Last Release
Scatter my Ashes
on the fields up top
Restless with wanderlust and anxious for adventure, a big-city Frankfurt woman’s life is forever changed when she encounters a completely different world—one of teeming nature, landscaped vistas, communion with animals, and the free human spirit—in the wild back country of the Yukon.
There she meets local icon Mabel Brewster, owner of the nearby equine stable, who is notorious for her extensive knowledge of the land, her stubborn grit and self-sufficiency, and her uncanny rapport with horses. A series of breathtaking journeys, perilous adventures, and illuminating life lessons transform these unlikely friends into spiritually bonded soul sisters, whose love withstands the test of twenty-two adventurous years and will forever reverberate in the untamed heart of the majestic North.
Elisabeth Weigand lovingly pens a heart-wrenching tribute to the life of Mabel Brewster (1935-2015), whom she met upon her immigration to Canada’s Yukon Territory in 1993. Through a stunning retelling of her life in the remote north that is at once spellbinding, light-hearted, beautiful, and heartbreaking, the reader is transported to the last untamed frontier— where nature reigns supreme and true friendship never dies.
More about the Book
This memoir is written in honor of the dearest friend I ever had: Mabel Brewster.
I only knew Mabel for the last 22 years of her life, which at the same time were the first 22 years of my life.
My new life. In Canada.
We met in Haines Junction, Yukon, in 1993 when I had just immigrated to this amazing country, beginning a live in the most northwestern corner of Canada. I was introduced to a small community experience with somewhere around 800 people after thirty some years in Germany’s Frankfurt with a population of 800.000.
I downsized. And I loved it.
Mabel and I did not become fast friends right away. It took me a while to get through her tough outer shell and tap into the soft, loving and caring inner self of her. However, I managed and I feel tremendously grateful to have been there.
Mabel was a women that never said “no”, when you needed her help.
She also never said “yes”, when you asked if she needed help. She ploughed ahead with all her might managing things on her own. And succeeded. In most cases.
In the beginning I tried to help her wherever I could. Soon I realized I was overcrowding her with my offers, and that I rather should stand back and let her try, having the help available if she asks for it.
We learned a lot together.
We learned to be loving friends, funny horse companions, trusting partners and comrades in crime.
We recognized each other’s weaknesses and how to live with those, while we acknowledged the other person’s strong points, mine rather not being so many.
Together we went on uncountable adventures. Adventures with guests from all over the world and into the wild back country of the Yukon. Always with horses and sometimes for many days. Or we went out with friends and fellow horse people.
And then there were those trips with just her and me, reconnoiter- trips, when Mabel wanted to find that old trail, “which must be somewhere over there …” Those were the ones one quickly started to fear.
She meant the world to me. – And she handed it to me.
The world. – A new world.
Mabel was taken out of my world, but she can never be taken out of my memories.
This collection of our adventures and trials, of tear and laughter will tell why.