Want a northern Canada podcast to get stuck into over the holidays? Here are 10 of the best episodes we published in 2024.
Cabin Radio’s two podcasts are Cabin Talks, which publishes our best broadcast interviews, and Mornings at the Cabin, which gives you everything from our daily morning show.
Watch out for a new limited-series podcast coming from Cabin Radio early in 2025, investigating one of the past year’s biggest mysteries – one with Yellowknife at its heart.
In the meantime, dive into some of these highlights from 2024.
Search for Cabin Talks and Mornings at the Cabin wherever you get your podcasts.
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You can also listen live to Mornings at the Cabin from 7-9am each weekday, while Afternoons at the Cabin broadcasts our best interviews on weekdays from 12-3pm.
1. Ali Kincaid’s journey in hockey
From April: “There was a mechanical room at the rink. They moved some buckets to the side and put one of them upside-down. ‘Sit on that and get dressed.’ It wasn’t really fun.”
That kind of experience might not make you fall in love with hockey – but Ali Simpson was already too far gone.
Simpson, now Ali Kincaid, was the only girl on her Yellowknife minor hockey team. When she reached 12 years old, she was kicked out of the boys’ locker room at the city arena and given a tiny broom closet instead.
It didn’t dissuade her. Through sheer force of will, abundant talent and even a letter-writing campaign, her hockey journey took her to the NCAA at Cornell University in New York State. She joined Clams ‘n’ Moose on Cabin Radio to explore her career.
2. Canada’s military plans for the Arctic
From April: “The area that I need to do the most work in is the Arctic. What northerners taught me is that means an investment in infrastructure.”
That’s defence minister Bill Blair’s assessment of how Canada’s increasing focus on Arctic security can help the Northwest Territories to replace and upgrade the ageing infrastructure that’s causing governments increasing headaches.
What does that really look like, though?
Under a new defence policy promising more than $70 billion in nationwide spending over the next 20 years, how much is coming north and what will it buy? Blair appeared on Cabin Radio to set out what the North can expect.
3. Marie Wilson on reconciliation
From June: Yellowknife resident Marie Wilson, a former CBC North broadcaster and director, played a central role on Canada’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission.
For years, Wilson served as the lone non-Indigenous commissioner as thousands of people gave testimony about their experiences in Canada’s residential schools.
Nearly a decade after their publication, the commission’s final report and calls to action are still shaping much of the nation’s response to the trauma generated by residential schools and colonization.
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Wilson has published a book – North of Nowhere: Song of a Truth and Reconciliation Commissioner – that partly documents the inner workings of the commission and partly serves as a memoir. She joined us to talk about the book and her work.
4. Rebecca Alty on Yellowknife’s evacuation
From August: The people running the NWT government’s review of last year’s wildfires and evacuations hadn’t approached Mayor of Yellowknife Rebecca Alty as of August. She was worried about it.
“I worry that people aren’t going to participate in that one because it’ll be too distant,” she said in a podcast released on August 16, a year to the day after the city she leads began evacuating because of oncoming wildfires.
Around 19,000 people left Yellowknife by road and air, some 7,000 or more vehicles streaming down the tiny, lonely highway to safety while dozens of aircraft carried out a two-day airlift. Residents were kept away from their homes for three weeks.
The city’s own review of what happened last August and September is complete, with its own set of criticisms – things like communication are paramount – and a list of recommendations, drawn up by independent contractor KPMG.
Alty discussed how her job evolved during the evacuation, how she and the city approached communication with residents, whether she believes public trust in government remains damaged, a year later, and what lessons have been learned.
5. What do you do once you’ve seen every country?
From August: “It’s really that millisecond. If it takes too long, and your face kind-of drops, it’s almost impossible to get a ride. You have to get a ride before that.”
Sascha Grabow knows exactly how to hitch a ride.
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If he didn’t, his travels might have ended long ago. Instead, Grabow – a German adventurer in his fifties – has spent decades trying to visit every one of the United Nation’s 193 member states.
He says he reached that marker in 2016, checking off Somalia as the last UN-recognized country on his list, but that didn’t end the journey. He is now on a mission to visit “every province of every country,” and that brought him to the NWT and our studios.
6. How NWT snakes are surviving the fires
From December: Big Bertha has problems.
Bertha is a red-sided garter snake. The fire scar on her side tells the story of what has been happening to her home just outside Fort Smith, near the NWT-Alberta border.
Fort Smith was evacuated for weeks in the summer of 2023 as multiple wildfires threatened the town. Those fires rolled right over Bertha’s habitat.
These snakes are the only reptiles confirmed to exist in the territory. If those fires killed too many snakes or ruined their habitat, who knows what might happen to those that remain.
That’s where Johanna Stewart comes in. Stewart, from Yellowknife, is an environmental science master’s student at Thompson Rivers University who is helping to lead a project that spends two years tracking Bertha and friends. We followed her work over the summer.
7. A new Yellowknife album
From December: Carmen Braden’s fourth studio album, A Hard Light, just came out. Join a listening party featuring Braden, producer Mark Adam and Cabin Radio’s Ollie Williams.
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Get a special episode of the Cabin Talks podcast and spend an hour listening to the album’s nine tracks with commentary from Braden and Adam.
“This one came out of the Seed Songs album, which was a pandemic process where I was making short ideas for songs and trying to make them as beautiful as possible,” said Braden.
“These little seeds were planted, and now they’ve blossomed into these nine songs.”
8. The Grinch takes over the airwaves
From November: The Grinch stepped in as guest host of our Santa Claus parade special – and became increasingly giddy with glee as Cabin Radio struggled to find its own float.
The City of Yellowknife’s 2024 Santa Claus parade had a Grinch theme, so the Grinch was right at home gazing with delight from studio one as many Grinchy creations paraded past through the city’s downtown.
However, his delirium doubled as Cabin Radio’s Ollie Williams appeared bamboozled by the apparent disappearance of the station’s parade entry.
Listen to a short selection of highlights from the 90-minute live special.
9. Hot Frosty
From December: “You get a script that’s titled Hot Frosty and there’s some hesitations that arise within you.”
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Safe to say those hesitations didn’t last long. Hot Frosty is a 2024 festive hit and Yellowknife’s Dustin Milligan, the desirable ice sculpture-turned-man in question, is basking in its glory.
Milligan joined Cabin Radio’s Clams ‘n’ Moose from Los Angeles to discuss the movie, his connection to Yellowknife and what’s next.
10. Cabin Radio takes on big tech
From March: The NWT’s premier said one of the big obstacles to ditching daylight savings is getting the tech giants to make the change.
RJ Simpson said the Yukon’s experience several years ago showed the process was “more labour-intensive and much more complicated task than people might expect.”
“There is not one entity that you go to and say, ‘I want to get off daylight savings time, I want to stick with a permanent time.’ We have to reach out to Microsoft, Apple, Google, a number of these different companies,” he said.
So we called Apple’s customer service team. Listen to the call.
