The sunlight/darkness question

One question that people asked me frequently in Rhode Island was just how many hours of daylight and darkness would I be getting in my part of Alaska. A lot of people assume that the whole state of Alaska gets six months of light and six months of darkness. The reality is that different parts of the state get different amounts of sunlight. I can only give reports of what it's like in the southwest part of Alaska.

So when friends kept asking me this question, I wasn't quite sure what to say, but I told them I could answer them with my own observations when I got here. Now that I'm here, I have some clarification. I can only comment on what the summer is like so far. In the winter things will get considerably different. I've been in Anchorage, Bethel, and Tunt. In each one of these places the sun has gone down around midnight. On my second night in Anchorage, I walked around downtown thinking it was still early because it was bright out. It was 11 PM. I watched the sun set in Bethel after midnight while hanging out with a group of new teachers. The sun sets late and rises early.  I woke up at 4 AM in Anchorage (I was still functioning on east coast time) and it was bright out.

Therefore, on average it's been dark for about four hours a day since I got here. I'm enjoying the extra light right now 'cause I know it's going to dwindle in the winter. And when it's light out, I don't mean that the sun is beaming down from above. Usually it's very cloudy and often very rainy. The temperature has been in the 50s and 60s everyday. I don't feel like it's August. In fact, the other night was the first time I've worn a winter hat in the summer. The picture below was taken from my living room window. You can see the sun peaking through the clouds. It was 10:30 PM.