Ahead of Monday's polls, candidates trudge through fat snowflakes blanketing this frigid central city, past naked trees and forgotten Christmas lights.

Political reporters grumble about ink freezing in their pens, while candidates moan about added costs of politicking indoors.

Party leaders have been stranded at airports by ice storms as they criss-cross the vast country. Others saw political rallies flop, unable to attract crowds on cold nights.

Misery is especially acute for Prime Minister Paul Martin's Liberal Party as it faces the prospect of losing a 12-year grip on power. Polls show the opposition Conservatives are poised for victory.

Reg Alcock, a burly Liberal, is defending the seat he has claimed four times since 1993, in Winnipeg -- reputedly the coldest metropolis in the world, where temperatures plunge below minus 20 degrees Celsius (minus four Fahrenheit) in January.

"Winter slows things down a bit because you can't walk as fast on ice and snow," he told AFP, decked out in ear muffs, his nose red and cheeks flushed.

"It gets darker earlier (in winter) and people aren't as comfortable opening their door to strangers at night," said Alcock, lamenting that his glasses fog up each time he comes in from the cold.

Some of his supporters are not just nursing political wounds -- they have also been injured by slipping on ice.

The Conservatives, led by Stephen Harper, are leading in national polls by around nine points as the Liberals struggle with corruption allegations.

An unscientific "mitten poll" by the National Post, in which voters sent in lost mittens to the newspaper along with their voting preference, predicted a Conservative majority government on January 23.

Canadian political leaders, with an eye on turnout, usually prefer to put their fates in voters hands during warm summers. But opposition parties toppled the Liberals with a no-confidence vote in November, resulting in a January vote.

In frigid Winnipeg, people seem to have warmed to the notion of a winter election, as the party rhetoric heated up.

"If a candidate goes out in this weather, I don't mind holding my door open for him," said one voter. "It shows (their) determination."

Some partisans however lamented they could not hammer election signs into frozen ground and were forced to plop them atop roadside snow piles.

"Snow plows have buried our signs," moaned Conservative spokeswoman Emma Wilford.

"Everything is more challenging in winter."

Conservative candidate Stephen Fletcher, a paraplegic, "has literally had to put snow tires on his wheelchair," she said.

Liberal candidate Bruce Benson hiked across 500 kilometers (280 miles) in 20 days north of Winnipeg in old snow-shoes, fighting strong prairie winds and risking injury to reach disaffected aboriginal voters.

"I want them to get to voting booths using a method of transportation they'd used for thousands of years, if they have to," he said, sporting a tan any skier would be proud of.

Liberal environment minister Stephen Dion went ice-fishing on nearby Lake Winnipeg for a photo opportunity and caught a jackfish.

And Jack Layton, leader of the New Democratic Party, went dog-sledding across Great Slave Lake outside Yellowknife to drum up support north of the 60th parallel.

"Whatever it takes to get there ... We feel good about what's going to happen in this election," he told local reporters.

"The dogs were about as well-behaved as my caucus," he added.

As bad as things are, they could have been worse, as this winter in Canada has been milder than most, with cities like Ottawa, Montreal and Toronto basking in temperatures around the freezing mark.

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