Alaska Winter

I slept like a log last night, it was snowing all night and cloudy so no chance of catching the lights. I was at breakfast soon after 8am and was rewarded with steaming hot coffee. Today I took a walk in the woods around the lodge, hoping to spot some wildlife.  There are some well trodden paths, and while they are covered with fresh snow, they are quite packed underneath, so easily walkable if you stick to the trail.  I wandered a bit, stopping and looking and listening for anything living, but there was just me.  Lots of animal tracks, what looked like moose, hare and possibly lynx, but only tracks.  It started snowing quite heavily again, so I put my camera away and wandered back to the lodge.  I had totally overdressed and was roasting, it's about 1 degree here, much warmer than I am used to.  I had to stop and take my toe warmers out because my feet were melting. I pottered about my room, downloaded photos and caught up on the happenings around th...

I woke about 8am after my lateness getting to bed.  Breakfast is between 8am and 10am, so I took a leisurely shower and sorted my rats nest of a bag into some sort of order.  We had to bring a duffle to make them easier to pack into the vehicles, which works for stowing bags, but with one big empty space, it becomes a jumble in no time at all and you can't find anything. Breakfast was good, cheesy scrambled egg with bacon, cereals, a variety of toast and muffins etc.  My only complaint was the coffee was lukewarm.  I must get their earlier tomorrow. I pottered about for a bit, washed some essentials, and then headed out.  The town of North Pole is a short distance away from Fairbanks, and it has to be done really. I hate selfies, but I had to on this occasion.   I was amused to see the same toilet paper hoarding is happening in Santa's home too.  Maybe he's stockpiling for Christmas! Toilet paper shelves empty at the North Pole.  Wha...

Some  more picks of Coldfoot, this time the diner/truckstop. Kevin, standing next to the anti-freeze selection The bar, which is not open at the moment. They've had some snow recently Last day today.  We are flying back to Fairbanks, if the weather is kind to us.  It has been snowing lightly on and off, and there is cloud but quite a high ceiling.  So we are hopeful of a flight, because another 6 1/2 hours of wheels rolling is not appealing. One of the hardest things to cope with in the cold is managing your layers, as we get out of the van and need to layer up, and get back in the van and need to strip down else we melt.  So no matter how careful you are, or how organised you try to be, you always drop a glove, or forget which pocket you put the lens cap in, or can't find your hat.   It's cosy, that's for sure ! Our flights are scheduled for 2pm and 3pm, we weigh too much and have too much gear to all go on the same flight....

Breakfast at 10:30am again today, a repeat of yesterdays brekkie for me, and we piled into the van and headed off, this time to visit Wiseman in the daylight.   What a magic little village.   I was fascinated by how the logs are joined on the corner.  This is the cabin we warmed in for our first night of Aurora viewing. We headed north again stopping at a few places on the way for photos.  Or snapping pix out the front window of the van. Ice road truckers This time we stopped in a little pull-out area for lunch, and Claire announced that this was her first snow picnic, so that required a photo.  She had us all in stitches the other day as she told us that she had been so involved with her Coronavirus preparations at work in the lead-up to the trip, that she did not have time to put much thought into it.  So she did not realise that she would be in snow.  She arrived in Anchorage, she had been there before in summer,...

Trucks parked up for the night at Coldfoot These are our digs at Coldfoot Camp.  It is very basic, but the beds are comfy and the water is hot, though the shower is tiny. Looking in from the doorway And looking back to the door from between the beds.  Behind the door on the left is a toilet and a small shower. Looking out across the truck park, which is mostly empty during the day.  The diner where we have breakfast and dinner is the right-most building. The view out the entrance door to our accommodation. Note: the coldest temperature recorded was -82 F which is -63 Celcius.  It was warm when we were there, 10 F which is about -12 C.  We must be acclimatising because we could walk across to the diner without needing coats or hats. Breakfast was another enormous meal, I had the biscuit sandwich, effectively a scone with a burger pattie cheese and egg.   Yummo, washed down with coffee. We were on the road again by about midd...

We met for breakfast about 7.30am and then it was time to weigh in, all our bags were toted up so that they can calculate how to get us back from Coldfoot.   We had to provide our weights to Chris before the trip, and they make an allowance for winter clothing.   Because we all have so much stuff including camera gear, they will need two planes for us.   We stowed all our excess luggage in the left luggage room at the hotel, and then it was time to hit the road.   It’s a 254 mile drive to Coldfoot camp, which will take us 6 ½ hours driving time, so it will be a log day.   We had a quick stop at a Starbucks to grab a snack to tide us over, because lunch will not be until around 2pm at the Yukon River Camp.   Our ride at the first restroom stop Icy cold long drops became a feature of the trip. As it turned out, we did not make our lunch stop until after 4pm, because there were many photo stops along the way.   The Dalton Highway, made f...