I like traveling to unusual places. Even a spot that's unpleasant, in a conventional sense, can be fun to visit just to see what it's like, amass the relevant anecdotes, etc. But I think I'll be staying far away from Yakutsk.
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Vacation Spots to Avoid
15 Jun 2008 04:02 pm
Comments (9)
What, you hate Risk? Yakutsk is one of the countries - high on the list of ones that English speakers have to stare at and attempt to pronounce (along with Kamchatka). That always made it one of my favorite Risk countries.
Well, if you want the other extreme, you could go to Bangkok in the dry season. Suffice it to say, air conditioning is a must. Bangkok has three seasons which are deceptively named. There's the dry season, which really, really hot and doesn't rain much. There's the wet season, which is really, really hot and rains a lot. And there's the cool season, which is just really hot with little rainfall. On a rare day when it dips below 80 F, the locals will be wearing winter coats. And even in the dry season, humidity rarely falls below 70%. It makes Houston in the summer seem pleasant. But the food is great.
Yeah I hear Irkutsk is so much nicer and still leaves you in position to attack Kamchatka...
I spent this last winter in Fairbanks. It didn't get that cold (-50C) this year, but I hear some years it does. Our coldest day was around -50F, but we did have a week under -40. Handy conversion tip, -40 degrees is the same in F or C. And for what it's worth, -40 degrees is painfully cold, especially if you're from Houston, TX.
The interesting anecdotes, though, like you said, have actually made this winter worth it. I've Vehicles behave strangely once the temperature drops lower than 30F, and really interesting physical phenomena start occurring. Also, everyone has a story of how they lost some skin by accidentally touching a door handle without gloves or inadvertently discovered the freezing temperature of tequila, etc. etc. Fun times. You should check it out sometime.
What MattY failed to do (again) is read and understand those squiggles on the screen. Namely, the contention that there was very little wind in the area.
Because of that, there is at least one place in the lower 48 that's far colder, and no doubt large numbers of places in AK - highpeaks for instance - that are also far colder. Those aren't cities, but they'd flash freeze you faster than in the city in the article.
I'll stay home and watch Ice Road Truckers instead.
Fairbanks ain't much different than the article. Spent several years living there. We'd be taking out the trash in short sleeves during a winter "warm front" when it would go from -35 to 0 in a short time span. -35F was a normal low in Dec-Feb, with usually a week or two with lows hitting the -50Fs. You learn to deal with it.
At least in Fairbanks there is almost no wind in the winter. Very still, and quite beautiful really. But there are a couple of months where it's too cold for me to xc ski and it's dark. Rough part of the year, and a good time to take advantage of the lax weed laws.
Interesting trivia: -40C = -40F
Comments closed June 29, 2008.
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Heads in the Sand
http://www.independent.co.uk/travel/europe/the-beaches-are-clean-in-albania-and-theyre-almost-empty-847255.html
This sounds much better
Posted by Displaced Canuck | June 15, 2008 4:46 PM