Tales From the Trails
For your enjoyment I've posted a collection of some of the recollections, trail stories and favorite memories I have from working with the dogs. This is quite sporadic and abbreviated, largely due to time constraints, as my focus is necessarily developing the team and the memories, rather than documenting them in a timely manner. Sometimes it is also hard for me to sort out what is most important and what would share the best with the larger world. Often I discover that moments I find extraordinary do not translate well to the casual observer. So please bear with me, ask questions, and I'll strive to explain what I can and help you understand some of the marvelous experiences which the team allows me to share with them.
You're also invited to read and enjoy the Briar's Patch Sled Dogs Blog. The dogs don't actually know we're blogging about them, so it'll be our little secret -- although if they did know, I think they'd approve...probably just think up more mischief to post about!
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2 March 2005 – I'm a Distance Musher Now
Greetings! As I type this I reflect on how lucky I am that my fingers don't ache as much as most of the rest of my body does…but I'm reveling in those aches, every last one of them – all completely earned!
The team and I finished our first distance race this past weekend – yea! OK, a baby race at 132 miles, but as our race marshal Jack Beckstrom said as he shook my hand at the finish line “Well, you're a distance musher now!”
I'm real proud of the team and just wanted to share that with everybody. They did great, I set up a plan which we executed and, problems and all, we ended up finishing ½ hour ahead of schedule. I started and finished all 12 dogs on my team (first time I'd driven a 12 dog team on a sled). Weather was crappy on Sunday and through howling winds and driving snow they just kept on truckin'! Everybody ate, everybody snacked, everybody drank. And today in the dog yard they're pretty satisfied with themselves, and they should be.
Here's some of the details for those who are interested.
8 competitors entered the 132 mile distance race, which had 3 checkpoints (at roughly 25, 78 and 107 miles), mountainous course, mostly climbing and descending, not much level terrain. 6 of us finished, and the other 2 scratched, at the first and third checkpoints respectively. So I ended up with the “red lantern” award, for the last place finisher, and got a bottle of wine. Actually my third bottle of wine of the banquet – one for coming in 6 th (the race paid down to 10 th ) along with my check, one for being recognized as “Best Rookie”, and one for the Red Lantern. Complete times are on the Arrowhead race website at www.arrowheadsleddograce.com , as well as a map of the trail showing the checkpoints.
My game plan going in was to do the run to the first checkpoint in about 3 hours, then rest 2 during the heat of the day (the afternoons have been quite hot), then truck on up around Medicine Lake to 4 Corners, rest for 5 hours, then head back down the trail to checkpoint 3, do the mandatory 2 hour rest, then head home the remaining 25 miles. What really happened is more interesting – it was overcast the first day, not as hot, the dogs were high on race adrenaline (first race ever for about half of them), and they would * not * rest – in the checkpoint, they stood and screamed and barked, so we took off after about an hour (at least 50 minutes of which were quite noisy), and I tried about every 10 miles to stop and see if they would settle down. No takers. Snacks were enthusiastically consumed, then the crying to go resumed. OK…. So where I'd planned to be into 4 Corners about 9-10pm, we arrived at 7:44pm. I decided to rest them for 6 hours instead of 5 to try to make up for some of the rest they kept refusing. They were a bit tired coming in – feeding was unusually quiet, but everyone ate. So we prepared to depart about 2am, and had to bootie everyone due to the crusty snow, and I decided to give my outbound leaders a rest (Gerry and Crimp), and put in my inbound leaders (Sinclair and Reebok).
I relearned an old adage: if it ain't broke, don't fix it. Well in my case I broke it, the front end of my team that is. For several miles Reebok was a space cadet – darting to the sides of the trail, chasing Sinclair all over the trail, and in general being a pain. She never really settled down up front, so I finally swapped her out through some variations and ended up with Gerry and Sinclair who took us home. About 4am it stated to snow/sleet, the nasty stinging right into your eyes kind. I thought Fay was injured and I was concerned it might be her shoulder since her gait was so funny, so I bagged her – NOT a popular idea, and I had to spend a few miles popping her back into the bag before she really settled in. So we arrived into Pilgrim Creek for our mandatory 2 hour rest at checkpoint #3 to some early morning rain at 7:38am. The dogs were getting pretty tired at this point – we'd done tougher stuff than this in training, but not this long, and you could see they were beginning to believe it would never end. We took off after our two hours and 6 minutes (to adjust for the staggered start times) to have the rain quickly turn to snow, a LOT of snow. The upper trails had several new inches and previous tracks were already gone, even though Bino had passed through less than 3 hours before I did. Then at the top of the last hill, Pomeroy Ridge on the back side of Deer Mountain , the wind was howling across the trail, snow blowing like crazy, no tracks in the snow just wind ridges, but the dogs knew we were almost home and paid it no heed. Actually the only thing that bothered them were the spectators near the end – a guy was walking along in the trees on our right side about ¼ mile from the end and suddenly Gem saw him and about jumped out of her skin and caused a big tangle. Got that straightened out and arrived at the finish line to the cheers of our friends, all the race vets and officials who'd braved the nasty weather to see us come in. Congratulations all round, lots of hugs and pats for the dogs, and then “Arf! Arf!....Arf! Arf!” Sandy started her chant again! All is right with the world! Nobody complained about getting in their boxes, and everybody ate and rested well. Elaine and Peggy fed them in the rainstorm before the banquet while I took a much needed shower and Elaine dropped them after dinner on the way home, but I was long gone by then and hardly remember a thing.
So my first foray into distance mushing was everything I'd hoped for and dreamed about, and then some. I figured I'd have some problems and I did – one particularly nasty downhill switchback early on when they were fresh was troublesome and sure ‘nuf I got dumped and dragged but held on and onward we went. It certainly didn't help that as I was trying to slow them down coming into the steep turn, Martin Koenig (who won the race) flies by me on the inside of the turn and of course my team gives chase! But I'd built time for trouble into my plan, so we still ended up finishing by 1:30pm Sunday instead of the 2pm I'd been planning on. So everybody is resting up and OK, and we have a starting point now for what we can do as a team. Now to see how much more we can do… And it was simply magical to pull out of 4 Corners in the wee hours of the morning, with muted cloud-obscured moonlight, and to turn off my headlamp and just watch the team glide through the darkness – is was surreal, like a dream sequence in an art house film. I had a blast, and even when I was miserable it was still wonderful to be out there with the dogs. They all did well, all pulled hard. No, I'm sure it wasn't an optimum schedule, or the best they could do, but it was a plan and we stuck to it as best we could and now we have a baseline to work from.
Repeat as much as possible till 2008 and finishing the Iditarod! Thanks to everyone for their encouragement and support…we're on our way!
-- liz
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21 February 2006 – 2006 Race to the Sky, a few thoughts
Hi All –
Sorry I've been incommunicado since returning from the race, I've been swamped doing dog sled rides every day, trying to cover the race expenses – my “winnings” didn't exactly cover everything, or very much at all! ;-)
The race was an awesome experience, and leaves me hungry for more. This distance stuff is incredibly wonderful – also tough, but if it wasn't, it wouldn't be nearly so wonderful, would it? The team and I finished, coming in 16 th out of 24 teams which started the race, earning us another red lantern to put on the mantle above the wood stove. Eight of twelve dogs finished the race, and each one had their moments – the leaders led and everybody pulled! It was a terrific learning experience for the two-footeds as well as the four-footeds, and we all have a bunch of things to work on this coming year. ;-)
That's the reader's digest version. The long version is attached…holler if you have questions or comments – with your help, I'd like to get it ready to put up on my website as I get the site revamped this spring.
Despite Peggy's disbelief, I really love this stuff, all of it, so stay tuned, more to come!! One of our guests a couple of years ago read all the staff's hands, and she said I was on a quest…I sure hope this is it!
-- liz
And here's the longer detailed version:
12:38am, Thursday, February 9, 2006. My dog team and I pass under the arch signifying the finish of Race to the Sky. Our truck is dead ahead, but no humans in sight, just a quiet warm-ish night – but the lights are on even though nobody is home, which adds to the surrealness of the moment. Bam, just like that, it's over. We FINISHED Race to the Sky. Pinch me, wow, I can't believe it….
So now, after having a week to reflect and catch up on my sleep – wow, still can't quite believe it. After all, Race to the Sky is a big-time race, one that real mushers do…golly, gee, whiz! ;-) Not to worry, humans quickly materialized from the dark trucks to greet me and the team, including the race marshals and most importantly my handler Elaine. A few highlights of the race for me…
First the factoids: This year's race was divided into a 50 mile stage on Saturday Feb. 4 starting from historic Camp Rimini and going nearly to Deer Lodge, and a 300 mile continuous portion of the race which started at Lincoln school the next day. Pretty good snow coverage everywhere, so we got to run the entire course as planned – see www.racetothesky.org for more details. 24 teams started the race at Camp Rimini , and 16 finished. John Barron repeated as the 2006 winner and came across the finish line Tuesday evening at 7:12pm and the Red Lantern Winner came across Thursday at 12:38am….oh yeah, that's me! My lantern collection continues to grow… ;-)
The starting team at Camp Rimini : Reebok, Crimp, Summer, Tumble, Tie, Sinclair, Rope, Gerry , Utah , Sandy , Shasta, Smoke.
The first stage really had me worried. It was an icy start at Camp Rimini , with very thin snow and a pumped up team – yikes! A lot of the trail talk at the driver's meeting had focused on the middle section of trail that first day, a narrow twisting snow machine track that connected 2 groomed trail systems – down into a ravine, travel along the creek, back up the other side, several places of which it was just barely wide enough to fit a sled between the trees. Double yikes! So when we got there, the dogs followed the signs and then 2-by-2 dropped out of sight in front of me…here we go, down the chute, can't stop now, just ride it -- in deep snow, going straight downhill, dogs flying, sled wallowing – hey, wait a second! I can control this! I can ride this out! Hey this is a blast!!! I was having as much fun as the dogs were – Wahoo!
Then back up the other side, onto the “boring” groomed snowmobile trail, just in time for a blizzard to blow in, and I do mean blow! Snow, wind, keep following the race's trail markers, those you can see anyway. I noticed there also appeared some other markers besides our race trail markers, somebody was using pie plates. Suddenly I came around the bend, snowmobile trail curved right – and EVERYBODY who had passed me was to my left. Teams going this way and that, an opening in a barbed wire fence and the trail descended steeply and a bunch of teams stopped facing uphill, patiently waiting for ??? Seems everyone in front of me (practically the whole race at this point) had followed the little pie plate markers – turns out they were for a snowmobile club poker run the next day and directed folks down into a big snow play bowl with no outlet. Folks had been messing around down there for an hour or more – loose teams, dumped sleds, no trail, soft deep snow – terrific fun, sorry I missed it! A snowmobiler rode up at that point and confirmed we needed to go right to Deer Lodge and offered to put in a track for us to the next intersection, since all semblance of grooming was long gone in the storm. I happened to be first at the “intersection” and had to get out of the way and follow him so the other teams could also….and thus my team LED Race to the Sky – for about 10 minutes until everyone got back on the trail and John Barron very graciously passed me again. We went over Champion Pass in the snow, then as we started to drop towards Deer Lodge the snow stopped, the sun shone through under the clouds, over the mountains and valley just before sunset – it was breathtaking! Too bad the dogs don't enjoy views – I sure did! A great reception and dinner in Deer Lodge capped off a really fine day on the runners!
The restart the next day at Lincoln school was fairly unremarkable, except I had to drop my first dog, Tie – a wrist injury he'd sustained the week before on a training run flared up and I couldn't warm him out of it. We picked up our riders at the start line, meandered through the trails up behind Lincoln for a while, then back to the school to drop the riders and pick up our handler who rode with us through Lincoln in case our dogs decided to run the highway instead of the snow strip. We had no problem with that, and luckily at least a little snow was left to follow (the latter teams had none and Cindy Gallea's team tried ducking into every store front along the way – someone suggested at the post-race driver's meeting to take away their credit cards to solve the problem!). However when we got to High Country Jerky, we're supposed to cross UNDER the highway through this cattle culvert…obviously I need to find a cattle culvert for training. They got all balled up but once they were untangled and led into the culvert, we emerged on the other side in fine shape – dropped Elaine off and we're FINALLY on the trail for good. 40 miles to reach…
Cain Ridge – an exercise in parking nightmare for the trucks, and little/no volunteers to get mushers checked in and out. Had an extended 2 hour unplanned stop – rookie musher and rookie handler logistics compounded by the parking nightmare and the truck was a million miles away. Live and learn, and another 32 miles to…
White Tail Ranch – has water available, right up until someone flushes the toilet for the 3 rd time, then the water table is too low and no water for dogs, please use the porta-potty outside, and go ahead and melt all the snow you want. Terrific spinach chicken soup. Getting there over Huckleberry, heavy fog – can't see a darned thing, but not a big deal. We saw the lights of White Tail for a long time as we descended from the pass…and finally got there.
The “fairly flat” 53 mile stretch from White Tail to Seeley Lake – wasn't. Didn't help that it was the middle of a sunny warm day, and I didn't know what the trail looked like and I'd heard horror stories about getting lost going into Seeley Lake . Turns out it was well marked and again not a big deal. Ready for a nice rest among the trees. I bumped my original rest time from 6 to 7 hours, as the heat took a lot out of them. Then had to stay an extra 45 minutes to drop Crimp, who suddenly turned very 3 legged and had a lot of pain in his left rear foot. Talked extensively with Dr. Sue about his sesmoiditis, and bingo! We solved the mystery of his funny “skip-gait”. As she was describing this chronic condition I was steeling myself for her to say his career was over. Drum roll…. “Is it treatable?” “Oh yes, absolutely! Here's what you can do…” Whew! That alone was worth the price of admission! Off to Owl Creek and the really big climbs without my main “mountain man” – he pretty much single handedly drove the team through the blizzard and climbs in the Joseph race. OK, now who's going to step up to take his place?
Sandy . Just as Crimp stepped up in the Eagle Cap race, Sandy 's star shone brightly throughout Race to the Sky, especially the second half. As the team's resident “cheerleader” her chant of “Bark-bark! Bark-bark!” at every stop has always kept the team revved up. She also did the heavy lifting at lead for much of the second half of the race. Big climbs – yes. Tough trail – yes. Lots of miles – yes. She was the proverbial Energizer Bunny, even when others got really tired and tried to stall. So I planned for it to take 9 hours to Owl Creek, and we got there in 8.5 – but it was mentally a grind, even more than physically. Once we got off the wide groomed trail and got onto the snow machine track up, over and through the woods, I was happy thinking we were almost there – the snowmobile trail map says this section is only 15 miles. But what a 15 miles! Took us forever, 4 hours to be exact. Pulled into Owl Creek at 7:50am for a much needed break.
Left Owl Creek late afternoon after luxuriating in the sun all day, getting some food and sleep, and steeling myself for the 52 mile return trip to Seeley Lake . As it cooled off the dogs' energy picked up and we motored on into the night, led by Sandy and Reebok. Near the top of the climb out, water runoff had created several paths cutting cross the trail, the last one particularly deep and wide – the sled hit hard and so did Shasta in wheel, and shortly thereafter she went down. So I unloaded the sled, rearranged everything, stuffed her in the back, bungeed some gear on top of the bag, zipped her up – and we carried her the remaining 40 miles into Seeley Lake. Shortly after bagging her we powered up over a lip in the trail and lo! We were back on the wide groomed trail again! So soon! I looked at my watch – 4 hours…what a difference your expectations make!
Got back into Seeley Lake about 1:30am and was met by the checker and – Peggy?!?! In a supreme act of love she had sent Elaine to get some sleep and had sacrificed her own beloved sleep to help me out. Oh yes, and help the dogs – actually more like help the dogs and by the way Liz too. I'd already decided to drop Shasta and Rope – Rope had started puking on the way into Owl Creek and he was in the team coming back but we went slow so I didn't have to bag 2 dogs. A race bug was making its rounds and there was a lot of puke on the trail. He wouldn't eat or drink, so we got him started on some antibiotics and an IV bag of fluids to get him re-hydrated. Just before we pulled back into Seeley Lake Gerry started to puke also, but he was still eating and drinking, so I started him on antibiotics and kept my fingers crossed, determined that he was going to stay in the team for the last leg.
Homeward bound – the last 74 miles. Left Seeley Lake just before 10am fueled by a famous breakfast burrito, and Gerry and Reebok took us up out of there and onto the main trail. Slowly, but we kept going. The day quickly grew miserably hot and sunny, then thankfully clouded over even if it didn't cool off. After the significant climb past Monture Creek, we stopped in a meadow for some snacks and trail rest. It was definitely cooling off and I could only stay about an hour and a half before I was pretty chilled. Gerry got a new burst of energy and we moved well after the rest – not sure if it was the rest, the cooler temps, or the fact he thought we would be stopping in a few miles at Whitetail Ranch again just as we had Seeley Lake on the return trip. But we on-byed Whitetail, much to his dismay, and started the return trip over Huckleberry. Gerry is tired now and a drag on the team, so I kept Reebok in solo lead and put him on a neckline attached to the handlebar of the sled, so he could just walk with me. I kept working with Reebok and the rest of the team and we kept making (slow) progress. At one stop I noticed Gerry had stopped lagging behind the sled and had come up a few steps to be in front of the handlebar, as if to say “OK, I took my break, I'm ready to go again.”. So I took him up on it, put him back in lead, and we made our way over Huckleberry. Once we dropped down into the trees above Lincoln , he was pooped again, so I put him back in the team and put Sandy up front with Reebok and that's how we came across the finish line. Pushing, pushing, focused on getting to the end then BAM! It's over. The team did a great job and gave me lots of “To Do” items for my training list. Like Tumble and Utah acting out by keeping stopping to pee going over Huckleberry, even though they know better and have never done that before. And many new insights for me as to the depth and character of my dog team. Smoke and Summer were awesome in wheel, pulling hard each and every step, never hesitating. Ditto Shasta and Rope before I had to drop them. And the leaders all came through when it counted. I'm really proud of all of them. I had written a race schedule for the race predicting run times for each segment, and we hit them all nearly to the minute…guess I'm getting to know my team a bit.
None of this could have happened without an army of people whose help and support have enabled me to pursue this crazy passion. But especially I am grateful to Elaine and Peggy for their hands-on help and support to accomplish our first qualifier. Elaine is wonderfully detail oriented, a quick study and promptly figured out the handler's game – and the dogs responded well to her care. Peggy was intent on taking care of Elaine, but not being “stuck” at the checkpoints – she rented a car, had us bring her X-C skis along, was going to do some sightseeing for her first time in Montana She saw the sights of the checkpoints and the motels. The ski bag did make it out of the car top box, but remained unopened for the duration. The extra car was extremely handy to shuttle gear at Cain Ridge, grab food in Lincoln , get some sleep at Seeley Lake , etc. She took care of Elaine, and Crimp, and me, and Crimp, and Tie, and Crimp, and Rope, and Crimp…well, she took care of Crimp and all the rest of us. Go team!
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Now for a story from last fall's training in Minnesota...dateline Togo, Oct. 16, 2006...
Cnce again, it seems that whenever I have mushing adventures Gerry is in lead…
To set the scene, to access all of the trails west of here, we have to pass over the Valley River . There is an old broken down and much repaired 4 wheeler bridge which hunters and the dog teams use and we rely on it heavily during fall training. There is also a snowmobile bridge which is used during the winter when the swamps freeze. However this year northern MN is having a terrible drought, and we've been using the winter trail nearly every day to access other trails, as the initial swamp is dry as a bone.
Last week Jamie says: Did you guys go over the bridge?
Jane and I: Yes, it was fine although some of the holes are bigger than last year…
Jamie: What about the snowmobile bridge?
Me: huh?
Jane: No, we haven't been out there.
Jamie: Let's go see if we can get through!
“Let's go see” is a code phrase for a whole lotta work. Bring extra water and snack bars, fill up with gas, prepare to be out there a while. So off we went, the 3 of us with our teams. We alternate leading as a person will stop to water their team or work with the dogs and gets passed by the others. Once we hit the snowmobile trail it got a lot wetter (more mud holes to drink from) but I didn't think too much about that. We broke out of the trees into a swamp that was NOT dry – I was in lead – and I saw my dogs drop into a hole and come up the other side, 2X2…and than the 4 wheeler dropped – and stayed there. *#^%(!!!
Mud up over the wheels. The objective is to have the dogs pull you out and to not use the throttle – thus teaching the dogs they can pull through anything. However we were really stuck. So I looked back and Jamie was proceeding to move her dogs off the trail to the right to go WAY around me – gee thanks! I got off and slogged up to Reebok and Gerry in lead, and they were looking like let's go! Everyone else was either standing in a hole with water or had scrambled up on a tussock of grass to wait and see what we were doing. So I went up past Gerry to reconnoiter the bridge, which was just ahead and to the left of my team. It looked icky but doable to get to the bridge, but – but the other side was completely flooded from a backup behind a beaver dam. No go, we would have flooded the machines and/or gotten them hopelessly stuck.
So I went back to my machine and said “Everybody PULL!” and used the throttle just a touch to get the machine started and we popped out of the hole. Whoa! Before we got into the next hole I wanted to see what she wanted to do. Jamie saw the flooding and agreed we couldn't get through, so she kept on swinging her team to the left and they came around the left side of my team and back out the trail the way we had come in. Jane was following her track, but before she got to my team I took my leaders and turned them around, so the whole team got lined up going back on the trail on the left side of my 4 wheeler, which was still pointed ahead to go forward. At this point, Jane's team came up and started to pull past me and her machine got REALLY stuck in the same hole I'd just gotten out of, only about 4 feet to the side of where I'd been. Using the throttle produced lots of slinging mud but no movement. Much *#&^$*$(#*&^!!!!!! She happened to be running a team of puppies (yearlings) and they didn't know how to pull so they pretty much just stood there. More &^#$%*&!!! So I offered to get on the throttle while standing on the back of the machine to give (a little) more weight, while she lifted and pushed on the front end and we both yelled at her team to “Everybody PULL!”
Her's still didn't…but mine did! Out of the corner of my eye I saw my machine swing around as my team churned ahead, dragging it around through the mud (engine was off, in 4WD low 1 st gear). It of course dropped back into the hole we'd just gotten out of…and partway back up the other side but it wasn't level and since there was no steering it hit the side of the hole and promptly flipped on its left side. My team did stop at that point and waited for further instructions. Gee, the bottom on my machine sure was muddy!
Dogs and people are all fine, so let's take advantage of this! I'm now about 5 feet ahead of Jane's machine. Once we upright my 4 wheeler, I can get it the rest of the way out of the mud, then use my winch to hook up to her machine and use my team to help pull hers out. So that's what we did. Worked like a charm…the dogs were highly motivated at this point to get out of that cold wet swamp! We carried a lot of souvenir mud home and my left headlight became unplugged in the process, but other than that none the worse for the wear. It was cool!
The dogs are getting stronger…
Sorry, no I don't have photos…while it was a great photo-op, I had a couple of other things on my mind at the time.
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As for 2007, many stories to share in my head, many I've shared verbally, none committed to writing as of yet. My bad. Wonderful memories…coming back to the finish line of the Shasta 135, climbing Pomeroy Ridge in the pre-dawn and hitting the top of the ridge just as the first rays of sunlight did – magical!!!! Same thing happened in hitting the ridge above Fish Lake in the high country section of the Eagle Cap 200 – rosy fingered dawn and the team arrived together at the summit. At RTTS, on the last leg for home during the deep overnight hours, crossing the tiny bridge over the Little Blackfoot River with a leader who does somersaults to avoid water. Will he pull us across? Nervous anticipation…finally at the river's approach…”Rope, ON ACROSS!” I see him hesitate for the briefest of instants, then it's as if he gulps and charges! GOOD BOY! Meanwhile, Tumble in wheel with Smoke takes one look at the water flowing by her on her right, and without missing a stride, climbs over Smoke's back to supposed safety on the other side of the line…only to find there's water over there too! Oh no! And before anything else could be done, everyone was safely (and dryly) across…whew!
