Blizzard Camping Trip

Yep, you read that right. 

I was doing my regular teaching in Kobuk. By that I mean the standard mathematics, language arts, industrial technology, social studies and physical education that I teach every day. Then my lead teacher (principal) tells me about a trip the high school takes every year. The goal of the trip is to get some exposure to future career options. These activities include some exposure to careers in industries like culinary arts, construction, and process technology. After, the course usually does something with students that is educational about a variety of topics (they change it every two weeks). The week I was scheduled to go was the two weeks they decided to do Arctic Survival. Being from Kansas, I was very apprehensive about camping out in a tent for two weeks in the Alaskan wilderness. However, when the boss tells you to do something, you do it. 

So for two weeks I was scheduled to be in Kotzebue for classes on careers and then the camping trip. Thankfully, the first week was full of classes on how to survive while students got exposure to career options. The second week we are scheduled to camp. The classes were pretty entertaining, In culinary arts, all the students got certified to handle food, we made pizza and ice cream, and learned a lot of useful information on bacteria. In construction, we got to view the shop where students were currently building a roof to go on a house, learned how to manage money, and got to do some heavy machinery simulators. Process technology had some very cool stories about experiences in the navy, explained the process of the Alaskan Pipeline, and explored career options within the field.

However, the best classes were the second half of the day. In the afternoons, we went to lunch at the local school in Kotzebue and then worked with the industrial tech/STEM/wood working teacher. In these classes we made stickers from vinyl, learned how to set traps, learned some survival tips if you end up stranded in the wilderness (including how to create snow caves and snow coffins), and lastly, we got to create our own niksik. A niksik is a type of fishing pole you would use if you are ice fishing. It is made from two pieces of wood. You create a handle and then what we would call the "rod" in the lower 48. In total you make roughly two feet worth of wood with the rod extending roughly 10 inches and the handle is about 8 inches. Then you just need line, a hook, and some bait. 

When the time came for us to actually get out there and go camping, a horrible storm came to Kotzebue. There was heavy snow and winds reaching 60-90 mph. Planes stop flying in or out of Kotzebue. Every night, I could hear the wind howling outside and could see thick snowflakes blowing in sideways from my window. The morning we were supposed to go out I was informed that even the most experienced campers and outdoorsmen were opting to stay in. Likewise, my students and I did the same. Instead of camping, we are continuing the courses that we had experienced the week before. The students got to create an ulu which is a curved blade used for skinning animals. Typically, they are made from the horn of a caribou. 

In a way, I have misled you. The title says a blizzard camping trip but the camping was cancelled. So we only experienced the blizzard from the bus or indoors. "Blizzard Camping Trip" sounded a lot cooler than "Almost A Blizzard Camping Trip." 

This is a photograph of the sound near Kotzebue