Allow me to state the obvious, it snows a lot in Alaska.
My first winter in Fairbanks, Alaska it snowed five feet in five hours; an unbelievable foot per hour. It was amazing to anyone, but to a native Floridian it was magical. During that blizzard it eventually snowed 72 inches in 72 hours with snowflakes three inches in diameter as they fell blanketing Fairbanks. It looked like I was in a magical animated movie!
That same year in Anchorage it snowed so much that even the local wolf packs were impressed. The wolves who lived in the mountains north of Anchorage could not hunt their normal prey due to the snow depth, so packs of wolves snuck through Anchorage eating every dog they came across. Needless to say, many pet owners were unhappy. On the upside – less annoying barking …just saying.
When I skied at Alyeska Ski Resort that year, over 80 feet of snow accumulated. By March the two-story chairlifts snaked through canyons of snow with the skiing surface above the top of the lifts. It’s hard to picture this: the ski slope was above the top of the two-story lift towers!
For my second winter in Alaska, I invited my sister Mary Helen to visit. She would see more snow than she could imagine.
To my great disappointment, a week before Mary Helen's arrival in Anchorage the temperature soared above freezing; over the course of four days all the snow vanished. I was heartbroken. This never happens in Alaska!
I devised Plan B. It may have been a balmy 40 degrees in Anchorage, but it was a pleasant 20 degrees in Fairbanks with lots of snow; we would go north for Christmas!
On her way up to the un-frozen north, the man sitting next to my sister on the plane proposed marriage. The ratio of men to women is so skewed in Alaska that it was customary practice for a man to propose marriage to a woman on first meeting her. It may be your last chance, after all. My sister turned him down, she was already engaged and was even wearing the engagement ring.
My sister arrived a few days before Christmas. We toured around Anchorage, and then drove into real winter toward Fairbanks.
My Alaska mode of land transportation was a 1979 Ford Mustang. Not the quintessential Alaska vehicle, but it was fully equipped: roller-ball snow tires with inch and a half metal studs, battery blanket, engine block heater, and extra interior heater.
Fairbanks was a six-hour drive from Anchorage on the only paved road in Alaska’s interior. You couldn't make a wrong turn or get lost, as there were no roads to turn off onto. We reached the only gas station at the midpoint or point of no return. We got out and took photos in front of the abandoned three-story igloo hotel. The igloo hotel is still there and still abandoned. In the middle of our photo session, it began to snow.
This is before The Weather Channel and Doppler radar, so we didn't know that this was the leading edge of a blizzard. We headed north straight into the as yet un-bared teeth of the storm: the snow increased, the wind increased, and the temperature dropped… a lot and fast.
I was getting a little worried - not much. I had been in Alaska a year and a half! I wasn't a cheechako, a person who had not survived an Alaska winter. I had been through plenty of blizzards I reassured myself. I heard an army pilot say that they could hear the universe go ‘click’ when their airplane fuel gage reached the point of no return. I heard that ‘click’ now… and it was not a sound I wanted to hear.
I could still see the orange flags that marked the edge of the road. The paved driving surface was indistinct from the tundra, flat and white to each side of the road as far as you could see through the falling snow. I decided to casually and calmly give my sister a description of my emergency supplies in the car's trunk: vapor barrier boots, sleeping bag, tent, stove, rations, etc. My description only scared her.
The temperature was dropping to dangerous levels. Sevier cold can cause even small mistakes to become life-threatening situations.
The road was stark white and the sky above the road was light gray, just enough difference for me to steer by. The snow swirled at the edge of my headlights outside of which the day was pitch black. The blizzard was approaching white out conditions. Not good. No cars were coming south, in the opposite direction, which was a bad sign. I slowed down a little as the car slipped slightly in the building snow. There were no cars behind us, an even worse sign. The flags on the side of the road were showing less and less above the building snow.
A white-out comes with a warning of sorts. Your visibly decreases as the snow creates a curtain between you and reality. Your vision becomes flat losing perspective. That loss of perspective was happening now.
My driving safety and staying within the boundary of the road was dependent on my ability to see the line where the earth meets the sky with the forced perspective of the road edge markers converging into the distance.
All that flattened now. There was no horizon line, no road edge, no falling snow – just the white nothingness.
The line between the road and sky disappeared into one white blur; we were in a white-out.
We couldn't turn back like I said, having passed the point of no return to Anchorage. The snow was overwhelming my one-and-a-half-inch metal tire studs, no ice, just too much snow. I was a very experienced winter driver by this time in my life, but I didn’t want the car to slide into a deep snowy ditch in the middle of nowhere at minus 10 degrees. I eased my foot off the gas, slowing the car but not stopping.
Just when I was beginning to think about panicking, I saw two lights behind us. Bright, high lights. It was a snow grader – a miracle with six wheels!
It was the kind with the blade in the middle and the cab on top up high.
I waived it past me, pulled in behind it and let out a big sigh of relief. I followed the grader all the way to Fairbanks, not even slowing down though Nenana’s one traffic light. We never saw another car or person! No one else was stupid enough to be out in this blizzard.
We had a great Christmas with my friends and fellow army officers the Reagors. She was a helicopter pilot, and he was an artillery officer. By the next day, Christmas Eve, all the roads were plowed, Fairbanks didn't miss a beat.
We went to the North Pole, the city of North Pole that is, which is just to the east of Fairbanks to visit Santa’s Workshop. Being Christmas Eve, Santa's Workshop was in full swing. I mailed postcards, to be stamped ‘North Pole AK.’ I submitted several naughty lists for my young cousins. Santa would write letters keeping my young cousins in line for next Christmas. We didn't see Santa; of course, he was flying around the world delivering Christmas presents. We talked to several elves, their job was complete for the year, they were very relaxed. Santa's workshop is still on St. Nicholas Drive in North Pole, AK. It has a website and an 800 number. Santa is real; don't let anyone tell you different.
We drove north of Fairbanks, stopped to take a photo next to the Alaska pipeline. It was very famous, having been recently completed. We then drove further north to where the paved road ended. At the end of the world, I mean road, the Highway Patrol has a special station. To continue north on the road to Prudhoe Bay you had to sign a waiver. The waiver stated that you were certifiably crazy and knew how dangerous it was. The state of Alaska was not responsible for your death if you were dumb enough to preceded. A classic waiver if there ever was one. Only ice truckers used this road.
After Christmas my sister and I headed for Alyeska Ski Resort in Girdwood Alaska. The mountain begins at sea level and goes straight up to 4,000 feet. Resort may be stretching the term a little; the hotel rooms were trailers linked by an inside hallway. Mary Helen really didn't know how to ski; she was from the South after all. Nevertheless, she had skied before.
Alyeska has a Bunny hill, the run would be a triple black diamond on any southern ski resort. Being the worst brother ever, after two runs on the bunny hill I took my sister, who could barely ski, to the top of the mountain. I wanted to ski in the high bowl area, so I gave her a map and made plans to meet her for lunch. Fortunately, she didn't ski off one of the many 2,000-foot cliffs to her death. She was rescued by a man who got her to the midpoint lodge and asked her to marry him. Of course. She turned him down.
My sister is still mad at me 30 years later about her almost skiing over the unmarked 2,000-foot cliff. I can't imagine why? She lived! It didn't spoil our trip. Does a life and death experience to get between siblings? Of course not! Mary Helen and I had experienced several of those already!
That night we were sound asleep having worn ourselves out skiing. I woke suddenly with a start as I flew out of my bed and hit the floor hard. My mind slowly grinded its gears: why was I on the floor? Was I drunk? No. I hadn't drunk that much.
Then Mary Helen landed on top of me, “Ouch!” My sleepy mind noticed that the floor was shaking, I looked around, everything was shaking. An earthquake! I had never been in one, it had to be an earthquake. The safety brief on earthquakes dictated we run for the door frame. Part of my brain told me to do just that. Naturally I ignored that thought; I was 25 and invincible. In addition to the shaking my ears were filled with sound … a roar. It could only be one thing: an avalanche! I had never been in one of those either.
So, with no logic or common sense I jumped up and ran for the plate glass door on the ground floor facing the ski slope and the 4,000-foot mountain of snow, throwing open the curtains. It was indeed an avalanche barreling and roaring down the mountain straight for us. My sister joined me at the window of death.
Wow, my brain registered the mistake we had just made. Damn, my mom is going to kill me if my sister gets hurt, I thought. Before we could move or tear our eyes away from the wall of snow… it began to slow, then stopped a football field away. Lucky. “Maybe we shouldn’t tell Mama about this,” I said.
We skied through New Year's Eve. At midnight hundreds of local kids with flashlights skied down the mountain on every run so the entire mountain was bright with the light of the New Year. Beautiful.
While the band played Huey Lewis & the News ‘Power of Love’ we danced and drank. Mary Helen and I were at a table in the bar watching the spectacle when I left to go to the restroom. On my return all the chairs at my sister’s table were full of men.
As I walked up, my sister introduced us, “Joe, Mike, Todd this is Wil…” At this pause in her introduction, the men looked at me their faces turning into unhappy frowns. “Damn,” they all thought. I could read their minds, “She already has a boyfriend or a fiancé.” My sister continued the introductions, “Wil ... my brother.” The men's faces morphed immediately into joyous smiles! A single woman! In Alaska no less! I drank for free all night as the brother of the lone single girl at Mt Alyeska Ski Resort on New Year's Eve. And the fact that she was beautiful only added to the novelty. All three of the men proposed marriage over the next few hours. They were disappointed but not surprised at her rejection.
My sister mailed me photos from Florida a few weeks later. “All my outdoor photos from the trip were ruined,” she said due to poor photo development. “All the photos are so dark,” she wrote exasperated. I wrote back to her saying nothing was wrong with the photos. She forgot that Alaska had no sun in the winter; the sun had set in October. Her photos were dark because it was nighttime during her entire trip! You just grow accustomed to how dark it is in Alaska in the winter.
It was an exciting visit: warm front, blizzard, white out, earthquake, and avalanche … what more could you want in a fun family holiday trip?
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