Hey,
I know I just wrote!
Today is Thursday July 1 and the outside temp is cooler at around 68 degrees. For the last couple of days the temps here have been to say the least “warm”. Yesterday’s previous record high was 76 degrees (record low 33 degrees). The temp topped out yesterday at 84 degrees and before you start making rude noises about that being nothing compared to where you are, just remember there are no air conditioners here. Everyone has fans of course but also remember that we have 24 hours of daylight. The weather the last few days although beautiful, has been unseasonably calm with little breeze, no clouds to block the sun, and since there’s no rain, the dust is terrible. Tuesday was warm (not as warm as yesterday) and I had plans to go down the beach and go wading after work when Patty called and said she had a lab tech in town making a site visit. She wanted to know if I wanted to take a ride to show him around. My response was that I was standing there in a tank top and shorts waiting for her to get home. (This is something I have not worn since coming to Alaska, and after looking at a picture Patty took of me, the tank top is going back into storage, probable forever.) Patty and I took a ride down the beach with the lab tech hanging onto the back of Patty’s 4-wheeler trying to look at everything she was pointing out and trying to take pictures without being tossed of the bike. We showed him all the usual sights-the town from one overlook, the sound from another, the air force radar dome making sure the Russians don’t invade Kotzebue, the wind farm, a sled dog kennel on the beach…….. (Didn’t know there was that much to see here did you? Eat your heart out). On the ride down the beach we passed a number of locals out trying to beat the heat and wearing of all things, bathing suits. (I will not commit in print how this looked as I would probably be struck down by some god or another.) A number of them were wading and swimming in the sound. After a good ride we stopped at a nice spot and I waded out into the sound up to my waist. I’m standing in Kotzebue Sound, a part of the Bearing Sea, which is part of the Arctic Ocean, up to my waist in water that less than 2 months ago was ice over 3 feet thick-what a man! Emboldened now, I then went in up to my neck (uttering a few expletives while doing it of course) staying down just long enough for Patty to snap a couple of pictures before wading back to shore. I stood there a few moments and said “the heck with it”, waded back out and dove in. Like most cold water I have swum in, after a few minutes it became quite comfortable. How many people can say they swam in the Arctic Ocean?
Yesterday was even hotter as I mentioned above hitting 84 degrees. I have done something I came to the arctic to get away from-sweat. I took a ride around town yesterday before coming home and as I mentioned there was no breeze. The sound was flat calm and beautiful. The water was clear for a few feet off shore as there were not even any waves breaking on the shore. Looking both ways down Front Street I could see kids wading and playing in the water. Interspersed at safe distances were the floats of salmon nets leading from shore out into the sound. Walking throughout town were folks in all manner of summer dress including women in strapless tops and halters and many folks in shorts and tank tops. My first thought was why does anyone here even have those types of clothes? I then realized most folks take at least one vacation to warmer climates during the winter and I guess they keep them stashed away for these occasions. I passed in front of the A/C grocery here and noted an elder standing by the doors as she does almost every day, the always present cigarette dangling from her mouth. She lives at the Senior Center, an assisted living center just across the street from the store. She is at the store most day’s I believe waiting for folks to donate money for cigarettes, or just cigarettes. Yesterday she was wearing and Atikluk (a cotton Eskimo pullover top that has a hood and large pockets in front). I mention this because I have never seen this woman without her winter parka and snow pants on, no matter what the weather was, winter or summer. So I suppose this was a testament as to the unseasonably “warm” temp. On my way home, as I swung down a dusty road by the back lagoon I passed a large group of folks playing in the water there too. As I passed the group I caught the smell of suntan lotion, definitely an exotic scent here.
So, to those of you who frown on coming here because you prefer the beach, see what you’re missing. You could be the first on you block to be able to brag abut how you got a suntan while wearing your bathing suit in the arctic!
Last night was a bit uncomfortable even though we had taken the curtains down, had all the windows wide open, and the fans going full out. Both of us slept in the bare minimum of clothes and no sheet. We were awakened at 1am by kids running their gas powered radio controlled cars outside the windows. So much for the vision of this being an ancient Inupiat culture-always the clash of the old and the new. However I awoke around 4am and the temp had dropped by about 15 degrees and we both covered up. This morning getting ready for work the sun was just a red ball peaking through the haze. It is my understanding that there are over 50 wildfires burning in the state and smoke is blanketing many portions. A glance at the weather channel on the internet shows the forecast is for smoke. I’m not sure where the nearest fire is but it nowhere close. The only good thing is the haze seems to be filtering the suns rays and making it a bit cooler. We will see what the day brings. At least I am not in one of the villages right now as almost all of them are inland and being away from the sound, hotter. A side note is that although the wind has died, it appears as though the mosquito season is almost at an end. There were a few down the beach Tuesday but almost none in town.
I have repeatedly mentioned flowers but I just have to do it again. As I mentioned in my last email, I had taken some pictures of blue iris not 20 feet from my apartment on Sunday. At that time there were just a couple of bunches of them blooming in an area behind our apartment that runs about a block. Tuesday they were everywhere. It simply amazes me how rapidly and how drastically things change here. Less than two months ago the water was frozen and the snow was even with the top of a boat that sits on a trailer outside our apartment. Now we are complaining about the heat and the dust, and folks are swimming. One day the tundra was covered with ice and seemingly the next it was brown with just patches of ice then after blinking again it was green. Now there are flowers everywhere. As I looked at the temp of 84 degrees I reflected on how just a couple of months ago it was in the minus 20’s.
Truly this is a land of diversity, always affording new experiences.
Carlo
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Last updated:
08/29/05