Original subtitles

NARRATOR: On this episode of Life Below Zero...

ANDY: It's a whole different ball game in the summertime.

NARRATOR: Unpredictable weather is shaking up life in Alaska.

CHIP: The time to make these things is right now.

NARRATOR: A lesson in survival cuts deep.

CHIP: Ow.

ANDY: Let's go!

NARRATOR: Andy and Kate put their youngest dogs to the test.

ANDY: No.

-Hey, look. -NARRATOR: Glenn encounters unexpected visitors.

GLENN: (GASPS) Oh, my God!

NARRATOR: And Sue's quest to find food brings her to unfamiliar waters.

(SUE SCREAMS)

NARRATOR: For Sue Aikens,

summer is the time to gather food

to survive the winter months.

But the absence of caribou in Kavik,

has forced her to seek out other options.

SUE: The fishing trip is looking, uh, more like a hunting trip right now.

I don't know, I've seen, maybe, 10 caribou.

You got a little mum and baby sleeping right underneath the ball

that I'm gonna sleep in.

There are rules that govern.

Flying and hunting on the same day is a no-no. That's an unfair advantage.

So I have to wait until, you know, tomorrow morning in the wee hours

before I can actually pull the trigger.

I've heard about this fishing hole for a long time, I wanna try it out,

and it just worked out there's some caribou here, too.

My little cubby for the next couple days.

The DEW Line days, the early warning detection system during the Cold War.

Big radar golf balls.

The last of the remaining sites

on the north shore of Alaska are disappearing.

They've all been decommissioned, no longer military property.

They're tearing everything out and getting rid of it.

This is pretty cool.

There is supposedly, like,

the north slope's coolest Arctic char fishing hole.

And I want, you know, I keep hearing everybody talk about it over the years,

but I haven't been able to get here.

Well, now I did.

So that's the main focus, but coming in,

the caribou are just kinda running around.

You know, I have to wait until 3:00 a.m. to pull the trigger.

So as far as I'm concerned, it gives me a little bit of time,

I can make my little cubby nice.

I can get a little cup of tea or something going.

I'll go ahead and, uh, work on my fishing

while I'm waiting on my hunting.

Working on my hunting while I'm waiting on my fishing.

Kinda spoiled for choice right now.

CHIP: If you want something, especially up here,

you either make it yourself, or you just do without.

We're going downriver.

We're going towards the ocean,

to a place where there's lots of islands

where the seagulls like to lay their eggs.

We're trying to see if there are seagulls sitting on their nests.

And now is the time to keep a close watch.

So that's what we're doing and today's our first check.

We can pick the eggs from them for, like, three days in a row

and stop, and they'll still have babies.

NARRATOR: For the Hailstones, breakup of the river leads to a spring harvest

and a search for a summer delicacy, seagull eggs.

Oh, look, swans.

(CHIP SPEAKING)

(SEAGULLS SQUAWKING)

CHIP: I wanna show my kids where to go get these eggs.

I want them to have the knowledge of where and when.

This is the time to do it.

This is the place to do it.

We're in a place where there's lots of mud, it's easy to lose your boots here.

This is deep mud.

This island is full of all kinds of crazy little ways to get stuck.

It's got long deals to it, I want you guys to pair up.

-Who's gonna stay together? -Me and Carol.

CHIP: Okay, that sounds good, as long as you guys got a partner.

If we don't pair 'em up, you know, they can lose their boots,

they can fall in the water and get icy.

And plus, too, it's real easy when you have a system of two people trying to get eggs.

My younger kids haven't done this very much.

My older kids know this place very well.

CAROL: Oh, look!

Nope, that's not a nest.

These are tidal flats, and after the flood has passed,

as you can see from this mud, the water's been over top of it.

Then they come and lay their eggs as soon as the flood goes down.

Flood's gone down, hopefully the smelts are coming in,

cause they gorge themselves on the small fish, and right after that,

they'll go and they'll nest.

They'll be munching down and making eggs.

It's like a little maze, you have to go and search, um, for little islands and stuff.

It's always fun for the kids, it's like Easter.

(AGNES SIGHS)

(QUTAN AND AGNES SPEAKING)

(AGNES SPEAKING)

QUTAN: Oh, it's empty.

AGNES: Another nest?

They look similar like that.

That looks like one that's gonna be made soon, but not quite yet.

CHIP: This one's been worked on.

See how wet it is from their feet?

Where they're sitting, see how they carve this out?

They got rid of the debris.

As soon as they're ready to lay eggs, we'll start to see feathers.

A few feathers smashed in there and then they'll lay the eggs.

So from indications, is that they're getting ready, but they're not here yet.

They're getting ready to lay. Could be tomorrow.

Only fresh nests. I see they're working on their nests.

AGNES: Yeah, we've seen a few nests, too.

There's quite a few nests that aren't worked on

and there's about maybe, I've seen five or six that were worked on.

No feathers in them yet, though?

No feathers in them, nope. So I would say maybe a day.

As long as we're here early, we're happy.

When we get back down here, they'll be fresh.

This will be awesome.

ANDY: Even the most confident person and knowledgeable person

is gonna get their butt kicked from time to time,

but as long as it doesn't kill you,

it's a good learning experience.

I think I'm gonna take some dogs out and run them,

get a few of these guys used to boats.

I try and use my dogs all year long.

They're not just sled dogs.

They have to know how to get into boats.

When they're in boats, they have to behave.

Because if I get 15 or 20 dogs in a boat

and they're not behaving, it's pretty chaotic and pretty dangerous for everybody.

KATE: During the flood of 09',

having all these little extra skills

really made a big difference.

They had to get tied into boats

after they'd all been scared out of their wits floating around in water.

Getting into boats, getting into canoes, getting into a helicopter,

arriving in Eagle, having a stranger take them in a truck.

They handled it beautifully, and that is good training.

ANDY: You're gonna dump me.

Oh, man, you're strong.

Oh, crap!

Our summers are four months long,

four months to do all the work we need to do.

Before you know it, winter's here.

(DOGS WHIMPERING)

Everybody in the boat! In the boat! Good boy!

These dogs were rescued from our property in 2009, by canoe.

So that really brought home to me

the importance of not only teaching a dog to be a sled dog,

but to be a really well-rounded dog,

to be exposed to a lot of different things

and have a lot of different capabilities.

It's my job in the summertime now to get out there,

expose the dog to what I expect them to do, give them that experience,

give them that confidence so that when I decide to go out and do something,

it goes like clockwork.

Let's go for a run!

Let's go for a run!

You guys ready to go?

This will be a test.

GLENN: It's very exciting living out here.

I mean, it's so much more complex

and more intellectually challenging and physically challenging

than if I were just to go buy my food.

That heat feels nice. A lot of times when I stoke the fire,

I like to just stand by the stove and just enjoy the warmth.

I would like to take a sauna, that would feel great.

When it's cold, the end of the day,

your muscles are sore just to get in there.

Maybe I can build a little sweat lodge.

Maybe I can make something like the shape of a tepee.

Or maybe a little dome.

Just cover it with a tarp, put a wood stove in it.

But I've never built a dome before.

I'm not sure how that would work out.

It would be an experiment. I would have to try.

The goal is to contain the heat.

If I make it small enough and it's tightly enough built,

then that it will get it really hot in there so I work up a good sweat.

This looks like a pretty good spot. It's level.

It's pretty close to the lake.

I just have to be able to sit in it

and have a wood stove in there with me.

If I was sitting right here and I had a stove here...

A little place like this...

That would be nice.

I'm gonna go look for some poles to start building it right here.

NARRATOR: Living hundreds of miles away from the nearest hardware store,

Glenn must build everything by hand.

See, a tree about this big around, I can bend it,

then if I bent another one down and tied them together, I'd have an arch.

That might work.

This is the thing about a sweat lodge, it's more than just physical.

It's gonna be good for the consciousness, too.

It's a whole different atmosphere in there.

I am gonna have to clean these up really well

because any little thing like this, that's gonna stick right through my tarp.

I gotta take off all the little sharp nubs.

All these jobs, they're real enjoyable.

It's just such a beautiful atmosphere to work in here.

It's just gorgeous.

There's two caribou right there. It looks like a cow and a calf.

I haven't seen any caribou in about 10 days.

That's nature. It's alive out here.

There's a lot going on.

There's a wolf right now walking along the edge of the shore,

right behind the caribou.

(SOFTLY) Wow.

And now he's considering his options.

(GASPS) The wolf needs to chase.

(GLENN SPEAKING)

Where'd the calf go?

The wolf is right at the corner.

He's turning around, he's going back into the woods,

but the caribou got separated.

Is the other caribou still in the woods?

You don't usually see caribou down here this late in spring.

I don't need caribou now,

but it's pretty interesting to see them.

If that calf made it, it's gonna go back to its mother, eventually.

Caribou can generally outrun a wolf

as long as they get a little head start.

I can't imagine anything more interesting to do

than watch life like this taking place.

You never know what's gonna happen.

That's what's so exciting about living this way, it's that...

I'll be doing one thing, like building a little sweat lodge,

and the next thing you know,

there's caribou getting chased by wolves right here in my front yard.

ANDY: It's constant planning here and it's not for next week,

it's for next year.

That's really important when you live this way.

We got a boat full of dogs and we're here,

getting ready to take the dogs for a run

on the islands across from my place.

It's really important to keep these dogs

in shape all summer long

so that they're ready to go in the fall time.

The more they know, the better.

I want them to be as experienced in as many different things as I can.

'Cause you just never know what's gonna happen.

Okay, out of the boat. Go on.

Good boy. Go, Tope, go, Tope.

Getting in and out of boats is really a skill they have to know.

It has to be not unquestionable.

When the flood hit us,

the only way we were able to evacuate our dogs was to put them into a canoe.

Had my dogs not been able to ride in a canoe,

that wouldn't have even been an option.

Straight ahead, let's go. Come, come, come.

These dogs work really hard all winter long,

and this is, kind of, playtime for them,

but it's also educational for them.

It's just about exposure.

Lots of experiences. Experience is knowledge,

whether you're human or animal.

Everything we do with the dogs is giving them

as many experiences as we can.

The other thing I like to do is I like to watch the dogs,

and see which ones are running up front.

Those are potential leaders.

Right now I've got Topaz running up front with Jack.

Jack and Topaz, so far, are doing really good.

You know, I really spend a lot of time doing discipline training with the dogs.

I want them to be as experienced in as many different things as I can.

Not just sled dogs,

they're guard dogs, they're work dogs,

they're pack dogs, they do everything.

Come, come. Everybody come. Everybody come.

Two reasons why I'm doing this.

One is just to get the dogs out, muscle them up a little bit.

But probably more importantly,

it's being confident in whenever I tell them to do something, they do it.

Let's go home.

Atta boy. Good boy, Jack.

Everybody in. Come on, Coug.

Jack, you did a good job. You're a boat dog now, Jack.

SUE: Just 'cause I haven't done, it doesn't mean squat.

It's something I'm going to do.

It's not things I haven't done.

It's things I haven't done yet.

NARRATOR: An unseasonably late caribou migration in Kavik

has forced Sue 34 miles to the coast in search of food.

SUE: Yesterday, Jake brought me in,

there were a few caribou running around, but I can't pull the trigger.

You can't fly and hunt on the same day.

And I'm just getting ready. I'm making some coffee.

And I'm gonna go out and see

if I can spook one of them up.

I mean, I've never had a year where I only see six to 12 caribou

from May until now.

I mean, we're right before the migration.

The worry is still there that if they don't migrate through my area,

within five, ten miles of my area,

that's, kind of, a game changer for me for the winter.

Time to go and see who's out there.

So I brought my stick, the gun, got my net.

And I'm just gonna kinda go prepared for anything that might happen.

I need to get something so I survive the winter.

(SOFTLY) There it is.

I can try to put the sneak on these up here.

I'm gonna leave my pack and my pole here.

There is one, there is two. Where's the baby?

I have to verify that there's no calves.

It's an opportunity, but you don't shoot mums and babies.

You know, there's definitely three cows,

one's fairly juvenile without calves,

two cows with calves, but they're now... They're all together.

That leaves me one cow that I got to try and pick out of all of them.

The amount of effort it's gonna take to try and maybe pick out that one cow

is not worth it.

I do not, will not shoot a cow with a calf,

and it's just too difficult for me to separate them out,

so on to the next thing.

Well, this is the pond everybody, 'Yay,' screams about.

I haven't had the opportunity to add much fish to my diet, but I want to.

So this is a good learning experience.

Take that! I mean it, take it.

Oh, shit.

No, no, no, no, no.

(SCREAMS)

The fish was just a couple of feet from being dinner when the line broke.

I have undersized equipment, and a formidable fault.

I do need to work the bank as little bit of it as I've got.

I got to, kind of, try and wear 'em out.

There he is. Oh, it's a little bitty guy.

But I got him! Oh, shit, don't let him go!

You're not the size I wanted, but he is a fishy.

Yay, I got a fishy!

Come on, come on, come to mama.

Yeah!

Now that's a freaking char, man.

I think that you probably can count on two hands, maybe three,

the amount of people that have been to this location to fish.

Whoa, whoa.

This is a bigger one.

I had heard it was this good. I had hoped it was this good.

So yeah, I'm pleasantly surprised.

Oh, no!

Phew. (CHUCKLES) Almost... Almost got away.

Number 10, final one for the day.

You know, I had a pretty good day, uh...

Eventful.

Went, saw some caribou, tried to get on them,

got on them, got within shooting range, turns out to be, uh,

cows and calves so can't get them.

Found this one. Bam, bam, bam, bam, bam, bam.

Got a little technique down to get them away from the current,

lessening the power of the strike and the fight,

and was able to get them up here, give them headaches, and get my limit.

What a beautiful fish. Thank you, fishy.

What was that? (IN HIGH-PITCHED VOICE) "You're welcome." Okay.

GLENN: It's not just this place, or this way of life,

that's all interchangeable.

It's what's in your head that matters.

Consciousness, you know?

NARRATOR: To combat long days of physical work

and bitter winter temperatures in the bush,

Glenn Villeneuve is building a sweat lodge.

I've got the first two here,

and I wanna put two in the other direction.

I'm just gonna lean those together.

You use natural materials out here. They don't grow straight.

Trees aren't straight, so why try to make everything straight.

You don't need it straight.

I can picture sitting in here, getting a good sweat.

If I wanted to, I could build a much more elaborate sauna,

but this is, kind of, a nice way to do it. Just keep things simple.

If I can spend one day building a sauna,

why make it more complicated than that?

I've got several steel barrels that I store things in,

just to protect my things from the bears and from the weather.

This is an extra one. I'm gonna make it into a wood stove.

(HAMMERING)

There.

That's where the wood's gonna go in.

Smoke comes out here, needs a place for air to go in on the bottom.

This is a tarp I'm gonna cover the sweat lodge with.

Well, so far so good. Frame hasn't fallen down yet.

Awesome. This looks great. This looks like it's going to work.

It's just the right size. I'm real happy with the way the frame turned out.

I just have to secure the canvas,

cover the floor in spruce bows,

get the wood stove going in here,

and I'm gonna have a good sweat in here.

Best thing about the sauna is the atmosphere.

You could actually live in something like this.

What it's about for me, is it's just about meditative, calm, peaceful living.

Awesome. Got the stove in, got the spruce bows down.

Can't wait to try it out.

CHIP: Knowing the proper preparations makes for a smart person.

And you live long, live good,

and you don't rely on anybody but yourself.

This is a place where I do a lot of hunting, this area.

The birds fly by, the caribou will come here to cross.

This is like a natural trap.

And one of the best things here are the fish that come through.

Right now, I'm waiting to see if I can see the little smelts that are coming along.

Smelts are fish, real small ones that are thin.

As they mate and they spawn upriver,

they turn around and go back immediately after doing it.

But they don't all do it at the same time.

So they may come in here packed in a bunch, real easy to scoop out.

But if we caught them coming down,

we'd only be getting two or three at a time.

So we really want to get them full of eggs as they're heading up.

(SEAGULLS SQUAWKING)

What I'm counting on today

is for the seagulls to let me know where the smelts are.

Because as soon as the seagulls

have fed themselves very well on smelts,

they're gonna head back,

and they're gonna go nest up and they're gonna lay eggs.

So we want the smelts, too, and then we'll go get eggs from the seagulls.

So, in a round-robin way,

I'm, kind of, trying to predict when the seagulls are gonna lay their eggs,

and at the same time, I don't wanna miss the smelts.

I'm gonna go to these alders.

I'm gonna find a couple that have some really nice forks in them,

and I'm gonna make two dippers.

I'm gonna show the kids how to make those,

and they can learn the dip netting.

What you need to do is you need to bend them like this,

so that you know that they're flexible.

Doesn't even have to be a hoop. It can be like a more of a square.

It can even be like shovel-shaped. It doesn't matter.

We still want to be able to make something that we can dip down

and pick up the fish with.

When you get a lot of fish in there, it weighs a lot.

And you're gonna need the strength of the hoop to pull them up.

That's looking good, and if you add one more, you can make a good hoop.

We're using natural materials and we're using them basically in their natural form.

It's using the stuff around you to accomplish comfortable living.

(INHALES SHARPLY)

Ah.

I passed the knife tip across my finger and sliced it.

It doesn't even hurt, the knife is so sharp.

I had to double check to see if I was even cut.

Just don't touch where the bandage goes on here.

There you go.

Just swiped it with the tip of my knife.

Okay, we're good.

NARRATOR: Spending the summer on the Kiwalik River,

hundreds of miles from any medical services,

the Hailstones must rely only on themselves.

CHIP: Look at all those birds coming over that hillside.

You girls wanna go over to the river and go have a look

and see if you see any little flashes going by,

or you see what look like raindrops hitting the water, with no rain.

Just get to a high bank. Don't go to the sandbar. Go to the high bank.

GIRLS: Okay.

CHIP: Only indicator we really have right now are birds. The seagulls will let us know.

They eat those fish, and they gorge on them before they lay eggs.

CAROL: Do you see anything?

What do you think?

And then it'll dip into the smelts

and pull them up, and hopefully dump them.

Back in the water and do it again.

And when the smelts have passed by,

we'll zip upriver with the boat,

get ahead of them, and do it again.

That sound good to you?

(IRIQTAQ SPEAKING)

CHIP: We're going downriver here,

and we're gonna have a look and see if there's smelts coming up the river.

They take quite a while,

but what we really wanna do at this evening time is make sure

that we're not gonna have the smelts pass us by in our sleep.

We had a really late freeze up

and we're having a really early break up,

so we've got, like, an extra month-and-a-half of summer added.

Hopefully, the fish have caught up.

It's time for smelting. We just don't know where they are at the moment.

I don't see any smelts!

I think we're gonna go back home

'cause we're down here by the mouth,

and the sun's gonna go down soon.

It's better as it is, for them not to have shown up than to have missed them.

ANDY: It's the same old story.

Experience is knowledge. Knowledge is confidence. Confidence is a job well done.

Our life along this, uh, Yukon River in the wintertime

revolves mainly around dogs and snow machines.

And in the summer time, it's all about dogs and boats.

Each dog has a talent.

Often times, some dogs have multiple talents.

But they all have a weakness somewhere.

And so it's my job, as their owner,

to figure out what their weaknesses are,

and realising that, when I go to do a job,

I don't ask them to do something that they're not good for.

So what I plan on doing, Kate, I want to take Topaz and Jack and Cougaran.

We'll put Topaz in lead, and then Jack and Cougaran next to each other.

And then we'll let them go, and just see. I have no idea.

I'm hoping they don't run all the way back to the lake with this.

I'm hoping they'll just go a little ways and stop.

But I have no idea what they're gonna do.

It's really important to identify, at a very young age,

dogs that have potential leadership quality.

Topaz is probably gonna be one of my better leaders in the future,

so now I'm trying to expand that into summertime.

The other dog that's showing a lot of potential is Jack.

He's a big dog.

Having a large lead dog that can break trail

would be a real asset to me when I'm out trapping.

Okay, tighten up, let's go. Hip-hip. On by. Whoo-hoo!

The trail that I'm using today is mainly a winter trail.

In the wintertime, the water freezes, smoothes it out a little bit.

We get snow blowing in there, drifts in it,

and then I can put in a pretty nice trail.

Uh, it's a whole different ball game in the summer time, it's full of ruts, pits.

It's gonna be interesting to see how they handle it.

Straight ahead.

Whoa!

That was really good, you guys. Good dogs.

First things first, the canoe goes in the water.

Topaz gets in the boat, and we go out for a paddle, and we see how she does.

No, you've got to learn how to do this. Come on. Good.

Right there. Good girl. Sit. Sit.

Good, sit. Stay, stay.

That's what you want to do.

Good girl.

Looks like Topaz is doing really well.

She's sitting there. She's watching the paddle.

You'd think she'd been in a boat all her life.

You're doing a good job, Topaz.

Good girl!

I'm pretty impressed. She was the one I was worried about the most.

I thought she was so hyper. I thought for sure that dog was just gonna go,

"Uh-uh. Not going, got to move around, got to jump."

Uh-oh. We got a leak. We've got a pretty good leak.

I've got a geyser coming in. Why don't you look around in those packs?

I might have some duct tape or something, Kate.

We're gonna have to tape it up.

Kind of looks like it was a bear tooth, or bear claw hole.

It's one I missed when I was patching it.

KATE: Oh, no.

ANDY: I think you did good.

Okay, out.

-KATE: Come on, Topey. -Good girl. Good girl.

This is what I call a Navy patch.

One of the things you learn if you're a seaman in the Navy

is how to fix a hole in a boat by driving wedges into it.

That was, kind of, unexpected, but that's the way it is out here.

You know, you just got to deal with things as they come

and figure out what you got to work with and make it work.

All right, let's try Jacker. Hey, Jack-Jack.

I think Jack's at, kind of, a critical time in his development.

He's going from puppyhood into adulthood.

Or at least becoming an older teenager.

We're gonna make Jack graduate from high school and move on to college today.

Atta boy. In, in.

Sit. Sit.

(ANDY CHUCKLES)

Nope.

Let's get him back in. You stand on the dock so he can't do that, okay?

In the boat, come on, boy. Atta boy.

-KATE: Down you go. -Now I got you.

Good boy.

KATE: He looks so pathetic out there.

He's just holding onto Andy for dear life.

You sure make it hard to paddle, though,

with you right in my face like this.

Jack was pretty tentative getting in the canoe.

Uh, he's still a young dog, he hasn't had a lot of experience.

I don't expect him to do perfect on any of this stuff.

You know, it's all repetition with dogs.

You got to do it over and over.

KATE: This is the whole point of it, is to have them

experience different situations, you know?

They've got to learn that where they're put,

and they're told to sit and stay, that that's where they stay.

ANDY: Out, out.

(KATE CHUCKLES)

ANDY: All right, Jack, out, out. Good boy.

-Yay. -KATE: Yeah!

Mainly, the experience was just to get the dogs settled down in the canoe,

get them used to riding in the canoe without jumping around.

For me, Topaz is, kind of, the star of the day as far as performance goes.

She did a great job leading, great job riding in the canoe.

Time to be a lead dog.

Actually, let's put Jack in front. See if he can go home.

Jack. No, you've been demoted, Jack's gonna be lead dog!

Yay, Jack, the lead dog.

It was a big surprise that Topaz was the easy one and Jack wasn't.

Because we'd have lost money if we had bet the other way.

ANDY: Let's go. Hup-hup.

Whoo-hoo! Let's go!

What I'm trying to do is build confidence with Jack,

and the only way I'm gonna build confidence

is to give him a lot of experience.

I think this was really good for me to have a chance during the summer months

to put them to the test and to do some different things with them.

Things that most people don't do with sled dogs.

They really excel at what they're doing once they have confidence.

And that's the key. You got to get the confidence

or you don't get the performance,

so I'm really excited.

GLENN: Every day out here is uncertain, and that makes it interesting.

I never know what's gonna happen.

That's part of the reason I'm here.

Oh, that's hot!

I got my sweat lodge built. It's a beautiful curved shape.

I went with a dome.

Never built a dome before, turned out pretty good.

(SIZZLING)

Nice.

It's as much a psychological benefit as physical for me.

Just to sit here. It's just so calm.

And it purifies and it puts your consciousness in a different place.

It's just very relaxing. It's very meditative.

GLENN: Phew.

Oh. It's hot.

Oh.

The contrast between the heat and the cold, it really is invigorating.

It just gets the heart going.

It gets the blood in circulation.

Keeps you feeling vital. That's what it's all about out here.

Being alive.

SUE: The arctic is full of opportunists.

Human beings as well as the animals.

It's hard to eke a life out here.

It challenges me.

So, last night and yesterday, it was a big day, a lot of hiking.

And went after some caribou that I saw,

and it turned out to be cows and calves.

You know, the numbers say there's one lone cow,

but I couldn't separate who was who, so I had to let him go.

I continued on to the fishing hole.

Caught the limit for the day and...

But it took... It was another six, eight miles hiking getting back here.

So I've got my fishies here. I did not, uh, finish cleaning them out yesterday.

I just had to get warm.

As you can see, I'm sleeping on a metal floor.

You know, I'm over 50, I'm overweight, I smoke cigarettes,

hiking my brains out at 30 degrees.

So I'm a little slow-going this morning.

But I want to get out there and get these guys taken care of.

At these temperatures, they're perfectly fine to leave overnight,

but I don't wanna leave them any longer than that.

(BREATHING HEAVILY)

Fuck, fuck. My scope, it's all fogged on the inside.

(SEAGULL SQUEALS)

You got hit, you son of a bitch.

There he is.

A little heart rock.

Thank you very much, from my heart to yours, buddy.

You'll be some tasty little meat, keep me going this winter.

Get this guy cut up, get those fish cut up,

have some surf and turf for dinner.

I mean, I thought I was tired before,

and now I just made a lot more work for myself,

but that's the work that keeps you alive in the winter.

Couldn't ask for a more successful two-day venture.

You know?

Got my limit on fish, got a little bit of meat for the freezie.

It's a good trip.

It's a time of harvesting.

Get your whatever you're gonna use to eat for the winter,

better get it in.

Any little bit I get done before the snow flies,

adds in to being able to make it until the snow melts.

That's the goal.

I got to come out here and it's great peace of mind

for me to be able to just take a couple of days away

from the hectic-ness, and relax out here.

But getting the fish, finding the fishing hole, getting a caribou,

it's productive.

It went from being just a couple days

and a nice thing a buddy did for me,

to putting meat in the freezer and being able to sustain myself this winter.

So it's, uh, all around, what a really great trip.

CHIP: I can just go get it myself and make a living from the land around me.

And that's subsistence, that's real freedom.

This is, uh, not too big of an island, but it's not too small.

Try not to fall in the water.

Most of the water isn't any deeper than the boots.

Stay in pairs. If somebody gets stuck in mud, you help them out.

You girls know to keep your eyes on these seagulls 'cause they'll dive.

You will know you're close to a nest

when they are trying to hit you in the head.

The goal for the summer is to get eggs

and save them up. We like to eat the fresh eggs.

'Cause even though there weren't any yesterday, today might be the day.

AGNES: This is a real nice area. We call it the flats.

We're able to see long distances

and keep an eye on each other.

I'm always glad that you can see for, like, a mile away.

CHIP: We just got to these mud flats, and my kids are all dispersing.

We get to go out here and go egg hunting.

I really hope I run into something good.

Uh, there's no nest here.

Probably one was making one,

but I don't think they finished.

Here's a nest, still being worked on, but there's no eggs yet.

Sometimes we always walk for miles and miles

just to find one nest.

There's geese, swans, cranes, there's seagulls,

and they live on these islands.

They like to be on these little patches in between here.

All this water, these mud flats,

and they make their nests and they lay their eggs, and we gather them.

We're actually trying to get a renewable resource, and not impact the population.

(TINMIAQ SPEAKING)

Nope, I think we're too early.

I don't think we're too early.

I think we need to keep walking.

I think we're still...

-So, which way you wanna go? -Go through.

AGNES: Right in there.

Nothing? Seriously?

(QUTAN SPEAKING)

AGNES: We walked, like, a mile and there's still no eggs,

so we're just going to keep looking.

-Right, Qutan? -Yeah.

Okay, let's go walk over this way.

Hopefully, there will be some over here.

CHIP: I got all my daughters out here, and I got my wife out here,

and they're scattered all over this island. (CHUCKLES)

Hopefully, the kiddos are doing good.

Oh! I can see eggs, Ting!

Six of them. Six eggs.

Okay, starting to get a little scared.

CHIP: This is, kind of, a crazy spring for us.

The break up came probably

three to four weeks early this year.

It makes it difficult when the weather patterns have changed so severely.

AGNES: (CHUCKLING) Oh! Finally.

This is the first time Qutan's ever looked for eggs,

so, um, this is, kind of, a fun time for her.

I'm glad she found a few. (CHUCKLES)

(QUTAN SPEAKING)

(CHIP SPEAKING)

(QUTAN SPEAKING)

This is a good first day, I'd say.

-Yeah. -I wonder what the other kids have.

QUTAN: How much did you get?

(IDI SPEAKING)

CHIP: Come on over and count.

AGNES: It's not really a competition, but it is really exciting

when everybody gets together and we get to count everybody's eggs

and see how much we come up with.

Now, you can't count the one that broke as half-eight.

CHIP: Yeah, I counted mine.

AGNES: Okay, then. (CHUCKLING)

How much did you guys get?

QUTAN: We got 13. CHIP: Two dozen.

We have, um, 24 all total and then you have 17?

We got 17.

-AGNES: 17? -(ALL CHUCKLING)

What you guys got?

-Me and Mary got 17. -MARY: 17, but one broke.

-We got 13. -CHIP: And I had 12, but one broke.

-We got 20! -Whoo!

When we wake up in the morning,

we'll be having some real good breakfast.

Fresh eggs.

TINMIAQ: 51. AGNES: 51 eggs.

(ALL CHEERING)

-Awesome. -Yeah!

CAROL: How much is that? 51? AGNES: Good job.

TINMIAQ: Yeah!

AGNES: Ooh, fun, good day.