Heading North

It's 8:45 on Sunday morning and I'm sitting in the airport again. Fortunately, it’s a just a local Alaska flight though I do need to head south before I can head north. I think it doubles the distance and dramatically increases the time. There is a layover in Anchorage and another shorter one in Deadhorse. Sunrise is still over two hours away but at least here in Fairbanks, there will still be a sunset every day. According to the weather guessers, it’ll be warmer in Utqiaġvik than in Fairbanks.

Just for comparison, here is the same graphic that I had in my last post for Fairbanks except for this time, it's for Utqiaġvik aka Barrow. Note the lack of any yellow (sunshine) in the December column. Also note that there are grey and violet showing dawn and dusk so it really isn’t dark as portrayed by the media. I’m hoping that there will be someone to pick me up at the airport as much of the staff could have gone to AGU in Washington D.C. last week.

This is Anchorage today. Snowing and 34°F warmer than Fairbanks. A layover of a bit under two hours before the flight north, over Fairbanks to Deadhorse. There, another wait before the flight continues to Barrow. Total time between arrival at the airport and destination, including layovers, about ten hours. Oh well…

Just a quick picture out the window at the Deadhorse airport. Not much to see as the last sunset was about a month ago. Though even when the sun is out there may not be much to see. Though lots of people flock here just to check it off of their list. The weather app says that it’s -20°F with a 14 mph wind. “Feels like” -43°F. So much for the tour of some airports. Next stop is Barrow.