Mike & Wilson at the start, -50 F!
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Howdy. This doglog may take a bit,
but I hope you’ll enjoy some of my thoughts and
recollections on our past weekend at the “toughest
300 miles in Alaska.” Here goes…
Since the drive home from GinGin, we had been locked
in the grip of a huge arctic high pressure that had
temperatures hovering between -60 (in the valleys)
and a couple warm days of -30. With that degree of
cold, I had run only six teams in almost two weeks
and the longest run was 36 miles. We kept packing
booties, planning checkpoint bags, and even cutting
and bagging meat snacks at -35, anticipating our run
in the Copper Basin 300, a race I’ve wanted to run
nearly as much as Quest. Not sure of our future
plans, I didn’t want to miss out on this race this
year. Every day as the race approached, we were
watching weather forecasts and reports from on the
trail of temps hanging near -60 in the Copper Basin.
I had set a kind of cut-off of -40 for what I
thought was reasonable for the safety of our team,
myself, handler Sue, and truck included. We are
riding a razor thin margin heading for Quest with
only 15 dogs still in the pool for the big race.
Logan had still not healed up from GinGin frostbite
to the point I felt comfortable taking him on Copper
Basin. Stump was doing much better and I decided I
could bring him along since we had invested in some
new dog coats that have additional protection for
the boys’ parts. We spent all day Thursday filling
up four checkpoints worth of drop bags and checking
the Internet for up to date weather. It was still at
least -40 both here and there. I don’t want to say I
was scared, but I certainly was concerned and had my
doubts if it was a good idea to follow through with
the race plans. Even on Friday morning after the
truck was fully loaded with gear and we were
starting to load dogs, I was asking Sue and Bill if
this was the right thing to be doing…
Like a ball already rolling downhill, we were too
far along and momentum just kept us moving forward
and out the driveway. Stress wasn’t exactly relieved
as we drove towards North Pole through ice fog and
-50 temperatures. After meeting with Allen Moore and
Aliy Zirkle at a gas station and also headed to the
race, we followed them through the ice fog and south
to the Alaska Range. As we climbed out of the Tanana
valley and the morning darkness, the fog dissipated
and the mountains awed us again. So did the moose.
We saw at least 25 moose along the roadside on the
drive, luckily, none too close. With the winds as
calm as we’ve seen them on our drives over the
Richardson Highway, we could enjoy the view and we
got through the mountains and down to Glennallen to
register at race central and drop off my 12
checkpoint bags. One bag for dog food and a couple
little things I need in the checkpoint right away
(wrist wraps, Mtn. Ridge emu ointment, Jim’s
shoulder vest, hand warmers and chore gloves).
Number two bag holds my personal stuff, like extra
clothes, hand warmers, my food, batteries, and some
dog stuff like extra harnesses, dog coats, gangline
sections, runner plastic, etc. The number three bag
holds fuel for my cooker. At the registration we got
to talk with Lance for a bit and also ran in to
Normand Casavant who we’ve raced with back at
Can-Am.
The temperature was right around -40 as we dropped
dogs from the truck, at our hotel in Glennallen.
Lots of other mushers were staying there, too and we
got to talk for a bit with Brent Sass, who ran Quest
the last couple of years and won the men’s GinGin
this year. He’s got his own style of mushing and his
enthusiasm for having fun and being as competitive
as he can be is contagious. He’s a good guy to be
around and I really enjoy his perspective and drive.
The dogs all ate an early dinner and we headed a few
miles down the road to the Brown Bear Rhodehouse for
the drivers’ meeting. It’s a good old Alaskan place,
full of character and characters, especially that
night with 27 teams of some of the very best sled
dog drivers in the world in the low slung, log room.
Lance Mackey, along with his handler Braxton running
the A-team, and Harry Alexie running his leased
team, were there. Also racing were, Allen Moore who
has won this race 3 of the last 4 years, 2000 Quest
champ Aliy Zirkle, 3-time Quest champ Hans Gatt, and
a bunch of other Iditarod and Quest finishers, many
in the top ten! It’s still hard for me not to be
completely intimidated sitting with folks I’ve
considered my mushing heroes for years, but I did
feel ready and confident in my team. My turn to draw
my bib number came and I pulled #13, considered a
lucky number in mushing circles. As usual at a
drivers’ meeting, reports of the trail were all
good. They never have anything bad to say about the
trail at the start. Honest information would always
be more helpful than wishful thinking, but
positivism almost always overpowers honesty at the
start. Normand was sitting next to us and he pulled
#14. He is up here from Quebec and the northeast
sled dog circuit and still needed to finish this
race for his qualifier for this year’s Quest, where
he’ll be an enthusiastic rookie. When he said, “My
Quest starts tomorrow,” I replied, “Just stick with
me,” with a wink, knowing he had a faster team than
ours. (He has finished as high as third place in the
Can-Am 250, back home.) I would have considered
myself very lucky to be able to stay even close to
his team.
Start Images - by Jonathan Flamm
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Mike Ellis - by Kimi Ross
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After a pretty decent night’s sleep, we dropped and
fed dogs, guessed at the temperature (-40? or
colder?), and drove the 45 miles to Wolverine Lodge
at Lake Louise where I ran the Taiga 300, my first
Alaskan race, not even two years ago. It looked a
lot different now at nearly -50 than it did two
April’s ago when I had come here to qualify for last
year’s Quest and I pondered how far my mushing has
come in that time. Ice fog hovered on the lake and
people moved about quickly, with purpose, around
still running dog trucks. Folks parked in an offset
manner to avoid blowing exhaust near others’ dogs.
Most trucks wouldn’t start if shut off for even a
short period of time in these temperatures and down
on the frozen lake staging area, there is no way to
plug in vehicles. We had Normand parked right in
front of us, perennial Iditarod musher Jim Lanier to
one side, and Lance and his entourage of three teams
and the National Guard on the other side. The dogs
got compliments on their feet and attitude at the
vet check and eventually it was time to harness,
bootie, and coat the dogs. The excitement at the
start of sled dog race is amazing, even in bitter
cold. I was ready to get going as the dogs.
Stump and Wilson, led by Sue, brought us up to the
start line. The team waited patiently for the start
chute to open, then they got a bit more excited in
the chute, and once we were off, they were awesome.
Mugs, Eliza, Gila, Reba, Trip, Lotus, Jim, Merlin,
Hood, and Ambler followed the leaders out into in
the ice fog. They moved like a well-oiled machine
for a few miles across the lake and a couple little
bays and swamps, before hitting a brick wall as we
entered the woods. The trail went from a nice firm
surface to 6-12 inches of sugar snow. Our speed
immediately dropped to half. The dogs looked over
their shoulders at me as to say, “Get off the brake,
don’t you know this is a race.” The trail had been
dragged and had a thin surface on the top, but that
top layer wasn’t deep enough or firm enough to
support the traffic passing it now. We slogged on,
hoping that around a corner, the trail would
improve. Looking back over my shoulder, I saw a team
coming on, and could tell right away it was Lance.
His team has a definite look to it, and it’s
impressive. I stopped, told the dogs to “Take a
break,” lifted my sled out of the trench of a trail,
and without a word to his dogs, Lance cruised by
saying to me, “I didn’t think there’d be this much
soft trail anywhere in the state after this cold….”
Even the lifelong Alaskan musher of the highest
caliber was surprised by the soft, slow trail. And
it had just begun.
I came along to Iris Sutton, whom you’ll remember I
traveled with in my GinGin a couple weeks ago, and I
got the team by when she made a stop. We plodded
along within sight of each other for much of the 30
miles to Tolsona Lake, the first checkpoint,
including getting passed by several more teams, all
trying to be positive about the trail. At least it
was warming up a little. After the sting of -50, -30
doesn’t feel so bad. Normally I like to pedal along
the side of the sled to help the team along. In this
snow however, I could not get off the sled. Nearly
every footfall would punch through the snow and I’d
sink to my knee, if not deeper. All I could do was
stand on the runners. I was very grateful for Carl
Brown’s new studded footboards as I think my feet
would have been pushed off the runners in the deep
snow many more times without them.
Into Tolsona
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Sue was waiting at Tolsona where
they had a chute set up, as spectators watched teams
come and go. With a quick check of my mandatory gear
and a couple initials next to my times, we were off
on to much better trail. I got out of sight of the
checkpoint, but not off the lake, and stopped to
snack my team. They were pulling well and had picked
up coming out of the checkpoint, the only one I
didn’t plan to stop at. We had 20-30 more miles to
Glennallen, the first real checkpoint. After only a
few miles of good trail, we turned gee on to a
25-foot wide, straight-as-an-arrow cut through the
taiga forest. The trail was the worst yet, nearly
bottomless sugar snow that the sled plowed through
instead of sliding over. For the dogs, it was like
walking in deep sand, and I do mean walking. Any
running, even on downhills, was a dream. It was a
plod. The only solace was that some very good teams
caught and passed us, but they took a long time to
gain on us and even longer to pull away. We were
slow, but everyone was slow. When Aliy Zirkle came
by after it had gotten dark, she said, “Is that
Mike?” I think she was pretty surprised to still see
us on her tail after close to an hour. I guess they
aren’t doing so badly after all, I thought. A team
came up from behind and followed us the last several
miles in to Glennallen after the trail got better
when we came out on to a plowed road along the
trans-Alaskan pipeline and then followed the highway
ditch across driveways and in to the checkpoint
behind a gas station at the corner of the highways.
Sue had picked a good parking spot at the back of
the holding area, hidden behind an excavator covered
in snow. I set immediately to my routine that has
become second nature for me. The steps get shuffled
around sometimes as priorities change, but the
chores are the same and all must get done
efficiently and as quickly as possible. The dogs ate
well, had no injuries, and were resting in their
straw within 30 minutes of my arrival. I heated
another batch of water in my cooker, made myself a
meal, and thawed some drinks while Sue sat next to
me in the snow at a balmy -27 degrees. She can’t
help with any chores, or touch the dogs, but having
her there to bounce ideas off of is priceless to me.
I was bummed by the very slow pace we had made over
the first leg and told Sue I was going to take six
hours rest here instead of the four I had planned
on. The lack of any long runs in the last two weeks
because of the bitter cold was showing in the team.
Finally finished at the sled, I went in try to dry
my gear and get a few minutes of sleep on the floor
of the roadside visitors’ center. I woke up from an
hour’s nap and as many other mushers were leaving.
Not wanting to fall too far behind too early, I
decided to stick with my original plan and go after
4 hours rest. The dogs didn’t disappoint me and
devoured their snacks and were ready to head off
into the moonlit night.
With Stump and now Reba in lead, we followed a
couple of teams out of the checkpoint and hit the
trail along the side of the highway, across many
driveways, headed for Chistochina, the next
checkpoint. The two teams that were ahead of us
pulled away fairly quickly and we continued along
our way, alone. After all the passing of the first
run, it was nice to be able to relax a bit more.
Much of this trail was near the highway with
occasional trips off into the bush, under a bridge
and up a river, or along a power line. The moon was
so bright I didn’t need my headlamp except to check
up and down the team every once in a while. After 45
miles or so, the trail was very windblown and we ran
over solid drifts interspersed with gravel and dirt.
We also entered bunny alley. At first I didn’t know
what the dogs got all excited about, but I nearly
lost the sled as they surged forward in unison.
Fearing a moose nearby, I flipped on my light and
scanned for trouble lurking in the willows. Then I
saw the first one, a snowshoe hare darting up the
trail in front of us. The dogs had a ball chasing
those bunnies the rest of the way to Chistochina and
our average speed went up drastically. We crossed
the road and checked in with 12 solid, happy,
healthy dogs just after 5am.
Christochina Checkpoint
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I was sure it must have warmed up to
around zero, but was told it was holding around -30.
I really need to get a thermometer on my sled. The
dogs again ate very well and I found no problems as
I worked through their feet and legs. The nice pace
(almost 10mph), especially at the end of the last
run had me in my best spirits of the race, so far.
Sue and I got to have some breakfast together before
I took a nap on the in a cold corner of community
center floor. I say a nap, but the constant slamming
of the front door across the room didn’t allow for
more than a few winks of sleep. I should have
investigated the other cabin I heard was available
for sleeping, but my gear was all spread out around
a heater and I didn’t really want to gather it all
up to move to another building. Unable to sleep, I
just rested my legs, and thought about the leg
coming up which has the reputation as the hardest of
the race, not to mention it’s the longest at 70
miles that I was told is more like 80. The plan was
to take 6 hours rest here and I stuck with the plan.
About an hour before I was to leave, I got up, had
some soup and biscuits, watered the team with a
meaty broth, and booted up the team. I made the
mistake of leaving the dogs’ coats on them. Mugs and
Reba were in lead, but neither of them was very
crazy about doing that job right now. They barely
got out of the checkpoint and then crawled down the
trail as they peed, pooped, and plodded. Sometimes
it takes a few miles for them to get going and I was
patient, but discouraged. After a couple of miles
without improvement, Stump went back up front to
replace Mugs’ slack tugline in lead. With all 12
tugs tight again, our pace increased not at all. I
considered turning back and scratching. I stopped
again and tried to perk them up with some ear and
back rubs. It made no difference. After an hour or
so of fairly good trail, I doubt we had covered 6
miles. I couldn’t believe how slow they were going.
It was daylight and sunny in some places and I
hadn’t taken their coats off to allow them to cool
down. Big mistake. Just as I was thinking about
stopping to take the coats off, Jim Lanier came
along and I pulled right over to let him by. I hoped
that we could follow along behind him and the dogs
would chase, picking up our pace. Well that’s
exactly what happened and our speed increased by
probably a mile or two per hour. Now I didn’t want
to stop and loose sight of Jim so we pushed on.
Eventually I couldn’t stay with him and we dropped
back to a painful pace, painful for me, not the
dogs. They can go along at a pace like that for a
very long time, which was a good thing because we
had a long ways yet to go. After a few hours of
pretty slow going, Michelle Phillips came along from
behind. I asked her to tell Sue when she got to
Paxson that we were going to be later than planned.
She said ok, and quickly was gone. Chad Linder came
along not too much later and he too passed and
pulled away pretty quickly. Then the hills started.
I could see it coming as we were in a valley with
nowhere to go but up. The trail climbs a summit
above treeline, drops into a little valley and then
makes another big climb to a view with the Alaska
Range to the north, the foothills we’d been climbing
through all around, and the whole Copper basin and
Wrangell Mountains to the south. It was an amazing
view as darkness fell. I felt very small and
insignificant. The trail then had nowhere to go but
down, and what a down it was. For several miles we
slid through a trenched-in, rut of a trail. The dogs
had broken out of their slump as darkness came and
the temperature cooled a bit. The terrain was
interesting to the dogs and they wanted to see what
was around the next corner again. I had a few
moments of being insanely grateful that the weather
was good, as I can’t really imagine traveling over
some of this trail in poor visibility or heavy wind.
The “interesting” trail kept up most of the way to
Paxson and included a crazy lake crossing where the
trail serpentined around bad ice and made me feel
like I was going in circles, a section along the
trans-Alaskan pipeline where there were no markers
at several intersections, a lake (Summit Lake) where
there were rock hard drifts alternating with soft
broken trail, and a climb off Summit Lake that is
the steepest hill I’ve ever taken a dog team up.
While traveling across the lake, I had watched a
team ahead of me obviously struggle getting up that
hill, but when we got there, they had just cleared
the hill and Stump and Wilson took the team right up
without hesitation. A few miles down the Denali
Highway right behind Chad Linder’s team and we were
in to Paxson. Sue, expecting me much later after
getting the message from Michelle, was not around to
help me park, but another handler ran to find her
and I got the team settled in.
I had been looking forward to having a quiet, warm
room to sleep in and a heater to dry gear for the
whole run here. Mushers are allowed to get a room in
the lodge since it is available to all mushers. This
was to be my oasis of the race. I had also told
myself that the team would get a full ten hours of
rest here to make up for the long, slow run to get
here. This was all about Quest training and I didn’t
want to plod out of this checkpoint the way I did
the last. I was more than a little bothered when Sue
told me the lodge had no heat or hot water. This was
not the news I needed. The recent cold snap had
frozen pipes and the circulating pump at the lodge.
The generator that supplies their power was also
having trouble, although the power was back on by
the time I got there. I spread out my gear around a
small electric heater in the room and a big blast
heater in the lobby the were using to keep the place
marginally warm. Then I went to the bar to have a
Paxson burger and an Alaskan Amber. Yummmmm. I had
to get my sleeping bag to stay warm in the room, but
I did get about 5 hours of uninterrupted sleep that
felt like heaven before heading back out to the team
to feed again and get ready for the next leg.
With Stump and Trip in lead, the team let out a good
howl as I walked back down to them after prepping to
go before going up to sign out. The long rest had
done them good, and it had done me good too. I had
sent a complete change of clothes to Paxson in my
drop bags and was glad to have some lighter
outerwear, as it was 40 degrees warmer than at the
start. My heavy suit is great when I need it, but
the rest of time it’s just too much to allow me to
work at all on the sled without sweating myself up.
The team took off nicely out of the checkpoint and
we headed for the long Paxson Lake. Colleen Robertia
and Normand Casavant were both hooking up to go as I
left and I thought I’d see them soon. Looking back
over my shoulder, I could see their headlamps in the
distance on the lake, several miles behind. The
trail got slow in between Paxson and Meiers Lakes.
It was light by now and I saw two moose headed down
a hillside, straight for the trail. The dogs hadn’t
seen them yet, but I could tell we were headed for a
bad scene ahead if something didn’t change. I
started hollering at the moose and they stopped in
their tracks, but the dogs got excited as they
finally could see the moose and surged ahead.
Luckily, the moose thought better of the encounter
and headed back from where they’d come. The trail
was far too entrenched in soft snow for the dogs to
even think about chasing them, and we moved on down
the valley. Coming off the south end of the much
smaller Meiers Lake, we immediately began to climb.
The trail stayed good though and I enjoyed every
part of this part of the run, except the dark clouds
and obvious snow to the south. I kept expecting to
see a team closing in behind me, but we crested the
mountain, snacked right on top with an incredible
view, and headed down the other side to a rude
awakening of more deep, soft, sugar-snow trail with
falling snow on top of it. Our speed dropped in
half. I tried hard to not let the soft trail get to
me this time and just stayed happy and upbeat with
the situation. The dogs weren’t so sure, but despite
being slow, they were still all working well and
eating well when I offered them snacks. After
crossing a bunch of “glaciers” (ice boils from
overflow that has frozen) along an active trapline
we crossed another lake and Colleen caught us and
with a smile and a wave was gone. We followed her
tracks through the fresh snow and the dogs were glad
to have something to chase after going along for
quite a while through fresh snow, getting first
tracks in a couple inches of powder. We popped out
on to the trans-Alaskan pipeline again and flew down
a plowed road on the fresh cushion of powder.
Arriving at Sourdough
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Eliza getting stitched up.
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A few more miles and we were
checking in to the Sourdough checkpoint at a small
group of cabins off the highway. Sue was right there
to help park the team and with 12 healthy dogs and a
smile on my face, I set to my last checkpoint chore
routine. Leader hook and snacks. Booties and
tuglines off. Coats on. Dog dinner soaking. Straw to
dogs. Ointment on dogs’ feet, wrists, and ankles.
Dogs fed. And as I was finishing with some extra
massage, it happened. I heard a growl and a snarl
and a snap. Joseph Robertia, who was standing near
the front of my team, hollered and I jumped up with
a holler. Eliza and Wilson had a three second
dogfight up in the front of the team. As they were
lying down, Wilson had wrapped his leg in Eliza’s
neckline. When she went to lie down, it tightened on
his leg and hurt. He snapped at her since she was
the closest thing to snap at. She snapped back.
Inspecting them, I found an inch long gash in
Eliza’s shoulder and a small puncture under Wilson’s
eye. I looked up to see a Vet standing right there
and motioned for him to come over. Inspecting the
wound, I knew she was out of the race. Karsten, the
Vet who was there, agreed that she should have
stitches to close the wound. I removed her harness
and shoulder vest and carried her to waiting arms
that took her inside for care while I finished with
the dogs that were still in the race. I was sad and
had to bite my lip to keep from screaming. I had
brought my whole team around this loop and was
expecting to be finishing with my full team, every
mushers’ goal, though seldom attainable in a race
this tough and long. My team had been the only one
to leave Paxson with a full 12. My emotions calmed
enough as I finished with the dogs to the point that
I could go inside and see how Eliza was making out.
They had already shaved around the wound, knocked
her out, and sewn her up when I came in to the
little log cabin with a woodstove, a bunch of warm
beds, and some moose stew in a crockpot. Eliza was
going to be fine, although she’ll need at least 10
days off before running again. That made me feel
some better, but I still was very disappointed to
have lost her for the race. She had been is swing
(just behind the leaders) since we left the start
and does a great job up there with her effortless
trot and enthusiastic spirit. Colleen, Normand, and
I all came in within a pretty short period of time
and we all wondered when the others were leaving.
The last run had been ok, but not great. I
attributed much of that to it being mostly in the
daylight when the dogs are at their slowest. We were
getting some information that it had taken the front
runners around 7 and a half hours to complete this
last leg coming up as news came over the radio that
Lance had won the race, followed by Hans Gatt and
Brent Sass. With that information, I figured I could
expect the last leg to take us upwards of nine
hours. I decided on a 6-hour break and went upstairs
to try to sleep. I did get a wink or two, but was
soon enough back outside watering dogs and prepping
for the last run. Colleen and Normand had both
started getting ready before me and were seemingly
much closer to departure than me. Thinking I’d
probably be a bit slower than either of them, I
hurried along to get out of the checkpoint. About 20
minutes before I’d planned on, I called to Stump and
Wilson, “Ready?”
They were, in fact, ready and marched us smartly, if
not terribly quickly, out of Sourdough ahead of both
other mushers. After a little tangle at a wrong turn
leaving, we got rolling along a river and under a
bridge that supported the pipeline. Trail was soft,
but several teams had been out since the afternoon’s
snow and we weren’t exactly breaking trail anymore.
After just about an hour and a half, I looked back
to see a light closing on us so quickly I thought it
was a snowmachine at first. It was just Colleen and
her team that had a fire lit under it. Almost before
I could pull the snowhook from stopping to let her
by, she was gone. It made me smile to think of how
much fun she must be having, moving along at such a
nice pace. We weren’t crawling, but we weren’t doing
anything like what her team was. It was impressive
at that point in the race. That excitement out of
the way, we settled back in to our steady pace under
a big moon slightly dimmed by high clouds. It was
light enough to run without a headlamp again and I
took advantage of being able to see more than the
tunnel of light the lamp creates. I only had
Crosswind Lake as a reference point for distance on
this run and it was 25 miles from the finish. We
went a long ways with me looking over my shoulder
for Normand. The dogs were on cruise control now and
the trail was fairly easy and mostly flat. I knew it
had to be Crosswind when we got there. A sign said
it was 21 miles to Lake Louise and then it’s 4 miles
across that lake to Wolverine Lodge and the finish.
“We’re going home boys and girls!” The dogs jerked
around to look at me as they know just what that
means and it was the first time they’d heard it on
the whole race. They picked up the pace to a lope,
and we cruised up the next few hills.
Just a mile past Crosswind, we came around a corner
and I could see a parked dogteam ahead. I flipped on
my headlamp and called to the leaders to go on by.
The parked team was spread across the trail and the
snow was deep off the side, so my team stopped. I
walked to the leaders and began to take them by when
the other musher walked back from his dogs to talk
to me. He started to ask for some Heet, the fuel for
our cookers, and I asked if he could help lead my
dogs by, then I’d stop and we could talk. It was
Chad Linder and his team had stopped on him. He was
short on fuel and food. I gave him all my extra
fuel, a bag of kibble, a bag of meat snacks, some
cookies, but I think the thing that brightened his
eyes the most was the Gatorade I offered. I asked if
he needed anything else and if he was warm enough.
He assured me he was ok, and I had no reason to
doubt him. I called the leaders up quickly, not
wanting my guys to get any ideas, and bid Chad
goodnight. I definitely felt sorry for him having
dogs that didn’t want to go so close to the end. I
was glad we were back moving for the finish. On a
couple very long, straight sections of trail, I
could see back at least two miles and no headlamp
was in sight. As Lake Louise appeared out ahead in
the dark, I knew Normand wasn’t going to catch up.
Four miles more across the lake and we could see the
lights at the finish chute, where we had started
almost three days ago.
I was glad to be back. The officials were very
interested in reports about Chad as they were
worried for his safety, but were relieved to hear he
had what he needed and was doing fine. After getting
the sledbag check done and thanking the dogs, we
pulled over to the truck for a post-race meal and
love. The dogs had done a great job. Not always the
fastest team, or even as fast as we expect them to
be, but they were solid and strong the whole way. I
should have had all twelve in harness at the end but
for that fluke thing at Sourdough. I couldn’t
complain. Stump had ended up leading 298 of the 300
miles and continues to amaze me. He wants to be no
where else but in the front and can make any other
dog running next to him look like a pro. Some of our
other leaders are very good, but Stump is one of a
kind. Special mention also has to go to my dog Jim.
At over ten years old he finished another tough race
in great shape and still pulling hard. He’s the
father of more than half my team and still is the
spirit and soul of Tsuga Siberians. The team got
some very nice compliments at the truck and I think
I was probably glowing with pride for my happy,
healthy team. Being the only team of Siberian
huskies in the race certainly makes us stand out,
and while that’s not ever our goal, sometimes it’s a
nice benefit. With the dogs cared for it was time
for a couple of burgers and beers at 6:30am. Then it
was time for some sleep.
The Finish Banquet was that night at Wolverine
Lodge. We’d spent most of the afternoon sitting
around the lodge talking with other mushers and
handlers, especially Colleen and Joseph Robertia.
They are great folks and great animal people. We’ve
really enjoyed getting to know them a bit. I got to
talk with Lance a little about the race and the news
that he is not going to defend his title in the
Quest this year. He’s got a lot on his plate and
with Quest having trail and purse problems, he had
decided to focus on his team and his leased team’s
preparations for Iditarod. I certainly don’t blame
him, but I sure will miss having him around at Quest
this year. Rumor has it a bunch more teams are
planning to drop out of Quest before the January 23
deadline. We’ll see what happens. Back at the Copper
Basin awards banquet, some guy from New Hampshire,
driving Siberians, was deeply honored to win the
Humanitarian Award in a room full of his mushing
heroes! I can’t tell you how proud I am of this
award, especially in this field of competitors with
their level of experience and expertise. To stand
out in that crowd is truly an honor I will cherish
for the rest of my life. My dogs make me look good
and I am grateful for their loyalty and friendship.
It’s a privilege to be on their team.
The excitement for the weekend was not quite over
yet. We woke Wednesday morning to news of very bad
weather to the south. 75-100 mile per hour winds
along with freezing rain were making roads
impassable down around Anchorage. We gave out what
extra dog food we had to those teams that knew they
weren’t going to get home that day and were running
short of food, and we headed north in a futile
attempt to stay ahead of the storm. Snow covered,
icy roads greeted us all the way to Paxson where the
mountains get serious. Fifteen miles past the lodge
we met the first truck coming towards us in over 50
miles. We stopped and he told us of completely iced
roads ahead. “If you don’t have chains, don’t go.”
We turned around and reluctantly settled back in to
Paxson Lodge for the night. Finally, on Thursday, we
made the remaining miles “home” to Two Rivers and
45-degree temperatures. It had warmed up 100 degrees
since we were last here! Just another week in
Alaska, the land of extremes...
With just two weeks left until drop bags for Quest
are due, we have our work cut out for us. We’ll need
to pack close to 2000 pounds of dog food, gear,
clothes, and supplies in around 40 bags for delivery
to Quest organization on January 31. We’re also
doing snow dances as the recent heat wave has made
trails skating rinks. After three days with temps
approaching 50 above, the snow has condensed and now
refrozen. The kennel and trails are a mess. The only
thing that will help is snow. Thankfully, as I
finish this up, the temperature has dropped to
around 20 and it’s snowing!! Let it snow, let it
snow, let it snow!!!!
Thanks for checking in.
Take care – Mike.
