It was 2 degrees F at my house when I started my first PolarTREC adventure. On the car drive to the airport and throughout my day of airports and window seats I was looking forward to arriving in Fairbanks and experiencing "serious winter". It would have been very disappointing if I traveled across 4 time zones and arrived in ALASKA and found it was less winter than my house in Upstate NY.I was scheduled to fly from Syracuse to Chicago to Seatle and then arrive in Fairbanks at 12:25am and the good news is that the airlines had a different plan. After a series of relaxing delays at "Camp O'Hare" the friendly folks at Alaska Air offered to send me directly to Anchorage to spend the night. Not only did I get to see a coastal part of Alaska, but it allowed me to fly into Fairbanks in the morning light. The mountains of the Alaska Range below the plane were snow covered and the bright white lines running out of the mountains were frozen rivers. It was hard to find a road but every frozen river surface was striped with the tracks of snowmobiles. As the plane pulled up to the airport the captain welcomed us to Fairbanks and pointed out that the temperature was 20 below zero. I was a happy camper!
A Cold Kiss!
Mr. Peneston Kisses a Bear!
Jeff Peneston kisses a an ice carving of a bear.
Everything in the last 2 days has been sensory overload. The people from ARCUS and the other PolarTREC teachers are fantastic, friendly and fun. There is a dog sled and an ice carving competition in town this week and that brings me to the man in the elevator with the chainsaw. We stood side by side waiting for the elevator this morning and I looked at the chainsaw, no case, no blade guard, etc. The door opened and we both got on. Sometimes you just have to have faith in people. By the time we had dropped 8 floors I had learned that he was a competitive ice carver! Another friendly guy in Alaska! To see more photos check out my photo galary.
Dragonflies Carved in Crystal Clear River Ice
Dragon flies carved from ice!
These dragonflies are about 3 feet long and amazingly beautiful
Ice Lens
A lens carved from ice that focused sunlight.
At the ice park they created a lens from ice and then focused sunlight to burn the paper on a sheet of drywall. Fire from ice!