Spirit Eagle Completed

This is a follow up to the post I did last week to give a bit more information about my trip to Fort Chipewyan.

Here we are leaving the LN group Shop. Thanks to Todd and everyone there for putting up with me over the past few months.The mosaic body was larger than the opening to get out of the shop. Fortunately, the boomerang shape of the wing enabled us to squeak it out … barely.

Using the boom truck to load the body onto the trailer

The body of the mosaic leaned on a steel A-framed glass carrier which was bolted and chained to the frame of the trailer. Everything fit perfect! Here it is with the legs loaded before the tarping. The sun was shining through the onyx giving an indication of how it was going to look.

Brother-in-law Keith loading one of the 1000 lb legs with his forklift.

I must say I was more than a bit nervous at the prospect of the 2 day drive to northern Alberta in the middle of the winter with  fragile piece of artwork. I purchased transportation insurance for piece of mind.

That’s a full size F-350 one ton pick up in front. The eagle was larger than the trailer, so it stuck out the front and back.

Things started out a little rocky as we blew a tire after only a few hours on the road outside of Clearwater.

We were back on track after replacing the tire with the spare which we replaced at the next major town (Valemount). We had lunch while a new tire was installed and were on our way  without too much downtime.

Jamie at the wheel.

Most of the delay on the way there was in going slow with our precious cargo and constantly stopping to check our load and add more bungees to keep the tarp from flapping. In the end I think we used every bungee that we brought to keep the tarp in one piece. The bungee job in itself was a work of art.  

We met up with an electrician in Edmonton who had driven from Red Deer to add some boxes to our load in exchange for some electrical work that we were going to do ourselves. It worked out great for both parties. At the end of the first day we had been on the road for 15 hours as we took a hotel 1.5 hours north of Edmonton. The tarp took a real beating  as we drove in darkness and couldn’t really see what was happening. A few holes opened up in the tarping and in the morning we re-jigged the tarping to hold it together for our final day.

Pay attention to the road around Fort McMurray; there’s lots of heavy equipment coming into your lane!

Here we are at the start of the ice road.

We arrived in Fort McMurray after getting an early start on the road and continued north past Fort McKay where the winter road to Fort Chipewyan starts. .

Most of the road went over land with about 8 ice crossings over rivers and lakes. the terrain wasn’t that different to the areas surrounding Kamloops so Jamie was comfortable to drive the roads although he endured an occasional yell from me to slow down over bumpy areas.

After about 5 hours on the ice roads we arrived in Fort, Chip. and settled in to our B&B with a hot homemade stew from Bob, one of the other guests we shared the house with.

Fort Chipewyan in winter.

The next morning, we were up promptly to do the install. It was only -25 with very little wind so we were lucky as it could easily have been -40 and windy.  For safety reasons, I decided to attach the legs to the body while still on the ground. Tom, our young but skilled operator of the telehandler boom machine did a great job moving slowly to ensure the eagle was not damaged while we raised it up.

Bill adjusting slings.

All in all, things went very smoothly and we finished the install after 6 hours.

Tightening bolts.

I felt a great sense of relief as I tightened the last bolts and the sun came out on cue to light up the eagle from the west as we posed for a few photos before we headed out of town.

Afterwards, we drove back to Fort McMurray where we had  a generous offer to stay with one of Jamie’s rugby buddies.

Einstien said success is 1 % inspiration and 99% perspiration. This proved to be true with this project as the creative part was very small compared to the logistical problem solving and the the brute force task of assembling a 17,000 piece mosaic and getting it up north in the middle of winter.  I’m hoping my next project is in Florida or California!

Many thanks to all those who helped out with this project. My family, including my inlaws,  my assistant Alice, with help from Rae. Garry and everyone at Inland glass, my brother Drew, Keith, my good friends Jamie, Shawn, Dave B. Larry, Mike, Will.  Todd and the folks at LN group. I called in a lot of favors. I couldn’t have done it without you.