A new contract is being sought for commercial operations on the North Rim of Grand Canyon National Park, including the lodging there, and it could result in a jump in overnight rates.

The Chignecto Isthmus sounds magical — “a quiet landscape of salt marshes and rivers” on a narrow strip of land that connects New Brunswick to mainland Nova Scotia. Even better, it’s home to four national historic sites that remind us about the clash between France and Britain for power in North America in the 1750s.

There he stands in the woods as you start walking down the Discovery Claim Trail to the creek where Skookum Jim Mason, Káa Goox (Dawson Charlie), Shaaw Tláa (Kate Carmack) and George Carmack discovered gold in the Yukon in August 1896 and sparked the Klondike Gold Rush.

It’s a good thing that the closest I get to Dall’s sheep in Kluane National Park and Reserve is the one carved into a stone slab outside the Thechàl Dhâl' Visitor Centre. Then, to satisfy my urge to see a real white sheep with curled horns, I squint at tiny white dots grazing on Thechàl Dhâl' (Sheep Mountain) and try a spotting scope for a closer look.