Inuvik, NWT, with a 2021 census population of 3,137 is the fifth largest settlement in Northern Canada (north of the 60th parallel). At “only” 68°22′ north, it doesn’t even quite make it to Wikipedia’s list of northernmost settlements. But that is the most populated town in Canada whose antipodal point lies within the continent of Antarctica. The antipodal point is the point you would get to if you could drill directly down through the centre of the Earth and come out the other side (also, it is the most distant point on the surface of the Earth, which is always approx. 20,000 km from the original point). Yellowknife and Iqaluit, the capitals of the Northwest Territories and Nunavut, respectively, have antipodal points that lie at sea close to the Antarctic mainland, within a few hundred kilometres from shore.
I found that interesting because while Inuvik is certainly cold most of the time, it’s still surrounded by a lush boreal forest and the warmest couple of months of summer are fairly pleasant. I’ve personally never been, but a friend of a friend lived there for years and still goes there. The antipodal point though is a white desert. About 300 km from that point, on the much milder coast (the antipodal point itself is more than 2000 metres above sea level), one finds Dumont d’Urville Base, a a French scientific station, which is completely barren of vegetation and is barely above freezing during summer (at least they have penguins).
The reasons for the difference in climate are many, but the Antarctic Circumpolar Current is probably mainly to blame, together with the high elevation of the surface and high albedo of the ice.
Its interesting in sweden/nordics because uppsala and oslo are almost above the 60th and gävle and helsinki are above it and they arent even that northern. The northernmost actual city we have is luleå at 65.5 and then theres kiruna which is the northernmost city(tho its a pretty goofy place) which is at 67.8. Then there are the norwegians with their cities that are for some reason ridiculously northern. Tromsø is almost at the 70th and its a pretty normal city all things considered.
People don’t realize just how far north Europe is. The French who first settled Montreal got there in the summer, and seeing that they were at a similar latitude as Paris, prepared for a Paris winter.
They had a very rough winter.
Sort of my point. I identify as very Southern in national terms, as I’m at the far Southern end of Finland, yet still above 60°.
The Arctic Circle begins somewhere around 66° IIRC.
But the difference here is that Canadian Northern territories are a bit colder than us Nordics, because we have the Gulf stream warming us. In 2009-2010 winter I was in the army and it was the coldest winter since the Winter War, and we were doing our NCO-course march. Most of which was annoyingly staying still and waiting — without camp fires. Fuck is was cold.
The weather I have here in Åbo is basically the same as the how the Brits describe their weather, always raining. All of the wind from the Baltic Sea gets split up here. Luckily there’s a bit of an archipelago to slow the worst of it. But it still bangs my windows something fierce at times. (Moreso in the previous apartment.)
Tromsø is pretty Northern yeah, but also on the coast, and warmed quite a lot by the Gulf Stream. I can see the massive difference in weather when going from the coastal city I live in to just 100 km inland to Lahti or Forssa for instance. I can just imagine how different it is on the same latitude in inland Yukon compared to Tromsø. The top of Filnand just reaches above the 70th degree, in Nuorgam. But Utsjoki (Ohcejohka) is the most Northern municipality in Finland, and the EU actually, at 69.9090° N. (Norway isn’t part of the EU as we all know.)
Yeah thats also why siberia is insane because its so inland. But i dont have any right to talk about cold weather, i live in jönköping which is extremely southern. We have 30c in summer here because of global warming now.
Damn, I’m 1 degree south of y’all, just missed the party!