# Your geographical misconceptions **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [December 30, 2020, 8:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-geographical-misconceptions/929294 "2020-12-30T20:58:33Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 31
**Author:** ![superwombat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/superwombat/32/16616_2.png) [@superwombat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/superwombat)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2021, 4:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-geographical-misconceptions/929294/602 "2021-02-13T04:54:48Z")
> [@eschereal](#): > > Kind of sad, really, as they have [the coolest license plates](http://www.plateshack.com/y2k/Nunavut/nun1999.jpg), that no one ever sees. The NWT has the same polar bear shape, modern ones have a northern lights background. Tourists from there have had their plates stolen while on southern vacations šŸ˜Ÿ ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2021, 5:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-geographical-misconceptions/929294/603 "2021-02-13T05:05:07Z")
Who got the Polar Bear licence plate was one of the major points of disagreement when Nunavut split from the NWT. ---
**Author:** ![jtur88](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e9c0ed/32.png) [@jtur88](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jtur88)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2021, 6:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-geographical-misconceptions/929294/604 "2021-02-13T06:08:59Z")
They both did, and Nunavut cars were registered with an N suffix. But Nunavut appears to have surrendered the polar bear in about 2013. ---
**Author:** ![AK84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/85e7bf/32.png) [@AK84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AK84)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2021, 6:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-geographical-misconceptions/929294/605 "2021-02-13T06:25:02Z")
I was staying at my Aunts house in Long Island in late August once. She was having a dinner party that day and needed some stuff. There was a market near her house and it being perhaps the only walkable part of Long Island, I volunteered to get it. A walk of about a mile and a half. I arrived at the store soaked in sweat from head to toe. ---
**Author:** ![eschereal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eschereal/32/18939_2.png) [@eschereal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eschereal)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2021, 7:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-geographical-misconceptions/929294/606 "2021-02-13T07:01:30Z")
It seems like the humidity goes all the way to the Rockies. We were in Manitou Springs, which is about 10 miles up into the front range, in August. It was 80/90F-ish, but tolerable. The next day we headed east, and about 60-some miles into Kansas, we stopped for fuel. I got out of the air conditioned car and could barely breathe. It was no hotter than the day before, but the air was absurdly thick. The car sits by the fuel pump and you see water running out from under it, and you think nothing of it because it is just what the A/C unit had been pulling out of the air. ---
**Author:** ![jtur88](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e9c0ed/32.png) [@jtur88](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jtur88)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2021, 11:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-geographical-misconceptions/929294/607 "2021-02-13T11:33:14Z")
In south Texas, I leared to walk to the store at about 2 pm. At daybreak, the humidity is 100% and there is no breeze. In the afternoon, the air evaporates the sweat which cools, there is often a breeze, and a few fluff shade-clouds form. Nicer, even though 105. ---
**Author:** ![Railer13](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/railer13/32/9742_2.png) [@Railer13](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Railer13)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2021, 3:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-geographical-misconceptions/929294/608 "2021-02-13T15:07:42Z")
> [@eschereal](#): > > about 60-some miles into Kansas, we stopped for fuel. I got out of the air conditioned car and could barely breathe. Perhaps this is my selective memory, but as a kid growing up in Kansas, I really donā€™t remember absurdly high humidity. This high humidity, I believe, is a fairly recent phenomenon. (Climate change?) ---
**Author:** ![eschereal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eschereal/32/18939_2.png) [@eschereal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eschereal)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2021, 3:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-geographical-misconceptions/929294/609 "2021-02-13T15:35:29Z")
> [@Railer13](#): > > as a kid growing up in Kansas, I really donā€™t remember absurdly high humidity Well, it was what you were used to. Relative to just inside the Front Range, the humidity in west Kansas seemed brutal, especially with respect to an air conditioned car. ---
**Author:** ![Railer13](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/railer13/32/9742_2.png) [@Railer13](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Railer13)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2021, 3:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-geographical-misconceptions/929294/610 "2021-02-13T15:40:02Z")
> [@eschereal](#): > > Relative to just inside the Front Range, the humidity in west Kansas seemed brutal, especially with respect to an air conditioned car. I still live in Kansas. I should have mentioned that the humidity now is much higher than I remember as a kid on the farm. ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2021, 3:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-geographical-misconceptions/929294/611 "2021-02-13T15:49:51Z")
> [@eschereal](#): > > Well, it was what you were used to. Relative to just inside the Front Range, the humidity in west Kansas seemed brutal, especially with respect to an air conditioned car. Iā€™ve never spent a full day in Kansas, but oddly enough, inside the Front Range, it always _feels_ like it is just about to rain due to the low air pressure from the altitude. Being someone who has never lived anywhere above 2000ā€™, I sometimes randomly get that feeling when I get very much above 1000ā€™, having experienced it in Cortland NY at 1200 but not at Asheville NC at 2300 so I donā€™t know if that would happen in Kansas ---
**Author:** ![panache45](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/panache45/32/64_2.png) [@panache45](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/panache45)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2021, 6:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-geographical-misconceptions/929294/612 "2021-02-13T18:19:35Z")
> [@AK84](#): > > I was staying at my Aunts house in Long Island in late August once. She was having a dinner party that day and needed some stuff. There was a market near her house and it being perhaps the only walkable part of Long Island, I volunteered to get it. A walk of about a mile and a half. > I arrived at the store soaked in sweat from head to toe. I lived on Long Island for a few years, right on the shore (Long Beach). I donā€™t remember the humidity being worse than anywhere else. Certainly not as bad as Manhattan. Ever been to Tampa in the summer? ---
**Author:** ![eschereal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eschereal/32/18939_2.png) [@eschereal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eschereal)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2021, 6:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-geographical-misconceptions/929294/613 "2021-02-13T18:32:27Z")
> [@panache45](#): > > Ever been to Tampa in the summer? Florida is not particularly pleasant in March. ---
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2021, 7:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-geographical-misconceptions/929294/614 "2021-02-13T19:26:31Z")
You people donā€™t have to put calendar modifiers on your comments, you know. Florida is not particularly pleasant. Period. ---
**Author:** ![eschereal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eschereal/32/18939_2.png) [@eschereal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eschereal)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2021, 8:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-geographical-misconceptions/929294/615 "2021-02-13T20:00:45Z")
Well, you will be pleased to know that most of it will be gone, sloughed off into the sea, by the end of this century. ---
**Author:** ![panache45](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/panache45/32/64_2.png) [@panache45](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/panache45)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2021, 11:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-geographical-misconceptions/929294/616 "2021-02-13T23:04:28Z")
I wonā€™t be around to appreciate that. ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2021, 11:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-geographical-misconceptions/929294/617 "2021-02-13T23:50:43Z")
> [@kitap](#): > > Itā€™s a weird green bird with skeleton wings. > [@LSLGuy](#): > > Thereā€™s another off-and-on discussion of @Northern_Piperā€™s interesting but confusing avatar started by me here: Itā€™s not confusing at all! Three drones, blowpipe, chanter and bag - so simple! ---
**Author:** ![kitap](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/b9e5f3/32.png) [@kitap](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kitap)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2021, 11:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-geographical-misconceptions/929294/618 "2021-02-13T23:53:40Z")
No, itā€™s a bird drawn by cartoonist George Price. ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [February 14, 2021, 12:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-geographical-misconceptions/929294/619 "2021-02-14T00:00:08Z")
Who is? ---
**Author:** ![The\_Stafford\_Cripps](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_stafford_cripps/32/7167_2.png) [@The\_Stafford\_Cripps](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Stafford_Cripps)\ **Post date:** [February 14, 2021, 12:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-geographical-misconceptions/929294/620 "2021-02-14T00:32:04Z")
> [@Knowed\_Out](#): > > Something I didnā€™t realize till I visited there, but the Highlands of Scotland are actually in the Arctic Circle. The bombastic tour guide explained that the constant cross-winds from the North Sea and the Atlantic kept the weather windy and chilly, so itā€™s best to fortify yourself with food and drink that make you fat and better insulated. > [@Dead\_Cat](#): > > Agreed - and that ā€œnorthernmost bitā€ is the Shetland Islands, which are some 300 miles north of the northernmost Scottish highlands. > [@Knowed\_Out](#): > > Yeah, I came to realize the Scots love tall tales. We took the Tour of the Dead tour in Edinburgh and learned that the big hill where the cemetery is located used to be flat ground before they piled all the Black Plague corpses there. I think weā€™re perhaps getting a little over-excited here. Nowhere in Shetland is more than 170 miles north of the Scottish mainland. However Scotland is on the same latitude as Hudson Bay, which is why the influence of the Gulf Stream and the North Atlantic Drift is relevant. Itā€™s important to know that tour guides talk absolute fucking bollocks. Moreover, a good proportion of them arenā€™t actually Scottish, they are as likely to be Australian or English, and the stories they tell are the ones which their employers have found resonate with foreign tourists, and not necessarily the stories which Scottish people traditionally told each other. So Iā€™m not sure which ā€œbig hillā€ is being referred to above, most tourist tours take in Greyfriars Kirkyard but itā€™s not especially (or at all) associated with the numerous outbreaks of the plague between the 14th and 18th centuries. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Stafford\_Cripps](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_stafford_cripps/32/7167_2.png) [@The\_Stafford\_Cripps](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Stafford_Cripps)\ **Post date:** [February 14, 2021, 1:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-geographical-misconceptions/929294/621 "2021-02-14T01:03:40Z")
What Iā€™m trying to say is that it is embarrassing to hear the bullshit that foreign visitors are fed about oneā€™s country, Iā€™m sure Iā€™m not the only Scot that feels that way and Iā€™m sure it doesnā€™t just apply to Scotland. It can get really irritating too, and even destructive; did someone tell you that itā€™s good luck to rub the nose of the statue of the dog called Greyfriars Bobby? Thatā€™s not a thing, itā€™s entirely made up by and for foreign tourists, and itā€™s beginning to damage the statue. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-geographical-misconceptions/929294.md?page=30) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-geographical-misconceptions/929294.md?page=32)