Nov 5 - 6- 7 Whitehorse & Siberia

---

November 5 - 6/7, 2007 -- Whitehorse --- Siberia
Well we are off. At 11 am, the flight left Toronto for Whitehorse the capital of the Yukon. If was nice to get on the plane and see Odny the head stewardess. She was the head stewardess on our trip last year around the Southern Hemisphere. In addition there are a number of people that were on the trip with us last year so it was a little bit like a home-coming reunion. Like last year we were spoiled on IcelandAir. Our lunch would be the equivalent of several dinners on Air Canada. Both Mare and I chose lasagna rather than trout. It was excellent almost as good as mine and that is the highest compliment I can give, since my normal comment when I have some at a restaurant is that mine is better.
The main street of Whitehorse takes less than 10 minutes to walk both sides. The population of the city is just over 20,000, We did a couple of tours then headed back to the hotel since it was snowing. A number of people including ourselves were hoping to see the Northern Lights, unfortunately about an inch of snow fell that night so the dance of the Northern Lights was cancelled.

It is more than ironic that it is always at airports that terrorist have never heard about or for that matter really care about that you encounter airport security that is over the top; I guess they want the practice. Our first encounter with this was at Ayers Rock in Australia last year. I very much doubt that a terrorist is going to pick an airport in the middle of the Australian desert to stage an attack nor are they likely to pick one in the Yukon. We landed at a large Russian Air base in Siberia for refueling, it was interest to see some MIGS parked alongside the runway and helicopters coming and going on a regular basis. Naturally we were not able to disembark and this would have been extremely difficulty since there was a scattering of troops around the plane. Some looked to be fairly attractive females but it was hard to tell in their bulky uniforms. The terrain in the Yukon was snow covered mountains with rivers flowing through the valleys. The difference between the Yukon and Siberia was that in the Yukon the tops of the mountain ranges were rounded off whereas in Siberia they rose to sharp peaks.

---

Photos

Whitehorse + Siberia
Boarding our plane in Toronto

Whitehorse
We were met at the airport by some can-can dancers plus the mayor of Whitehorse

Siberia
Part of our reception party at our Siberia refueling stop

Siberia
One of the mountains near the Siberian airbase

Siberian Airbase
Helicopters were continually taking off and landing