Last year, a young family of four, plus two friends, journeyed for two-months through some of Canada’s most remote landscapes. Dan Clark, Alice Young Clark, their children Koby and Ava Fei (7 and 5 years old, respectively), and their friends Bruce Bembridge and Marilyn Toulouse paddled from Yellowknife, along Great Slave Lake and passed through the proposed Thaydene Nene National Park on the historic Pike’s Portage route. The expedition—supported in part by The Royal Canadian Geographical Society—stretched over 1,000 kilometres and included portages, upstream travel, exposed lakes and whitewater rivers.

Here, Dan Clark discusses their trip and reveals his film about the adventure: “Together to the Tundra.”

There is a lot more to the tundra than bugs, but few visit this northern wilderness. In fact, the tundra is Canada’s least populated biome and largely unknown to those who live in the south. Could there be a better wilderness adventure destination?

During the summer of 2015, our multi-generational group braved the notorious bugs of the North on a thousand kilometre paddling circuit from Yellowknife, NWT. The goal was to paddle to the tundra and back. In eight weeks of self-propelled travel, we discovered an exotic realm more isolated, varied and memorable than previously imagined.

Bruce summed up the adventure nicely: “This was the toughest and longest trip we have ever done. It still feels unbelievable, but we lived our dream and experienced so much nature and history as an extended family.”

Our adventures are highlighted in the April 2016 issue of Canadian Geographic and our recently released film, “Together to the Tundra.” The film juxtaposes tough wilderness travel with the innocence of children at play. The film also draws connections back to the 1907 tundra expedition by Canadian author and founder of the Boy Scouts, Ernest Thompson Seton.

Find out what attracts some to the North by watching this 21 minute film below.