Smells Like Yukon Flog

When Up Here magazine ran a story on nude hiking, none of the northern tourism departments amended the requisite activity lists that appear in their vacation guides or on their websites. Maybe it was the fact that nude hiking just didn’t seem different enough from plain-old hiking to warrant its own category. We understand.

However, we’re waiting anxiously to see how the events that unfolded last week on a not-so secluded hiking / biking trail in Whitehorse will affect Yukon tourism marketing strategies.

Will the Department of Tourism and Yukon Wild finally wake up and realize the HUGE potential in a niche travel market that, as of yet, they have dared not target? In other words, will prospective visitors ever experience the joy of browsing the activity options on the Larger than Life website and laying their bulging eyes on “Wanking” (or some flowery synonym) in a list that already includes very similar pastimes, like golfing? We fear not.

Of course, it’s not just the participants we want to tap into. If we can attract gladhanding exhibitionists in sufficient numbers, we have no doubt that the Yukon will also experience a dramatic rise in visits for “sightseeing” and “wildlife viewing.” Bring on the voyeurs!

Stay tuned for a related disccussion about ways to rejig that “Yukon Gold Explorer’s Passport” promotion that Tourism Yukon went to the trouble to create, but can’t be bothered to write about on its website. (Hence, no link to an explanation.)

During our break from Flogging, we didn’t have a chance to check the Smells Like Yukon e-mail account for over a week. As a result, when we returned to the office, we had to deal with the inevitable backlog of incoming messages.

Each and every day, Smells Like Yukon receives, quite literally, a half-dozen, sometimes even a dozen, e-mails from fans and friends all around the world. In between calls to Animal Control to remove the last remnants of Robin Williams from Mark’s house, we’ve been sorting through–and occassionally responding to–all manner of correspondence from this global network. At this point, we’re almost caught up.

We’d be lying if we said that all the e-mails we receive are equally appreciated. For example, we can usually count on our friend Kevin to offer some interesting news or trivia that inevitably finds its way into a Smells Like Yukon segment. But after carefully reading his latest message to determine that it doesn’t involve the husky on the Yukon’s coat of arms or that mummified kitty they found in the Capital Hotel, no one’s sure what we’re supposed to make of Kevin’s announcement that “Dog makes love to cat.”

On the other hand, we do tip our hats to our pal Towiddowson, whose timely promise of “instant results with organ enhancement pills” suggests a Moens-ish inside knowledge of Smells Like Yukon’s future plans. In preparation to pump up the organ in the music tracks of future segments of the Smells Like Yukon radio series, Mark has been spending a lot of time watching The Band’s Chest Fever on YouTube. And while he has so far been enjoying this activity drug-free, he won’t discount the possibility that some chemical assistance might make his research even easier. He’s now looking forward to utilizing the giant package promised by Towiddson.

We’ve got a lot of other interesting correspondence we’d like to share, but it’ll have to wait. Animal Control has just pulled up again….

Well, the sun is setting on Zola’s Cafe Dore on Whitehorse’s main drag–and by that, we mean Main Street, not that little strip of road that runs between Ricky’s and the Chilkoot Centre.

As the local CBC reported this week, the popular coffee shop–which was only opened a few years ago–has succumbed to increased competition in the downtown area and will close at the end of the month. By our calculations, that’s tomorrow.

In an interview on A New Day, cafe owner and renowned coffee roaster Zola Dore (sorry, we can’t be bothered with those little Frenchy accent things) didn’t single out a certain well-known chain store as the culprit, but Smells Like Yukon could certainly listen between the lines.

As far back as 2005, Mark and Jesse could see there was just no way Zola’s could continue to compete with Envirolube, where they offer free coffee in the waiting room. As you might have heard in the first radio story he ever worked on, Mark has always maintained that the best coffee in town comes as a side dish with a quick oil change. And now, he has clearly been vindicated.

With this in mind, we suggest that the other Main Street-area coffee shops–Baked, Starbucks, Tim Hortons, Chocolate Claim and Java Connection–had better smarten up and finally take this Envirolube threat seriously. Ignore its coffee at your peril.

But, much like the java at Envirolube, this moral victory is bittersweet for Mark. Zola’s coffee was pretty good, too, and even he’s going to miss it.

Two days after the airing of the controversial “New & Improved” radio segment, the repercussions are still being felt. CBC Yukon’s Roch Shannon Fraser is humbled and contrite. CBC China’s Anthony Germain is accusing us of stealing his schtick. CBC Go’s Brent Bambury has asked us to stop dropping his name. And, just yesterday, one angry local listener released a 16-foot Burmese python into Mark’s house. Fortunately, the only victim was a three-foot high stuffed pig.

We’ve also been receiving a lot of questions with respect to certain claims that are being made about the band Wang Chung on the Smells Like Yukon website. The most frequent question–we’re not sure why–relates to the high note that the band’s leader singer, Mr. Wang Chung, hits at about the 2:33 mark of the Youtube video shot at the Yukon Convention Centre back in April.

At any rate, we’re eager to set the record straight. The answer to the question is a resounding “yes:” Mark is just off camera, squeezing the singer’s dong. Oh, the things he’ll do for “art”…

Somewhere in the Smells Like Yukon universe, a cool cat named Chairman Meow better double up on his or her serving of Tender Vittles. It’s going to take some serious head scratching for Mr. Meow to come up with more timely or captivating captions than the following entries submitted to Caption Contest #10 by another contender last night:

“Worried about what anti-sled-dog extremists might think, Murray Lundberg begins to walk his dog with him wherever he goes.”

“After setting the world record for the longest snowmobile ramp jump, Ross Mercer decides to celebrate by purchasing a new toboggan for his legless dog, Bombardier.”

However, we are deeply saddened to report that the individual who submitted these captions also prefaced them with this observation: “A great picture for the caption contest. I bet framed copies would sell well at the Gallery of the Midnight Sun or YAAW.” We at Smells Like Yukon, like many of you who smell like Yukon, find this remark highly insulting to the Yukon arts community. For the record, it is NOT our policy to poke fun at the Yukon’s cultural sector

Turning once again to verbally fluff our latest contestant, we’re pleased to certify that these entries we’re received before news leaked that Smells Like Yukon co-star Mark Koepke was considering augmenting the contest’s long-standing stupid prize with the even stupider bonus prize of the 1985 Subaru GL parked in his driveway. If Mark does decide to step up, it shouldn’t cost the winner more than about $75 to have it towed.

Keep your entries coming. But, please–make sure you also spare some time for the Subvert Smells Like Yukon Alternative Gameswear Where? Gallery. Your unelected officials are counting on you.

Welcome to the new Smells Like Yukon Flog. From now on, all updates, news etc related to Smells Like Yukon will be aired on this fan blog, along with the odd bit of dirty laundry. When necessary, we’ll also be using the blog to debunk some of the wildest rumours about Smells Like Yukon. We might as well start now.

No doubt, many Yukoners have heard media reports about problems at Whitehorse General Hospital. According to the media, a group of doctors is none too pleased with the hospital’s CEO. Whatever the source of this friction is, it definitely has nothing to do with Smells Like Yukon. Specifically, there is ABSOLUTELY NO TRUTH to a rumoured sponsorship arrangement whereby all doctors delivering babies in Whitehorse General Hospital would be required to draw a deep breath and pronounce “Smells Like Yukon” immediately before handing the newborn to his or her mother. Furthermore, rumours of compulsory “infant tagging” (i.e. tatooing) with the Smells Like Yukon brand are completely false.

While Smells Like Yukon certainly appreciates the creativity of hospital administration in seeking new sources of revenue, we decided that the proposed arrangement might do more harm than good to Smells Like Yukon’s trusted brand. Also, we couldn’t come up with $50/year.