I'm not sure how I missed reading this post till today...oh well. I'm also not sure why some of our other fun lovin members think your'e nuckin futs. Remember, it's because of the good 'ol cold winters up here that us folks here in Alberta and Alaska are able to get out on the ice roads on the frozen lakes etc. to extract all that oil, (30% of the known world oil reserve is in Alberta you know, so we need winter, Alberta and Alaska give each resident dividend checks each year cause theres so much extra cash in the gov. coffers) So a winter trip would be a blast. We're out there every day in the bush just a givin her. There are literally 1000's and 1000's of miles of roads in the northern bush. Example, take out your trusty Rand McNally and find "Manning" in northern Alberta, on Highway 35 then Fort Nelson, on the Alaska Highway, in BC to the north west. There are no roads on the map right, but in the winter you can travel on winter roads (no chains) between the two places. Or you notice a lake in the top northwest corner of Alberta, in the summer it's a fly in fishing camp, with guys comming in the summer from the US and having to pay $5000 for the week of fishing. Well, in the winter you can drive in and ice fish all you want for "free". (You'd have to pay to stay in a open oil drilling camp up there if you wanted, or just camp) So any way, all that to say winter camping/expiditing allows you to do things you'd never get to do in the summer, and in a whole different way. It's a riot.