It wasn’t exactly the most direct route, but after boarding the wrong plane and flying nearly 2,300 kilometres in the wrong direction, a Winnipeg man finally landed in Inuvik, N.W.T. a day and a half later than he intended.

On Saturday morning, Christopher Paetkau travelled from his home in Winnipeg to Yellowknife, N.W.T. in order to catch another flight 1,100 kilometres northwest to Inuvik, where he would be shooting footage for an upcoming film he was making.

After spending the night in Yellowknife, Paetkau checked his bags at the airport and waited to board his First Air flight. He said there were three other planes departing at the same time and he could see them waiting on the tarmac, but he didn’t know which one he would be on.

“As I’m waiting, I’m hearing three final calls, like final boarding calls, for three different flights,” he told CTVNews.ca on Wednesday. “So I’m like ‘OK my flight might be leaving right now. I’ve got work to do so I better get on the right plane.’”

Paetkau said he went to the gate agent and gave her his boarding pass and his ID and she checked off his name on a piece of paper.

The Yellowknife Airport’s computers were down at the time and employees were inputting information manually, he said.

After waiting 15 minutes, Paetkau said the other passengers around him abruptly got up and started boarding a plane outside on the tarmac. Confused, he returned to the gate agent’s desk and was told to go out on the tarmac too.

“So I’m following the rest of the people but I have a funny feeling. I’ve flown northern flights before… you’ve got to triple check. So I go up the airplane and talk to the flight attendant and I ask, ‘Is this plane flying to Inuvik?’ and she says, ‘Yeah, eventually,’” Paetkau recalled.

Wrong plane ticket

Although he thought the flight attendant’s response was a little odd, Paetkau sat down in his seat and began shooting off some final text messages as the pilot announced the route they’d be taking to Rankin Inlet and Iqaluit.

“I’m hearing the announcements, but I’m thinking ‘That’s a really circuitous route to Inuvik. Like, that’s way east, but I’ve now triple checked and the flight attendant told me this flight was going to end up in Inuvik eventually,” he said.

Paetkau said he assumed the flight must be going on a “milk run,” which involves many stops along the way.

‘This flight is going to Iqaluit, buddy’

Several hours later, the plane landed in Rankin Inlet and Paetkau said he asked a different flight attendant how long they would be stopping there for and how long it would take before they reached Inuvik.

“Her face just drops. She goes, ‘What are you talking about? Inuvik? This flight is going to Iqaluit, buddy,” he said. “We were both super confused.”

Wrong plane Rankin Inlet

Paetkau said he followed up with the first flight attendant who told him the plane would arrive in Inuvik “eventually” and she also appeared to be confused.

“She felt so bad. She was like ‘Are you serious? I thought you were joking,’” Paetkau said.

It seemed an earlier passenger had jokingly asked her when their plane would be arriving in Hawaii and she assumed Paetkau was also kidding around when he inquired about Inuvik.

Reaching Inuvik

Because of strong winds in Rankin Inlet, the pilot was unable to guarantee that another flight would be able to pick Paetkau up there and he was forced to stay on for the final leg of the journey to Iqaluit – more than 2,800 kilometres east of his intended destination.

“Everybody is just laughing at this and I’m laughing too,” he said. “At first, I was a little bit upset but then I thought ‘I just kind of have to roll with this.’”

Wrong plane crew 2

On Sunday, Paetkau returned to Yellowknife where he was put up in a hotel for the night before his flight to Inuvik the next morning.

“I made it! All is well” he exclaimed. “I got a bit of an Arctic tour, made friends with the flight attendants, First Air took care of me perfectly and now I’m in Inuvik.”

Wrong plane Inuvik

Paetkau’s positive take on the experience was echoed by the airline as well.

“We aim to please! Since you're buds with our crew and Captain, you're friends with the entire First Air family too! We expect a holiday party invite of course!” First Air tweeted on Monday.

Paetkau’s wife Kristin Westdal, an Arctic marine biologist who regularly works in the North, also got in on the fun when her husband called her from Rankin Inlet to tell her about the mishap.

“She knew exactly where I was and exactly where I was supposed to be and was having a laugh for sure,” Paetkau said.