All language subtitles for Life.Below.Zero.S05E01.Ready.or.Not.720p.WEB-HD.x264-KangMus_track3_eng

NARRATOR: Deep in Alaska,

hundreds of miles
from anywhere...

SUE: It is not for the meek.
It's not for the timid.

If you question
your own abilities,
be somewhere else.

...the clock is ticking.

AGNES:
We have to really prepare
ourselves for the cold winter.

NARRATOR:
Temperatures are dropping.

ERIK: This is a seriously
harsh environment.

NARRATOR:
And daylight is disappearing.

SUE:
Winter's barrelling down on me

like a freight train.

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

SUE: There was a bear sighting
just a few hundred yards away.

Everybody feels
it's gonna be an extremely
aggressive bear year.

GLENN: This is very
hungry country where I am.

There's a reason
why I'm the only person
within many miles of here.

Whoa!

If I fell down, it would
be a slow, painful death.

Whoa!

ANDY: A lot of people die
every year in Alaska
going through the ice.

Ah, shit.
Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa.

This time of the year,
it doesn't matter
what you feel like,

you still gotta get up
and get the job done.

Whoa! We got a live one.

CHIP: We are hunters,
not farmers.

We chase it down and kill it,
or we get nothing at all.

You can break down,
freeze to death,
you can crash,

but you gotta get out there
and earn it.

ERIK: It's hard when you're
cold and you're shaking.

If it was easy,
it really wouldn't be fun.

SUE: My name is Susan Aikens,

and I live 197 miles
above the Arctic Circle,

just a few miles
from the Arctic Ocean.

I live by myself out here at a
place called Kavik River Camp.

Population, one.

The meat that I hunt directly
means I live or I die.

I still don't have enough
to get me through the winter.

Gonna go a ways up river
and set up a tent
and see what I can get.

The goal is
I need to fill my freezer,

to put it in my belly,
so I don't die this winter.

Weather in the Arctic
is absolutely unpredictable.

Every sign says
big, bad winter again.

So I have to be
prepared for snow, cold,
pretty much the whole gamut.

It's the changing
of the guard.

Summer and the bounty of that
summer is going to go away.

The caribou migrate out.
They're gone.

The bears go to bed,
they're gone.

Most of the birds migrate out,
they're gone.

So if I'm gonna get meat,
I've gotta get it now.

I'm hoping to leave
with an empty sled
and come back with a full one.

Night-time is back,
northern lights are back,

it's just a quick slide now
into the fun
that we call winter.

NARRATOR: To stock up
for the impending winter,

Sue heads toward
where the Kavik River
meets several valleys,

a prime spot to source food.

SUE: There's your ptarmigans.

Oh, I see some ptarmigans
way out there.

I think I'll just have
to get close and see
where they're hiding.

Where there's one,
there's usually more.

I do have one,
let me go find him.

All right, well...

At least we got
one for dinner.

Thank you, little birdie.

This is a good first step
in filling my freezer.

But I'm gonna need to
do a whole lot more hunting
to survive this winter.

ANDY: I have ideas for how
I want my life to be

and you can make the life
you want when you live out
in the bush like this.

There's nobody telling you
what to do or what not to do.

I'm Andy Bassich.
I live here at Calico Bluff.

Ever since I was a young boy
I kind of had this gut feeling

that I wanted to
live out in the woods.

When I moved up here,
I didn't know anybody,

didn't know anything
about Alaska,

but there were something,
some deep drive inside of me

that put a calling to me to
come out here and live here.

KATE: My name is Kate Rorke.

There are no roads
to where I live.

No close neighbours,

just a whole lot of wildlife
and 20 sled dogs.

ANDY: In Alaska we call it
subsistence living.

Years ago they would have
called it a frontier life,

living out in the woods
and being self-sufficient
as much as possible.

For us, in the upper Yukon,

we go from summer to winter
very, very quickly here.

Fall times are very short

and there's a lot to do
in the fall,

with harvesting gardens,
hunting moose,
and catching fish

for both ourselves
and the dogs.

And we only have
about three weeks to do that.

KATE:
It's a major hurry now to get
the wheel across the river

so that we can get
the good fish

and get them as fresh
as we can to put up
for ourselves.

NARRATOR: Andy and Kate rely
on their home-made fish wheel

in order to secure food
from the river,

but getting it in the water
is a gruelling task.

ANDY: It's a big job
putting a fish wheel in.

Especially when it's just
one or two people.

Quite frankly,
everything that has to do
with fish wheels is heavy.

It takes a lot
of self-motivation
to live out in the bush.

You've gotta be able
to push yourself.

If you're a person that
when the going gets tough,

you just, kind of,
sit down and wait it out,

you're not gonna do
very well out here

because that resource
will either go by

or your opportunity
will be missed.

We're the last community
in Alaska before these fish
go into Canada.

So we're at the end
of the line, basically.

So even though a run
comes in really strong,

if it's fish like crazy
down in the middle
and lower river,

there may not be
a lot of fish in this run
that make it up to here.

We know when
they're expected to come,

but we don't know what
the numbers are gonna be.

KATE: So right now every
minute counts at getting
that wheel in the water.

So the quicker
we get it in the water,

the more luck we're gonna
have at getting some fish

to put up for ourselves.

CHIP: I didn't come here
to hide from anything.

I didn't come here
to find myself.

I just took the skills I have

and I focused it
into the proper way

a man should make
a living for his children.

Whoa.

AGNES: That's one big leg.

-Yee!
-Yup, the meat here
don't come in

pretty little
plastic packages.

It comes wrapped in skin.

We have to skin it,

we have to take
the muscle groups apart

and separate the bones.

There.

CHIP: It's a lot
of work all right,
but it's well worth it.

It's really clean food.

It's beyond organic.

I'm Edward Hailstone,
my friends and family
call me Chip.

I live with
five of my daughters
and my wife here

in Noorvik, Alaska,
along Kobuk River.

And I live
a subsistence lifestyle.

We hunt.

We fish. We gather.

And we do it as a team.

My name is Agnes Hailstone.
I was born in Noorvik,
raised here.

I've been here
pretty much all my life.

My daughters were born here
and hopefully
they'll do the same.

CHIP: So, I'm thinking

this place needs a cache.
We need a place to put this up
and to hang it in.

-Yeah.
-The best thing to do is just

-build a little
something here.
-Just build here?

Yeah, we could use it
this winter until we're
done with it,

so the caribou we get here
will go in the cache.

-Yeah, it'd take at least
10 logs per wall.
-AGNES: Yep.

And it's gonna take beams
for the floor,
beams for the roofing.

-So I'm probably
looking at, like, 50, 60 logs.
-AGNES: Okay.

NARRATOR:
With dark winter approaching,

the Hailstones will soon
partake in their most
crucial hunt of the season.

In preparation, they must
replace their old meat rack

with a new cache
that can store
larger quantities of meat.

CHIP:
When we're gathering wood,

we have to go
at least five miles away
from this town.

-Look at that!
-AGNES: Even skinny ones...
Oh, wow, we scored!

Even those little ones will
do fine for the top, yeah?

CHIP: They should.

AGNES:
Wood have so many purposes,

especially when we live up
here in the extreme cold

and it's always good
to have extra laying around,

because even your neighbours
is gonna run out of fuel

and they'll end up
having to rely on wood.

(CHAINSAW WHIRRING)

They all say
he who chops his own wood
heats himself up twice.

CHIP: So, I'm throwing
these logs out in the river

and she can bring
the boat right up to them,
add a loop or two to them,

and then go to the next one,
and go to the next one.

We're doing something
that's terribly efficient
and terribly useful.

And the benefits
out of this is everything
from heat to buildings,

and then back to
heating that building.

Looks like the wife
is coming down,
catching up with the logs,

and looks like, um,

all the ones I've tossed
in there along the bank here

are ready to get picked up
here pretty soon.

She's adding rope
and tying them in a bunch.

I think she's doing
a good job.

I was gonna
go over there with the wife,
and go jump in the boat,

and maybe start
manoeuvring her
a little faster.

Here's the next bunch, right?

Okay. Take this out
and attach it to that one.

AGNES: Right on.
We're not leaving any behind.

They're all following.

This enough for now.
This is a good load.

So this is all ahead,
full steam right now.

-(AGNES LAUGHS)
-But it's been a good day.

I've got a good load of wood.

I can sort this stuff out

and get started
making something.

In traditional days, this is
exactly what they would do
to get their firewood.

They'd go at the end
of the year when it's all
nice and dry like this,

and they'd float them on down
the river this time of year

in rafts like
we're doing here,
and that would be that.

And get through the freeze up
when you can't
go out and gather,

when the ice is too thin.

GLENN: I live out here
because I really
enjoy this lifestyle.

I enjoy
the autonomy it affords.

I enjoy the competence
it demands.

I like the connection
to nature I feel when I live
the way I do here.

My name's Glenn Villeneuve.

I live 200 miles
north of Fairbanks
in the Brooks Range of Alaska.

I'm a 60-mile walk
from the nearest road.

My nearest neighbour lives...
I don't know how far away.

I picked this place because
nobody else was utilising
the resources here.

It was a place where I could
go hunt, trap, fish,

live as close to
the land as I wanted to.

And it's the place
I consider home.

It's early in the morning.
It's just barely
starting to get light,

and this is the first day
that I've decided that
I wanna look for a moose.

With almost
nothing else to eat,

I can get by
for six months on a moose.

Okay. That has a razor
sharp edge on it now.

That'll shave hair
right off of my arm.

When you're eating
very little carbohydrate,
like I often am out here,

I have to get about
three quarters
of my calories from fat.

Mmm.

Fat's hard to find.

A lot of animals
don't have enough fat
to go with the meat.

The really critical thing
is to get a moose
with a lot of fat on it.

This is the time of year
when the moose are mating
and bull moose stop eating.

And every day that passes,

the longer it takes me
to get a moose,

the leaner
that moose is likely to be.

This magazine
holds four rounds,

but if everything goes right,

it's only gonna
take one to kill a moose.

When I pull the trigger
and that moose drops,

that's six months
food right there.

(WHISPERING)
I have to be really careful
not to make noise.

More often than not
I've detected moose

by ear
rather than by seeing them.

A lot of times, it takes
10 days to find a moose

before I get
a good shot at one.

So I just have to be
patient and pace myself.

Keep my energy going
so that I can get a moose

and I'd have energy left
to get the moose home.

I just heard a moose.

I just heard a moose
over this way.

I gotta get across
this wet area

before I can start calling.

Once I get on the other side
of the water,

I'll try to get him
on good ground.

If I kill him
in this wet spot,

it would be a disaster
trying to get him out of here.

Hunting on foot I can't cover
nearly as much territory

as if I had a motorboat,

or I was in an area
where I was using
a four-wheeler.

I see a big moose.

I can't tell
if it's a cow or bull.

I can't see the head yet.
I can't see the antlers.

It's a cow and a bull.
I can only shoot bulls.

If I can get that bull,
it's gonna be worth
dragging it down from here,

but I can't go much further.

(MIMICS MOOSE CALL)

They keep moving further away
from me into the forest,

further and further
away from the lake.

And I really need to get them
close to the lake
so I can get him home.

The bull's
right behind the cow.
I can't shoot right now.

It moved.

It takes days walking around
to find a moose.

Then you gotta get
close enough to it.

I'm just getting way
too far away from the lake.

If I had to move a moose
from here all the way down,

I'd have my hands full.
It would take me a few days
probably to get it home.

So I've pretty much
given up on this one.

It's a beautiful moose.
That's too bad.

It's just a beautiful bull.

Every year
that I've been out here,
I've always gotten a moose.

And it's always scary

because there's always
the chance I don't get one.

And if I don't get a moose,

it would be really hard
for me to live out here.

SUE: I live dynamically close
to my environment.

It's right up my backside
and I'm crawling on top of it.

So we better be
able to get along,

say "sorry" when we do
something wrong,

and "thank you"
when it goes right.

I've been riding the ridge
a little bit so I can
get a good look over.

Now I wanna just drop in
and follow it
and see what I see.

See if there's
a good, little campy spot.

See if I like the setup.
Am I seeing sign?

If not,
I'll go towards the river.

All's you can do is check
it out, and throw the dart,
and hope for the best.

NARRATOR: With winter
on the horizon,

Sue Aikens is on a quest
to secure food
for the long months ahead.

SUE: I got a nice little
valley that might funnel
some animals in.

They can come
down this valley,

down that valley,

up this one,
or down that one.

I mean, it's as good a shot
as any. I say I set up camp.

When it gets dark out here,

you definitely
feel vulnerable.

Expect it to be a pretty
brutal year with the bears.

NARRATOR: Living by herself,
hundreds of miles from
the nearest hospital,

Sue must protect herself
from the region's
many apex predators.

SUE: This is going to be
some bear fencing.

I'll get it to go
around a few times

and then you hook up the
battery to it and some leads,

and zap!

A little bear tries to make
a snack out of Suzie,
he's gonna get macked.

Sometimes all's you need
is a couple of seconds
to get yourself ready.

ANDY: Alaskans are
very unique people.

We're all very independent,
especially people
living out in the bush.

We're all very inventive,

tough, hardy souls

that wanna take
care of themselves.

NARRATOR:
Andy and Kate must get
their fish wheel in the water,

or risk missing
their opportunity for salmon.

-ANDY: Let's flip this over
so that the boards are up.
-Yep.

When fall hits,
it's the crunch time.

And we've gotta get
everything done before
that snow flies.

There's no time to stop.
There's no time to rest.

There's hardly time
to take a breath.

It's always very
nerve-racking for me
putting the fish wheel in.

The last thing I want is,

the day I wanna go fishing,
to break my wheel
putting it in

and then spend three or four
days trying to fix something.

All right.
Ready to go fishing now!

The fall chum have a very
short cycle of really up

and really down.
And when they're up,
they're up really good.

When they're down,
they crash, there's nothing.

Son of a bitch!

That's turning too fast.

Whoo, baby, there's a lot
of current there.

We have to bring it in
quite a bit.

That's turning
almost too fast.

Let's bring it in some.

I feel like the current's
a lot faster here this year
than it was last year.

So we don't have to
have as long of a spar.

We don't have to have
as long of a lead.

Generally, I like somewhere
between five and six
rotations a minute.

So one full rotation
about every 10 seconds.

That keeps one basket of
the wheel in the water fishing
almost all of the time.

What we want is we want those
baskets to be coming down

and just barely digging a hole
into the gravel.

And that makes a place
to where the fish can't go
underneath the wheel.

So if it can slowly
dig a hole for itself,

that increases the efficiency
of the wheel dramatically.

That's about where we want it.

KATE: Whoo-hoo!

Seems to be
turning really good

and touching bottom
and not going too fast.

So it looks like
we found our spot.

ANDY:
Here, fishy, fishy, fishy!

It's a crapshoot. We have
no idea what's going on

other than I know there are
fish coming up. How many?

I guess
tomorrow morning will tell.

There we go!

-First fish!
-Looks like a nice one!

I'm very excited
we got our fish wheel in,

and it's going
and it's catching,

and it went in
as smooth as silk.

ANDY:
Tomorrow it would be great
if we had maybe 100 fish.

That will be a really good
start for us.

CHIP: I live out here
for the freedom of
doing things my way

and the way
that I feel like doing 'em,

when I feel like doing 'em.

No hours, no bosses,
that's what it's all about.

This has always been
the best way to move a lot of
firewood in one shot.

Hell of a lot easier than
dragging it on a sled

just six or seven pieces
at a time.

(AGNES SPEAKING)

Yeah,
there's no getting stuck,
there's no being frozen,

there's no breaking
your equipment.
Much easier.

We have really
small trees up here
because it's the Arctic

and they have a real short
growing season.

And we have
real long winters and then
we have real deep cold.

Even though it's hard work,
I enjoy doing this

because I can see heat,

and then we can also
build things with them.

-Homeward now, huh?
-(AGNES SPEAKING)

CHIP:
Raw materials to us is part
of the essence of subsistence.

It's getting stuff yourself.

Getting materials
from the land,
the things you need.

It's always important
to have a cache in places
that you wanna frequent.

You do need to have places
to keep your things dry.

You need to keep
yourself dry sometimes.

So as an emergency back-up
I could walk inside the cache

and say, "Well, I need
to sleep here on the floor."

And that's happened
more than once.

I got a V-notch on the top

and on the bottom,
I have it notched like that.

So when they rest,
they'll rest like that
upon each other.

I'm gonna split
this one in half so that
it has a flat half,

that will meet my flat floor
and my flat beams

so I can stack the logs up
on top of it.

Now it can all disassemble

and I can take it in pieces
other places

and I can reassemble it.

Living a subsistence
lifestyle is basically
working for yourself.

And what we're doing is
we're going out,
we're getting materials,

raw materials, and we put it
all together to make a living.

You know,
we have it down for ourselves.

Nobody wakes us up
in the morning
and tells us what to do,

or where to go,
or how to get there.

We've learned over the years,
throughout my life,

just experiences themselves
have amounted to this.

This is actually excellent.

(CHAINSAW WHIRRING)

(WHIRRING STOPS)

Fucking shit, threw its chain.

These things happen.
It's part of having
any machinery.

This isn't a recreational use.

It's like our snow machines
or our chainsaws,

we don't just
recreationally use these

so we can have a little bit
of wood at the cabin,
you know,

for the two weeks
out of the year
that we use it.

Damn it, we are using
these things all the time,

and we're constantly
in a state of repair.

NARRATOR: With caribou season
just days away,

Chip must hurry
to complete his cache
in order to store meat

from the upcoming harvest.

CHIP: Instead of just
trying to use a chainsaw
to make a rounded cut,

I'm going down to the depth
I want it to be,

then I'm making my cross cuts.

That takes out
the pieces a lot easier.

Now that one fits.

From here on,
it's pretty much just cut,
and notch, and stack,

and I'll have my walls.

ANDY: We live out here
to live a certain lifestyle,

to be connected to the land,
to get the resources
from the land.

And that's what's
important to me.

You untie and I'll drive.

We're gonna go check
the wheel for a second day,

see what we get.
We're hoping it's not
too many fish.

We still wanna put up
a few more fish for ourselves.

It's very time-consuming to
cut them for human consumption

to do it right.

Scoring them.

There's a lot of work that
goes into brining them,

getting them ready
to go into the smoker.

If we get females,
we'll probably smoke some eggs

so we have some caviar.

All of that
takes a lot of time,

so 100, 150 fish
would be great,

it could be really bad news
if we pull up and the boxes
are overflowing with fish.

'Cause I don't want to
have to deal with 400 fish.

It'd be really nice
to deal with maybe 100 fish.

We can focus
on cutting, and drying,

and smoking some of the fish
that we want.

And it won't take me long to
put up 100 fish for the dogs.

That's nothing for us.

I guess we're gonna
find out here real quick.

Uh-oh.

We're probably close to 300.

It looks like we got
our work cut out for us today.

Definitely would much rather
have a few less fish,

but better too much than none.

(ANDY SPEAKING)

(CHUCKLES)
I think from here on out
it's gonna be slam bam.

We got a lot of fish today.

Kind of like
an Easter egg hunt.

You show up with your wheel
and you see how many eggs
you got in the basket.

That's the way
every day is out here.

We've got 200 fish.

They probably average
right around
seven pounds apiece.

That's not a half bad
looking fish right there.

Huh.

Keeper.

ANDY: All in all,
things are going pretty good.

It's a little more work than
I really wanted to do today.

By the time I cut
these fish and then clean
the fish for ourselves,

I think I'm gonna be
a sore little puppy
by the end of the evening.

I'm not complaining.
I'd much rather have the fish
than not have the fish.

It's all about a economy

of your time and energy
out here.

There's so much to do,

it's really important that
what you spend your time on

is done efficiently
and cost effectively.

That's why I've always been
a fish wheel fisherman.

For us, it's a really
efficient way to put up food.

KATE: Okay, well,
you've got 30 done.

You have about 160 to go.

(CHUCKLES)

GLENN: For me,

living involves hunting
and killing in order to live.

It's the natural cycle.

Part of the cycle
of life and death,

and I'm participating in it
every day out here.

(WHISPERING) It's my fifth day
hunting moose now,

and I'm over in an area

that I know is a good spot

for a moose
at this time of year.

I'm gonna move down
in here carefully this morning

and see if I can find
a bull moose.

Living up here
in the Arctic in the winter,

it takes a lot of energy,
it takes a lot of food.

I eat a lot.
I eat about three pounds
of meat every day.

Meat and fat.
That's what sustains me
in the cold weather.

(GLENN SPEAKING)

(MIMICS MOOSE CALL)

Here he comes.

See, he's waving his antlers
at me just like this.

He thinks
I'm a moose right now.

He's coming to fight me.
Look, he's got a cow
over there.

He doesn't want me
mating with that cow.

He wants that cow for himself.

He's gonna go out
in that open field, I hope.

I just gotta get
lined up for the shot.

(GUNSHOT)

I got him.

I got him. He's down.

That's a nice
looking bull, too.

There goes the cow
that was with him.

She's out of here now.
She's in oestrous.
She's mooing and mooing.

She's wanting to get bred and

he thinks
that I'm another bull
coming to take his cow.

He doesn't want that.
So he came over here to fight.

He was over here
to chase me off.

This is the fifth day
looking for a moose.

I've walked about
25 miles looking for this
moose around the lake.

It's dead.

If I had
very little else to eat,

just this moose here
would feed me
for almost six months.

It's really
an important moment for me
to get a moose like this.

It was a lot of work,

but I got him and I got
six months food right here.

It's a good moment for me.
I would rather live this way

by hunting than by
buying my food in a store.

That's the way
I live out here.
It's the natural cycle.

CHIP: We never had
no big dreams for big houses.

We treat this like a camp.

It's a place where we can
take shelter, we can eat,
we can see our family.

It's pretty nice.

It's coming together.
It's good.

I just got a few more logs
to add here.

Maybe four more on here.

NARRATOR: In order to store
and preserve the meat

from the Hailstone's
upcoming caribou hunt,

Chip is putting
the finishing touches
on the family's new cache.

The roof will be
cross-beamed like this.

And I'll put up
several of them

and then probably run a pole
underneath 'em for support,

and then I'll put plywood.

The only thing I'm lacking
is sheets of plywood.

NARRATOR: In Noorvik,
the Hailstones rely on trading
within the community

to support their
subsistence lifestyle.

We're almost quite done
with our cache

but we need a few plyboards.
So I'm just gonna walk around.

My neighbour have
some plyboards here

and I might have something
that he would like.

And so I was just
gonna go ask him

if he'd like to trade
or if I could buy some
of his plyboards.

-Yeah, good to see you again.
-Yep.

I noticed you have
a lot of plyboards.

Yep. This would be perfect.

Wow, these are nice.
Are you willing to trade?

What would you have
to trade for these?

I got 10 gallons of gas.

-10 gallons of gas.
-Yeah.

-Okay, good deal. Awesome.
-Yeah, good deal right there.

-These are perfect.
-Good. Yep.

AGNES: Score.

Those boards are like
$120 apiece boards
right there,

and for four of them,
and he's not using them,

and he needs gas
and I need boards.

So it's a good trade
for the both of us.

I'm gonna go tell him
the boards I traded
for his gas.

And I have to go
ask him for his gas now.

SUE: It's a calculated risk
every time you step
out the door.

There's no guarantees
in anything.

The only guarantee is it's
a limited time engagement.

So why not pack it
full of experiences?

Got a big rain system
coming in

and that will just
damage the hunting.

My visibility goes down to nil

and the animals are just
gonna find some hole
and hunker down.

I'm looking for anything

that's gonna provide meat
that's legal.

They're all on the menu.

But I need to get there,
get closer,
and get the good visual.

There they are.

Where are they going?

They call them ghosts
of the tundra.

And what that means is they're
using the geographic features,

the dips and swales,

and they'll travel
around in them,

and then all of a sudden
they're on high ground.

So for the human eye,
you're looking and,

"Oh, where'd they come from?"
They're just standing out
in the middle of the field.

What you don't know
is that there's a little
dip they travelled.

And then you go, "Oh, okay,"
you reach for your gun and,
"Where'd they go?"

They're gone.

Now I'm gonna do
the same thing that they do.

I'm trying to keep
the geographical feature

in between the two of us.

So I'm turning
the tables on it.

They use it to hide
and pop up and down,

I'm using it to hide
and pop up and down.

(BREATHING HEAVILY)

This is the game trail.

Bear. We've got
bear and caribou.

I know
they came through this way.

Shit. Okay. Shh.

All right, I see one.

Okay, she just made me.

I can't really get...

Looks to be 200-300 yards.

I've gotta take myself
out of the brush.

Okay, okay, okay, okay.

All right. Come on,
come on, baby, come on, baby.

(GUNSHOT)

One down.

I picked it right.

There was bear tracks,
wolf tracks, caribou tracks,
moose tracks.

This is definitely
the confluence
where you're funnelling.

Now time to go see what I got.

I've gotta go
retrieve the meat

before some of the predators
decide to relieve me
of the responsibility.

I've got a big old storm
coming in.

The forecast is, keep dropping
in temperature and snow.

This time of year I can get
three foot of snow

in no time flat.

Winter is breathing down
my neck.

Right now it's going
slate grey, which this time
of year means snow.

I can trap myself out here,
so I wanna get
this done quickly.

Very first caribou that I got,
I was maybe 12 or so.

Different things happened
in my younger life

and left me
kind of raising myself

and being alone
out in the wilderness
of Alaska.

Bus driver handed me
a gun and said,

"You don't learn to shoot,
you're not gonna be here.
Figure it out."

I got a handful of bullets,

I was pretty hungry.
I was pretty cold.

Here comes this animal
and I first thought of Santa,

you know,
and I was pretty star-struck,

and then my belly rumbled.

I took it down,

and it was a harsh reality.

It's, kind of,
a full circle moment.

Thank you.

Taking the first life,
and being grateful,

and not being hungry any more,

to being better at it,

still being grateful
that I won't be hungry
this winter.

I've been down here a little
while working on this.

There's no predator
within 10 miles
that doesn't know it's here,

so they're gonna be coming in.

So I wanna get out.

Temperature went down,
it's come up again.

Just looks
really unpredictable.

I know I'm in bear territory
and I'm gonna add snow, fog,

and everything else in on it,
it's not a particularly safe,
secure feeling.

For me to stay here,
it's really gotta pay off.

I'm not seeing the numbers
of caribou that say,

"Yeah, take another day."

What if I get stuck out here
a week and can't get in?

It's time to wrap this portion
of the trip up.

You know,
live to hunt another day.

CHIP: This is a place
that you can take your kids

and say, "Hey, look, this is
how to have a good time.

"This is a place
where there's days
of high adventure.

"And a lot of other people
are jealous."

I think I got
that one on straight.

I notched the tops
and then joined them together,

and then I put a cross piece
into each one

just to hold them in place
'cause I'm working by myself.

I'm almost done.

AGNES: Wow!
CHIP: You liking that?

Gee whiz! That's a lot
since I left earlier. Cool!

The caribous are starting
to move so it's real important

that we get this
cache done today.

Because if we don't
get this cache done,

then we're not gonna have
a place to store our meats.

CHIP: We got four sheets
of plywood over here

that my wife traded
the neighbour for,

and I'm gonna
put them up on the roof.

What isn't forgotten
and what's still very viable

is gathering stuff
for yourself,
building stuff for yourself.

This stuff is never outdated

no matter what
my technology would be.

If I was cutting these logs
with laser beams,

I'd still end up
with a log cache.

Someday the girls will come
and look at this and say,

-"Hey, look, this is how
my mum and dad did it."
-CHIP: Yep.

-I'm sure you'll get
all the credit.
-(AGNES LAUGHS)

AGNES: This is so cool.

CHIP: I used basically what
I could go out and go gather

to keep it the cheapest.

My wife traded gasoline off
for sheets of plywood,

and I bought a couple pounds
of nails for, like, 10 bucks.

I would say, in the end,
it probably cost us
less than $100.

And of course,
about three days of my time.

I'm gonna have
to put you a step here.

Here you go, woman.

It's all yours.

AGNES: You used 35 logs.

-CHIP: Cool.
-And only six of them
are halves.

And it's real easy for me
to go in and out of there.

It's your size.

So that should help things.

Hey, babe, how do you like it?

It's awesome.
You could go in and peek.

(GIGGLES)

CHIP: Who knows, Mary,
someday it might
even be yours.

We might be old,
and gone, and dead

and you might be an old lady

and telling your kids,
"My dad built that."

Go ahead, have fun.

(QUTAN SPEAKING)

(GIRLS SPEAKING INDISTINCTLY)

CAROL: Try and go on this one.

MARY:
Got to go like this, Qutan.
Put your arms the other way.

CAROL: Qutan?

CHIP: This right here
could last long enough

that my daughters could be
using this when they grow up.

CAROL: Oh, I joke.
QUTAN: So close!

I just gotta go work,
and take the kids,

and go upriver
and spend a couple days
doing our caribou hunt.

And then come back
and go fill it up.

CHIP: Is that a perfect door?

-Is that big enough
to get through?
-CAROL: Yeah.

Sun's just about down
and I'm tired.

-Me too.
-It's time to give it up.

-Love you, Mum.
-Love you.

Love you. Have fun.

-Thank you.
-Yeah.

-It's all good.
-You're awesome.

-So are you.
That's why I make 'em.
-Saw dusty and awesome.