Headed to Kivgiq

It is just about 10:00 AM. As soon as I post this, I will gather up my cameras and head for Kivgiq, where the dancing is expected to continue to about 3:00 AM tomorrow. Again, I will post no images today but Sunday, after I crash for awhile, I will see if I can pull out a handful.

Headed to bed without posting a pic

It is 1:16 AM and I just got back from Kivgiq, where I started at 10:00 AM yesterday. I'm going to bed.

Kivgiq begins - one random image

It is 12:18 AM Thursday morning and I just got back from Kivgiq related activities, which began at 10:00 AM Wednesday. I shot hundreds of frames today... hell... over 1000 I am certain, because there is always something happening during Kivgiq.

I do not have time to edit photos, so I just dropped my cursor into a folder on a file number and opened it up, having no idea who or what it would be. This is what it was - the drummers of the Barrow Dancers, concluding their first appearance.

Now I must do a few tasks, go to bed and be back at Kivgiq at 10:00 AM.

I can't take the time to write about it, except that it has been a great day, one of those days that reminds me where my heart is.

I hear about Chuck E. Cheese and the beautiful bracelet as I fly on Alaska Airlines toward Barrow; Barrow at -43, windchill -68

This is Allie, and the person that she is looking at with the big smile is me. She is telling me how she got to go to Chuck E. Cheese and that is where her mother, Monica, bought her the bracelet on her left wrist.

"And Chuck E. was there!" she told me.

She got a big kick out of it when I showed her this picture on my camera. It also got the interest of her mother, Monica, who takes pictures for the Air Guard out of Fairbanks.

Fairbanks is where they were headed, after a short trip to Anchorage. They have been in Alaska but a short time, having come from Maryland. Compared to their Maryland home, they find Fairbanks a bit sparse when it comes to shopping and dining activities and so they enjoyed their trip to Anchorage.

Monica is enchanted with the beauty of Alaska. Before coming here, she had thought that she would ultimately like to settle in Washington state, where she lived for a time, but seeing how beautiful Alaska is, she feels she must reconsider.

As for the miserable posture, this happened after we got half way to Fairbanks and then the pilot announced that the deicing system had malfunctioned and so we had to go back to Anchorage to get it fixed.

 

Once we returned to Anchorage, they told us it would take a few minutes to get the problem diagnosed and fixed, so naturally it took an hour or more. Of course, we had to stay on the plane and I was very hungry, as I had eaten nothing since my breakfast oatmeal.

Once, this would not have been so bad, because Alaska Airlines would have fed me a decent meal on the flight between Fairbanks and Barrow, but those days are gone.

Yet, we finally landed in Fairbanks. Allie and Monica got off the plane and other passengers boarded. One thing about flying by jet in Alaska that is different than Outside is that you always know several of the other passengers that you see. Sometimes, you know most of the other passengers.

That's Rachel to left, and Vera in the middle, from Anaktuvuk Pass, headed to Barrow to dance at Kivgiq. Vera told me the name of her tot, but I forgot. 

And this is Georgianna, who actually boarded in Anchorage in this seat. However, when the stewardess helped Allie to her seat and showed her mother where she had to sit, Georgianna felt bad, did not wish to separate mother and daughter, and so traded seats with Monica.

Once we got to Fairbanks, she returned to her assigned seat.

Her son, Steve, is a friend of mine and has taken me murre egg picking on the cliffs of Cape Thompson and he took me on other good adventures as well, from seal and duck and goose hunting to fishing.

Some of our adventures are recounted in my book, Gift of the Whale.

Georgianna is hugged by her friend, Sophie, of Kotzebue, who just boarded the plane and is headed toward her seat.

The fellow smiling at the tot is from Greenland. The tot and his dad have origins in Samoa and China, but now live in Barrow. Barrow, the coldest city in North America, has a substantial Polynesian community. 

The kid sees the light and reaches for it.

Inside the Alaska Airlines terminal at the Will Rogers-Wiley Post Memorial Airport in Barrow. Rogers and Post were killed in an airplane crash 12 miles soutwest of here.

The wait for luggage in Barrow always seems interminable. They do not put baggage out until the outgoing flight is fully boarded and roaring down the runway.

So you have to sit and wait for your bags for a full hour, at least.

 

This is Rex Nashookpuk, who did not come to Barrow by plane, but by snowmachine, from the village of Wainwright, just about 100 miles down the coast. The temperature was in the - 40's, the windchill about -70, but actually a whole lot more from the seat of Nashookpuk's speeding snowmachine.

Rex also came to dance at Kivgiq.

These are the buses and van used to take tourists touring about the local area come summer.

The ukpeagvik Presbyterian Church. Not so long ago, it was dark all day long in Barrow. After the sun went down November 18, it did not rise again until January 22. The days are still very short, but getting longer and soon the sun will be up all day long - from May 10 to August 2.

This is Anna, who lives on the east coast of Greenland. Anna came to dance at Kivgiq.

This bus will carry dancers from the many villages who have come to Barrow to dance at Kivgiq. 

A dog named Shadrach - the missionaries wanted him to protect them from the fire in the firey furnace, but Hobart wouldn't allow it

I now back up to January 28, when Margie and I were at my sister's house in Salt Lake City, where we had stopped to allow Margie to recover a bit before continuing on to Anchorage. The character with Mary Ann is Shadrach, her blue healer, border-collie friend.

Shadrach is crazy. Mary Ann loves him greatly.

I called him, "Hobart." Mary Ann did not like that, but Hobart did. He came right to me, tail wagging.

Mary Ann and Shadrack fight over a ball. Hobart wanted to get that ball, so that he could give it to me.

In the afternoon, I took Shadrach out for a little walk. We soon happened upon two Mormon missionaires, one named Meshach, the other, Abednego. I am not lying! I could never make such a thing up!

The missionaires were greatly relieved to see Shadrach. A really hot lady had threatened to throw them into a firey furnace if they ever knocked on her door again. They said it would be okay, if Shadrach was with them. With Shadrach, they could just walk around in that firey furnace and they wouldn't even suffer a blister.

So I told them that Shadrach was really Hobart. They got depressed and walked away. What good would it do, to get thrown into a firepit with Hobart? Whoever heard of Hobart, Meshach and Abednego walking around unburnt in a firey furnace?

Monday afternoon, I leave for Barrow. I just checked current weather there: temperature, -39; windchill, -63. The welcome will be warm and I look forward to Kivgiq, but I hate to leave Margie.

And what has happened to all my good Arctic gear, the clothing that used to keep me alive up there? It has all disappeared, or fallen apart.

I think a cat peed on my parka, and that is what caused it to fall apart.

Well, it was old and worn anyway.

But what do I do now?