Olympic torch heads to northern Yukon, N.W.T.
Last Updated: Wednesday, November 4, 2009 | 5:42 PM CT
CBC News
The Olympic flame is handed off from one torch to another in Whitehorse on Tuesday afternoon. (CBC)The Olympic torch is going to Canada's far north on Wednesday, stopping in Dawson City, Yukon, before crossing the Arctic Circle into Old Crow, Yukon, and Inuvik, N.W.T.
Residents in Inuvik — the first Northwest Territories community on the 106-day nationwide relay route — are waiting for the torch to arrive in their town around 5 p.m. MT, after it stopped earlier in the day in Old Crow and Dawson City.
Australian gold medal aerial skier Alisa Camplin was among five people to hoist the torch in Dawson City, where the relay started at Robert Service School and ran along the Klondike town's streets.
Camplin, the 2002 gold medal winner in Salt Lake City, is one of 15 international torchbearers taking part in the relay's International media program, aimed at increasing global coverage of the cross-Canada relay.
The torch relay in Dawson City ended at a celebration site near the Danoja Zho Cultural Centre, where a cauldron was lit.
A similar relay took place that afternoon in Old Crow, the Yukon's most northerly community.
Four torchbearers took turns carrying the flame through the community to Chief Zzeh Gittlit School, where Grade 5 and 6 students were on hand to sing O Canada.
Among the torchbearers in Old Crow were Erica Tizya, Trey Charlie, and Alan Benjamin, a champion snowshoe runner who ran in a custom-made pair of traditional snowshoes made in Fort McPherson, N.W.T.
"I'm pretty humble about this," Benjamin told CBC News in Old Crow on Tuesday. "Somebody nominated me to carry the Olympic flame, and it's an honour.
"Snowshoeing is our traditional sport. My grandmother taught me how to run on snowshoes."
Dog musher Doug Charlie took the final torchbearer, Martha Benjamin, to the school, where she lit a cauldron with the Olympic torch. A celebratory feast and dance is set to follow that evening.
"It's really exciting," said Lorraine Netro, the relay co-ordinator in Old Crow. "It's kind of a little bit nerve-racking."
The 45,000-kilometre relay began Oct. 30 in Victoria and will end Feb. 12 at the opening of the 2010 Winter Games in Vancouver.
The Olympic torch arrived in Whitehorse on Tuesday afternoon after travelling up British Columbia earlier in the day. Its last stop that day was in Atlin, B.C.
With files from The Canadian Press
