Magnificent Desolation

I was backing up the photos from Theresa’s IPhone the other day and came across these photos taken on her plane flight.

Thanks to the magic of Great Circles, the air route from Chicago to Shanghai takes you over the top of the world.  The majority of the trip is spent over the arctic wastelands of Northern Canada, Alaska, Siberia, and Mongolia.  If the skies are clear, the views can be jaw-droppingly beautiful.

Like every kid that grew up in the 60s I wanted to be an astronaut.  The rockets and all that were cool, but I think the real attraction was the thought of traveling to otherworldly places….of seeing something totally alien to the cornstalks of Indiana.  I loved the pictures of the earth’s curved horizon from high above.  Or the cratered landscapes in the photos from the moon landings.   “Magnificent Desolation” is what Buzz Aldrin called it when he went there.

Being in a jet at 40,000 feet on a cloudless day over the arctic is about as close as I’ll ever get to being an astronaut.   And honestly, I think it is close enough for me.  Yes, it is only 7 miles above the earth instead of the 100 miles for Alan Shepard or the 200,000 miles for the moon crews.  But it’s still high enough to see the curve of the earth on the horizon.  And on a cloudless day, the desolation of the arctic is just as magnificent as anything the moon might offer.