Adventures in the Labrador Wild                     
By Bill Murphy                      

We did an episode of Ryan's Fancy at the Govt fishing camp near Nain, Labrador. It took quite a roundabout trip to get to the camp, first by the coastal boat "Bonavista" from Goose Bay to Nain. Then by a 30 ft fishing boat from Nain to the mouth of the river and then by canoe up this very shallow river. We carried about 30 - 2 ft x 4 ft cases of equipment on the road with us in those days, so it was quite the task to get to the camp.

Horace Gaudie was our host at the camp, which was rustic but quite comfortable. We had a fine cook, a woman out of Goose Bay. We ate fish and game all through the ten days; Artic char, the finest fish in the ocean to my mind, grilled, baked and pan fried, caribou of course, and wonderful pies made from wild berries.

We did the show in September and the weather was just beautiful. But of course that also brought out the black flies and a Labrador pest called a "stout" that looked and stung like a large wasp. We were all black and blue from inset bites when we finally left the camp.

It was a challenge to film Ryan's songs in such a wild setting. We did not want to limit ourselves to the lodge electricity to run the camera and sound equipment in such with such beautiful scenery around us. So we had one of our innovative maintenance technicians at CBNT make up some adaptors so we could run the equipment off skidoo size batteries. Dermot sang one song with a beautiful waterfall behind him, something we would not have been able to film had we been tied to the lodge.

Getting out of the camp was even more of a challenge. We had arranged for two bush planes, Dehavilland Otters, to pick us up to take us back to Goose Bay. The first arrived around noon and took the band and crew while I waited with the equipment for the second Otter. I waited on the shore all afternoon, happily swatting flies and stouts, in the meantime Horace and his guests left to go hunting overnight and the cook had gone to bed with the flu.  The second Otter did not show up until about 5 pm, the pilot and I hurriedly loaded the equipment aboard and we made it back to Goose and landed on the Bay just as the sun was setting.

We had a rousing night at the RAF Bulldog club in Goose Bay and flew home the next day.