be a relaxing day as there were no excursions planned. We had a lazy morning going through our photographs and working on the blog notes. After breakfast, I went to a presentation put on by our guide Jason.
Besides being a guide for Lazy Bear Resort, Jason is also a commercial photographer and the in house photographer for the resort. He has worked for several news/sports media firms and has covered the last four Olympics as a sports photographer. Off-season in Canada, Jason guides and is a photographer for a tour company in Antarctica. He offered to put on a short presentation on tips on how to take great photographs. I desperately need those kinds of lessons.
Lazy Bear Resort has a small presentation building with multi media screens etc. near the docks and that is where we met. The lessons that Jason went over with us were the fundamentals for taking good photographs and he showed us many of his photos and explained what he was doing with his cameras, what he was trying to accomplish, and the proper settings and positioning to take the photos. Many of his photographs that he showed us are pictures that we had seen on TV or in newspapers. Many are iconic. Later in the morning, Debbie and I walked through the town again. We had learned that there is a stained glass window in the Anglican Church that we should see. We visited the church and learned that the church had once been located on the other side of the river near the Prince of Wales fort. It had been dismantled into three pieces and barged across the river and relocated in its present site. Inside the church is a large stained glass window that had been presented to the people of Churchill who had helped in the many searches for the sailors of the lost Franklin Expedition in 1845. Lady Jane Franklin, wife of the explorer, Sir John Franklin, had gifted the window.
Sir John Franklin had made several on land expeditions from Churchill into Northern Canada, before he made the ill-fated expedition that cost him his life and those of 129 sailors. Over twenty-five search expeditions were conducted between 1846 and 1880 in attempts to locate the remains of his ships and his men. Lady Jane was a driving force in encouraging the British government to launch these expeditions and she funded several of these expeditions herself. Of course, in 2014 the wreck of the HMS Erebus was located and in 2016, the wreck of the HMS Terror was located.
In the afternoon, Debbie and I attended an beluga ecology presentation put on by Courtenay. Courtney is a part time employee of Lazy Bear Resort and is a university student studying, northern biology. Her presentation was very informative and we learned more about the various northern ecological zones, and the effects of climate change to the lives of the animals and plants in the north.
In the evening we relaxed in the restaurant, chatting to various guests and then went back to our room to call our children and family.
Quilting in a Kayak 