Thursday, January 10, 2008

Leavin' On A Jet Plane

Temperature upon departure: 33
Temperature upon landing: -11


Today was the big day - time to start over again in Fairbanks!! It was a VERY long day for flying.. Beginning the day leaving the house at 6am EDT and arriving in Fairbanks at ~10:30pm EDT. But as usual, the people I sat beside on the planes were all very nice and interesting to talk to. The views were spectacular from the plane going over the Rocky Mountains and heading into the desert southwest of Nevada. What an odd place.. I think I want to stay living somewhere green.. Or white. None of that brown we-don't-have-enough-water-for everyone land.
The Vegas airport was nothing spectacular but they did have slot machines, and I'm pretty sure the girls manning the machines didn't think I was old enough to gamble (you have to be 21) but they also didn't vocally question it. :-P I lost two dollars and decided to call it quits. Guess I'll have to take that car loan out after all. ;-) The Seattle airport was a bit stressful, since we were running slightly late and I had to run across the airport to get to the AK Airlines terminal. But all said and done I made it there with 15 mins to spare. I knew I was in the right place and knew exactly who was from Fairbanks, which was most of them. They are a very friendly little bunch and the Carhart suspenders just give it away every time!! On the way up north from Seattle, the sun set at about 3:55pm - I figure we were barely over B.C. at that point. Sadly I could not see the gorgeous mountains throughout AK but I could see the snow reflected off of the mountains. It was awesome descending into FAI because you could see the lights from North Pole, but they were covered in snow and had the cool effect of a bush covered in Christmas lights that just had a fresh snow fall on top. Neither of my suitcases seemed to make it to FAI (except my skis) so I was stuck with the clothes I was wearing and luckily a few tshirts and fleece pants to sleep in. Luckily my luggage came back on the midnight flight and I scored some airline miles out of the lost luggage, so not all was lost. The moment I walked out of the airport terminal, my nostrils froze up in the -11 temps.. which was pretty pathetic since the temps get muuuuuuuuuch colder than that. Beautiful snowy crisp air though, that's for sure.
So glad to be back to where it feels like home!

2 comments:

Unknown said...

yeah you don't look over 21 :)

aarontyburski said...

I see it's already -38F for you. Good luck and don't grab an outdoor metal door handle without gloves on.