Most of the US today would have some serious questions about “global warming.”

They would however, be believers in “climate change.”

Frostbite-inducing temperatures gripped much of the nation, and schools in at least 10 states were closed, as were roads and government offices.

From Florida . . .

Click for PDF file.

In Florida, giant eagle rays, spinner sharks and more than 200 manatees wintered in a balmy canal outside a power plant, the latest exotic Florida animals seeking refuge from the state’s frigid temperatures.

Up north . . .

Nowhere was it colder than in Bismarck, N.D., where wind chills hit a frighteningly frigid 52 below zero Thursday and the temperature reached 14 below. Windchills were still near 50 below in the Dakotas for a second day.

And over there . . .

Britain, already deep in its longest cold spell in nearly 30 years, registered its chilliest night yet this season: minus 22.3 degrees Celsius (minus 8.1 Fahrenheit) in the Scottish Highlands village of Altnaharra.

I don’t think anyone would want to follow us on vacation. Our Alaska trek was done not only when diesel prices were at their peak but during the coldest and wettest month of August that locals had lived through in years.

Two hundred years of glacial shrinkage in Alaska, and then came the winter and summer of 2007-2008.

Unusually large amounts of winter snow were followed by unusually chill temperatures in June, July and August.

Anchorage Daily News, http://www.adn.com/news/environment/story/555283.html

I think I will start watching Alaska weather a little closer. We are planning a 2010 jaunt into the Northwest Territories and Nunavut with the goal of spending a day in Tuktoyaktuk on the Artic Ocean. The trip should be in late August through much of September and the weather will be a major factor.

 It is great to be able to add to our trip history that we survived the summer of ’08 in Alaska!