The feature article in the Daily News refers to the alcohol problem in Nome. I'm a very light drinker, but I do frequent cocktail lounges. That's hardly the word for what they have in Nome. You see, the neighboring villages are dry, so when the young ones (anyone younger than I am) want a drink, they have to go to Nome, the closest wet town. There are no roads of course, so they use dog teams, snow machines, or whatever transportation is available.
The reason I'm onto this subject in that I'm heading to Nome early in the morning for four days, and should have a great story to tell. My trip is to attend the Pioneers of Alaska Convention, so with a little luck, I'll get some images to share with the reader. So check back in a few days, and hear some tales. If nothing happens, I'll make some up. Okay?
4 comments:
Hello from a neighbor - I'm in Palmer.
~Sandy G.
Hope you have a good trip.
Just wanted to correct what seems like a simplification on your post: Nome has the second largest road system in the state at around 300 miles of roads. Hence you'll see lots of pickups, cars, and trucks, in addition to those modes of transport you mentioned.
Of course, there are no roads leading out of Nome to the other larger road system.
What about little Diomede island facing the big one, where the border separating the US & Russia is narrow!
Diomede is a city in Nome Census Area, Alaska, United States. At the 2000 census the population was 146.
The community of Diomede is located on the western face of Little Diomede Island in the Bering Strait. The entire island is incorporated into the city. Its residents are primarily of Inalikmiut (Inupiaq) Eskimo origin.
The first European to reach the islands was the Russian explorer Semyon Dezhnev in 1648. A Russian navigator (of Danish origin) Vitus Bering re-discovered the Diomede Islands on August 16, 1728, the day when the Russian Orthodox Church celebrates the memory of the martyr St. Diomede (hence, the name of the islands). In 1732, a Russian geodesist, Mikhail Gvozdev, plotted the islands on the map (hence, another name).
The text of the 1867 treaty finalizing the sale of Alaska uses the islands to designate the boundary between the two nations: The border separates "equidistantly Krusenstern Island, or Ignaluk, from Ratmanov Island, or Nunarbuk, and heads northward infinitely until it disappears completely in the Arctic Ocean."
Because the International Date Line runs down the 4-km (2.5-mi) gap between the two islands, you can look from Alaska into "tomorrow" in Russia.
In 1987, during the Cold War, Lynne Cox swam from one island to the other. The Diomede Islands are often mentioned as likely intermediate stops for a bridge or tunnel (TKM-World Link) spanning the Bering Strait.
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