It's even colder this morning!

I woke this morning at my cabin to see the temperature had dropped even further overnight. The ice fog was so thick driving into work that I could only make out the tail lights of the car ahead of me, and then, only when I was within 40 feet of it. While it's still dark out (8:40am,) from my office window, I can only make out the headlights of the cars going down 4th Street, and the shadowy outlines of the hotel buildings across the street. Even Yukoners are admitting that it is a little nippy, and we are all putting our hopes on the forecast promising that it will "warm up" to -20 C on Sunday. :-)

-41 C / -44 F --- Hitting a "new low!" :-)

The ice fog floats thick through the streets of Whitehorse, with visability of less than a city block. In the two plus years that I have been in Whitehorse, this is the coldest temperature that I have experienced... and It's been like this for three days now.

In this cold, funny things happen to different materials. Car seat cushions become as hard as blocks of styrofoam... the tires flatten out where they touch the ground, so if you park overnight, there is a flat part that goes "whump, whump, whump," as you drive down the highway, until they warm up.

Frost creeps up the inside of the windows in my cabin, and smoke from the chimney rises straight up. Firewood splits almost at the touch of the axe. Any remaining birds, rabbits, squirrels, and all the other animals seem to dissappear.

I have a "Canada Goose" parka... the kind scientists use down in Antarctica, and once we go below -30, the puffy down parka goes away, and the "Canada Goose" comes out. Coyote fur around the hood, the down of 21 geese as insulation, shoulder grab straps in case you go through the ice, or down a crevice.

It's truely a unique experience... and part of the adventure of living up here.