Two things happened on top of the world this week. In Utqiagvik (formerly Barrow), on Jan. 22 the sun topped the horizon for the first time since mid-November. The day before that, Jan. 21, was the first time since Halloween the town’s thermometers recorded a below-normal daily average air temperature. The returning daylight for the […]
On the upper Chena River in the heart of a cold winter, a songbird appeared on a gravel bar next to gurgling water that somehow remained unfrozen in 20-below zero air. Then the bird jumped in, disappeared underwater, and popped up a few feet upstream. The bird continued snorkeling against the current of the stream, […]
Tamuuliciqukut uksurpailan.–We will make dry fish before the winter. Winter in the Kodiak Archipelago quickly follows summer. As the days darken and stormy weather sets in, the landscape turns rapidly from green to brown, the temperature drops, and wet, windy days replace the warmer, foggy days of fall. In Prince William Sound, Alutiiq children once […]
Dried salmon savored by rural Alaska Natives as part of a subsistence way of life won’t be found among the Spanish tapas, Brazilian steaks, or Southern barbecue served in the restaurants of Jacksonville, Florida. Indeed, the differences between Jacksonville (pop. 821,700) and, say, the Yukon River village of Grayling (pop. 213) couldn’t be more profound. […]