Barrow was to me what Disney World would be to a kid. Almost everything I saw and heard made me stare in amazement as if I were in a fairytale. Partly this was because I had never visited an Eskimo community and had never seen as harsh an environment as the Arctic. Of course we were in Barrow in the summer when sun shines 24/7 and the temperature is an amazingly mild 32 degrees Fahrenheit (0 degrees Celsius). Yes, that is amazingly mild compared to the -90 degree winters! Despite the harsh climate and limited vegetation, wildlife is in abundance here. Seals, Polar Bear, Caribou, Snowy Owls and even mosquitoes the size of bees seemed quite common. It was hard to imagine we were only 1000 miles away from the North Pole! Apart from the fact that Barrow is the northernmost point of Alaska, it is also considered to be the northernmost continuously inhabited village in the world. Although a majority of the Inupiat who live here have electricity, water and sanitation, their diet of whale meat, Polar bear meat, seal meat and Caribou meat remains unchanged from the diet of their ancestors. One difference is that they now hunt with rifles and travel by snowmobiles.