Our five month expedition to arctic Alaska began today with our first stop at Kaktovik, Alaska. Kaktovik is a village of about 300 people, mostly native Alaskans, on the coast of the Arctic Ocean. It’s actually located on an island, separated by a small strip of water from the mainland, but in winter it is all frozen so it is essentially connected.


Turner “Is there enough room for me in the car?”


No one had much sleep lately.


The glacier crew getting on the plane.

Kaktovik, being a small town, has its own small-town issues. These are exacerbated by not being on the road system and the next nearest village being several hundred miles away. Kristin has spent time in nearly every village in Alaska, and considers this her favorite. Drugs, domestic violence, and general unruliness are not at all uncommon in many villages in Alaska. Though Kaktovik has its share of problems, it is still a functional, somewhat thriving, and friendly village. It is unclear to me how a community gets on a particular trajectory on these terms, but clearly Kaktovik is on one of the best ones in the State.

Kaktovik has become very familiar to us and, perhaps more importantly, we to them. We stay in regular contact with many of the locals throughout the winter and keep up on the news. Due to some cargo issues and lack of sleep over the past few days, we decided to spend the night there rather than try to start shuttling in to the glacier right away, giving us the rest of the afternoon to sort our mountain of gear and catch up with the locals at Waldo's. We had many visitors throughout the day, catching up with personal life or wanting to learn more about the glaciers. By evening we had discovered the location of most of our gear, totaling more than 2 tons, and after dinner most of us were ready for a good night's sleep.


Auntie Susan playing tug of war with Turner.


The entire glacier crew at Waldos. From left to right: Kristin, Turner, Darek, Terry, Ryo, Jason, and Bella.