Welcome to Fairbanks!
After a 16 hour drive to Alabama, a 1.5 hour drive to Atlanta, a 5.5 hour flight to Seattle, and a 3.5 hour flight to Fairbanks, I finally arrived in Alaska Monday afternoon to begin my 14 day quarantine period. Both flights were wonderfully smooth (at least during the times I was awake) and there were some beautiful views of mountains on the way into both locations.
A mountain peaks out of the clouds on my descent into Seattle. I still am not sure which mountain peak it is... do you know?
Seeing this mountain range [The Alaska Range] was how I knew I was about to land in Alaska!
After seeing all these mountains on the way in, the biggest thing I noticed on my trip between the airport and the resort where I’m staying is how flat Fairbanks is! I don’t know what it is but any location that has a very flat topography fascinates me (the other location that comes to mind is Houston, TX, where it feels like the only change in topography is the ramp onto the interstates). Looking out of my hotel, I can see the hills surrounding Fairbanks, but they feel so distant. When I mentioned this to Jeremy, he commented that “[Fairbanks] is in a bowl between hills” and promised that I would be seeing more mountains soon, so I am looking forward to that!
Life in Quarantine
Over the past two days, I’ve been trying to decide if I am jet-lagged or not. It’s fairly difficult for me to decide because 1) I don’t remember the last time I changed more than one or two time zone, 2) the last few times I did change several time zones I was in my early 20s/late teens, and easily bounced back every time, and 3) I’m still teaching my NYC students virtually, which means I have to be awake at 4:30 a.m. anyways! I will say that it is getting harder to wake up at my usual time in relation to the school day (an hour and a half before, which would be 3:30 a.m. here), so perhaps I’m not jet lagged. Darn it!
Being awake that early does mean that I get to see the sunrise through my window as I begin my teaching every day! It’s been lovely the past two days.
This was taken 14 minutes after sunrise yesterday, which occurred in Fairbanks at 4:40 a.m. You can tell from this photo (showing the parking lot in front of my suite) how fast it gets bright in the mornings!
As of right now, I’m hoping to make it to the weekend so I can spend some time really enjoying Fairbanks and preparing for the work we will be doing in Toolik!
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