Chris W wrote:
Floyd L. Davidson wrote:

. . .
On the other hand, if you take a boat to Big Diomede, even
today, you'll wind up in a Russian jail cell while they
negotiate your release.

What if you have to make a forced landing there. From what I
can gather about Little Diomede, there is little to no chance of
a forced landing there ending in anything short of a totaled
aircraft.

In the summer, that's a fact!

But over most of Alaska you aren't close enough to an airport
that you can make an emergency landing and expect anything less
than a totaled aircraft. There are no roads and no farm
fields... it's into the trees, onto the tundra, into the drink,
or splattering onto the rocks. And every hundred miles or so
there's a place you can land. I've only met one person who's
ever had an engine failure just happen to happen close to an
airport... (other than fuel starvation from an empty tank).

I would suggest an extended trip to Nome, and a few months
learning to fly in the Arctic before anyone try something like
visiting Russia.

That sounds like a great idea, although a few months sounds a
bit much to me. Maybe a few weeks?

Okay, but *I* won't be going for ride with you! ;-)

The OP also might want to take a course or two
in international diplomacy, or maybe get a law degree! The
paperwork involved is something only a real lawyer would ever
find exciting.

Hopefully the AOPA can help with the paper work, but I do plan
on learning Russian, at least a little and enough to know
aviation lingo in Russian.

Incidentally, we've had several Russian pilots work for one or
another air taxi outfits here in Barrow over the years. Every
single one of them struck me as excellent pilots, which says
something because while I'm not nervous at all about airplanes,
it's a fact that pilots scare me to death!

--
FloydL. Davidson http://web.newsguy.com/floyd_davidson
Ukpeagvik (Barrow, Alaska)