Tuesday, July 15- Barrow Alaska
The Land of The Midnight Sun
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Without question, this was the most interesting day I've ever spent on vacation. You will see
why. This is a big page because we did so many things. We are in The Land of the
Midnight Sun. It is 12:33 am and it is as bright out as it will be at 7:00 am when I
get up. It took as long to get here from Petersburg as it would have to get from
San Diego to London because Alaska Airlines is pretty screwed up from a
maintenance point of view. Of course, I'm glad they fixed the plane instead of
flying it into the ground. While some of their people are good, in general,
their company sucks.
Maria signed up for a tour of Barrow with a guy who sent another guy who took
us out to see the town. His name is Bunna and as of tomorrow, he will be the
head guy at his company. He is 27 years old and in the course of one day, he let
us eat a plant, introduced us to his family, let us watch him behead a dead
walrus and give us one of the tours of a lifetime.
Click on the following links to see everything we did on July
15.
It is too big to put on one page.
Barrow
- Bunna
Adventure -
The
Hooligans -
Walrus
Hunt
(As usual, click on the
small picture to see the big picture.)
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Barrow Alaska.
The Northern Most Point in the United States.
It took us a dozen hours to get here and it is among the most desolate
and beautiful places on earth. Two days is enough to see most of the
things that the natives want you to see. Call us first for the straight
scoop on where to stay and what to do. We're experts now.
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It is 7:00 am and showing. Remember, this is the
middle of July. What was the temperature where you live on July 16?
I've just had three pieces of bacon and some toast
at Pepe's Restaurant. It cost $7.50.
I looked for a Jack In The Box and couldn't find one. I
figure a Number 16 combo would cost about $27 bucks up here.
2 pounds of breaded shrimp costs $36.55 at the AC store
in town.
Milk is about $7 bucks a gallon. It is cheaper to drink
gasoline. That only costs $3.06 a gallon.
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This is neighborhood around the hotel. Most of Barrow looks similar except
some have newer houses. Since everything either has to be barged in during
July and August before the ice closes the ocean, or it must arrive on air
freight, many of the structures are prefab and precut housing
. Everything is built on stilts because of the
permafrost that lies several feet below the ground. If you put a standard
foundation down, the building will trap heat and melt the frost and slowly
sink toward the center of the earth.
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Perry in front of his Alaskan dream car.
(We thought about hot wiring it and taking it for a spin
but I can't drive anything that weighs more than my house. Also, we
figured the gas bill would be more than the lawyer and the fine combined.)
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Pepe's Restaurant. Everyone is having breakfast.
I am finishing Maria's food. It is a first. Normally, she finishes my
food.
The restaurant is owned by Fran
Tate, a 70 something woman who has appeared on The Johnny Carson Show and
is pretty well known. She is also the President of The Polar Bear Club and
Joe Shults' mom..
Tomorrow, you will learn why this is a big deal.
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This sign is outside the Convention and Visitors
Bureau where you can get a free cup of coffee and a map. The map isn't
really necessary but the coffee is. It was the middle of July and it was
32 degrees and snow. Coffee helps. |
Barrow is exactly 16.3 miles from The Middle Of
Nowhere. It is a heck of a long way to just about everywhere from here. |
We want you to know that Maria is almost a mile
off shore on a massive ice floe. It took her almost an hour to jump from
iceberg to iceberg. It was a grueling journey.
That's my story and I'm stickin' to it.
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Maria's day on the beach. We plan to come down
and take a photo tomorrow in a bathing suit. Well, Maria will be in a
bathing suit.
( I'll be in a Hawaiian shirt. If I go on the ice in a
bathing suit, some Barrow native will shoot me and try to remove my
tusks).
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Will Rogers and Wiley Post died 16 miles from downtown Barrow. This is
the memorial to their memory at the Barrow Visitor's Center. It is a
beautiful memorial.
It is quite depressing to see if you are a huge Will
Rogers fan, as I am. Wiley Post is a semi-hero to me as well.
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Maria and I went to the AC Store (Barrow's version of Wal-Mart) and
meet this fellow selling baleen whale carvings.
They are very cool and you can see ours if you come over
to the house.
Baleen is the strainer that Bowhead Whales use to filter
the water coming into their mouth. It is hard and a little like plastic.
It has hair on the edges.
You have to be pretty strong to carve on it and judging
by the handshake I got from this fellow, it must build up your
fingers.
You can etch it with a hand scribe which is like a
pencil or use an engraving tool, which is not traditional, but must be
easier on your wrists.
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This is a combination pool hall and Tijuana gift store. Maria wants
you to see the for sale sign in the back of the car. I don't know why. I
thought 800 was a fair price for it.
Boy, the hundred dollar car club has gotten expensive.
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Sam and Lee's Restaurant. We had two meals here.
It was good, and expensive.
I wish I had a photo of Mrs. Kim since she invited us
back the next night for Muktuk You'd like her.
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Mr. Kim is the owner of Sam and Lee's Restaurant. He is Korean. There are a
lot of Korean restaurant owners in Barrow.
He was a very nice guy. We traded him our share of the
hooligans for some
tempura batter and a cooking lesson.
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Mr. Kim gives Perry a lesson in carrot carving. He teaches Perry how
to can make carrots into swans.
Perry teaches Mr. Kim how to make swans back into
carrots.
It's almost the same thing.
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Muktuk. Whale blubber. The black stuff is whale
skin. It's ok. I wouldn't want to make it a staple in my diet, however.
Actually, it tastes a little like car tires on fat. I
suppose it's an acquired taste. I won't be here long enough to acquire it.
Besides, my wife and friends won't let me eat pork rinds, as though I want
to, and they'd flip if I developed a taste for Muktuk.
Once is enough for me.
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Final 07/20/03
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