I ran for two hours this morning. Snow fell in a hurry. This time last year temperatures were minus 14ºC. Today’s lowest was minus 2ºC.

At minus 8ºC this morning I decided to bring in water buckets. This followed a dog nail clipping session and all the usual reluctance.

Running this morning I followed fox tracks for a while in the snow. It looked like the fox had been dragging something. While walking dogs I stuck to the lake shoreline.

A few metres from shore I walked dogs over Chuk Lake’s new ice. It cracked and fizzed like walking too close to the massive electricity pylons I remember playing near as a kid. Moving caused ripples to roll and spread across water not frozen over. Dogs loved it.

The northern lights did their normal swirling green thing in the sky tonight. I almost forgot. A 650-pound eight-foot grizzly was shot dead in Inuvik this week. It’s the fifth bear shot in the community this year.

Red squirrels, ravens and a beautiful fox watched as I fed my dogs tonight. Twizzle bit his fat lump in half. Chomping on one piece a raven swooped and airlifted the other. Twizzle learnt a lesson.

It’s not turning super-cold yet, though it’s a time for loosening the dogs’ collars to accommodate their growing coats. Now frozen dog poo makes for easy pick up. Inside and warm, static sparks crackle off clothing and bed linen. Soon colder temperatures will give inanimate objects the ability to shock with static that’ll strike like an electric shock. The treatment always makes me mutter a swear word.

At 6ºC today an annoying last grasping summer melted snow. I walked the dogs over lakes to look at the Mackenzie’s east channel. It still flows. By 23^rd October last year this channel had frozen over. By the 28^th I was running my dogs on the river. I want to get my dogs in harness and pulling before too long.

The sun would have risen at 10.45 am and set at 6.30 pm meaning less than eight hours daylight, instead there’s been widespread storm warnings throughout the western Arctic.

First run of the season. I ran a team of seven dogs: Thule, Twizzle, Saxon, Piston, Marshall, Bomber and Beef. It snowed and snowed and snowed. Deepest drift reached my chest. Not an ideal first day. Thule worked hard up front. Sometimes I told her to stay while I laboriously broke trail before calling her to me ready to start the trail breaking process again. I used my Gerber Diesel multitool to tighten collar quick link snaps.

Calm day. Wormed entire team with Drontal Plus before walking out happy dogs.

Today was bright day and mild at minus 8ºC. After my own running, Thule walked with me for a couple of hours through deep snow. I wore my Tubbs snowshoes breaking trail through the deepest sections. Thule went ahead when snow wasn’t over her head.

Clocks went back one hour overnight. I spent more time out with Thule. The huge snowfall has created much lake overflow and many weak spots.