Welcome to Dundurn

Winter has shaped Canada's image and been embraced with hearty enthusiasm from snowshoeing hikers in the 19th century to future hockey stars on backyard rinks and to the indoor spectacle of figure-skating carnivals and curling bonspiels. Much of our literature, our songs, and our memories of youth reflect the bracing tonic that winter brings even as we curse the ice-laden roads on the morning commute or while planning our weekend ski trip. But alas, winter's demise to a weak reminder of its former glory is a real possibility as climate change wreaks long-term havoc.

Fifteen-year-old Mackenzie Hill knows something is up when she arrives home to find her father making a home-cooked dinner, instead of his standard delivery pizza. But nothing prepares her for the bombshell announcement: Mackenzie and her dad, alone since the death of her mother a year ago, are moving to Jerusalem, where her father has taken a position as a visiting professor at a university.

Pike's Portage is more than a trail from Great Slave Lake to Artillery Lake at the edge of the Barrens in the Northwest Territories. For years it was used by as an access point by Native Peoples, and as a transition point by intrepid explorers and adventurers. In the early 20th century, it was a trappers' right of passage. Today, in winter it carries hunters, and in summer only footprints of the most adventuresome canoe parties heading for the Thelon, Back, and Coppermine rivers.