Churchill: Into the Freezer!

May 11th, 2011

After we left Thompson, our next stop was the one and only Churchill. This small town of 923 people is known as the Polar Bear Capital of the World. And boy does it live up to its reputation. The outskirts of town are literally covered with these white majestic creatures. Because Churchill is located on the coast of Hudson’s Bay, as well as being part boreal forest and tundra, it is filled with many different animals such as beluga whales and 270 different species of birds. 

 

 

We first stopped at Prince of Whales fort.  It is a trade fort built on Hudson’s Bay. The area it is built on is of great historical value as it is where the Bay was first discovered. This fort began as a log fort built in 1717 by James Knight of the Hudson's Bay Company and was originally called the "Churchill River Post". In 1719, the post was renamed Prince of Wales Fort, but is more commonly known today as Fort Prince of Wales. It was located on the west bank of the Churchill River to protect and control the Hudson's Bay Company's interests in the fur trade. Work on the current fort began in 1731 but it was never truly completed. It saw its first and only battle when three French warships took it over. Being manned by only 22 men, it was taken without a single shot being fired. It has since been taken over by nature, with no proper historical or archaeological study having been done.

 We then took a trip on the Tundra Buggy Adventure. It was very exciting. We toured around north of the town looking for polar bears. We saw a few. We also saw some beluga whales in the water of the bay.

 

We were surprise by how much time it took only for us to do only three things today, all involved around polar bear.We then went into the urban area of the city to take the Hudson Bay Railway, the OmniTRAX, towards our next station, Winnipeg.