Happy WooHoo-lidays

visiting the dark slide

We try to get out skijoring after work as much as we can. This time of year its dark dark dark. But we still go and have a great time, you can tell by the looks on our faces to the left. We carry headlamps in case we need them, like when we run into Bullwinkle. But we prefer navigating by star.

Moonlight skiing

As far as skiing goes, not much is more enjoyable than skiing on a full moon lit night. Tonight we were out with friends and 5 rescued malamutes and husky up at glen alps. 8 inches of 18 degree powder, not a cloud in the sky and the full moon. You couldn't get a better evening to cross country ski.

telemark skiing

I like to ski, what can I say? I've been cross country skiing now for 32 years. Taken up skijoring as well, and that's fun too. Now for 4 years I been telemark skiing by skinning up the hill, and sliding down every Saturday almost, from October to May. I probably telemark skied 40 full days last year. What can I say? I like to hike up and ski down, what could be funner?

HEY! I see my turkey and its running away!!!

Its our 28th annual ski and eat for Thanksgiving. This morning we broke trail in 12 inches or so of powder. Ganik was out front taking the brunt of trail breaking which made things easier on me. About 3 miles out we suprised a moose in the trail which jumped up like a jack in the box, Boing! Babe(Jago) particularly went nuts and so did the moose around her 12 in close vicinity were running away while she screamed "HEY I see my turkey and its running away!". Nicki of course went down luckily I stayed up .


Getting the turkey in the oven is next!

gettin' out again

Yesterday I skijored Ganik up to the base of Manitoba. With my busted up rib it helped! Once we started climbing it was a different story. He ended up wallowing in some deep powder when the trail breaker headed up the middle of a shallow gully instead of a ridgeline.

Skin tracks are hard enough on a dog but in deep powder they are hell. All the dogs were having problems and had we known the powder was this deep would have left the dogs at home.

It was mashed potato down low, a nice ankle biting crust from about 1600 feet to 2300 feet. A break able crust for another couple hundred feet then it was powder. Great snow for turning but the wind kicked up and covered our up track between runs. Thankfully it was shallow slope so we felt the avi danger was down.

Ouch! That Hurts!

Started out skijoring when we hit some rock hidden by snow. Not a big surprised since we don't have alot of snow, but still, my feet came to a standstill and my chest thumped the ground pretty good. Knocked the wind out of me. Later I realized my thumb was sprained and for a bit thought a rib was busted. Thank goodness not only bruised. but it busted the LCD display on the camera :( Here's a pic from out on the trail.

Season Opener

Today was our season opener skiing. A little tour for turns down in Turnagain Pass. Last year we got 80 days in, and today we started towards that goal. We skied that little ridge to the above and right of Valley's ear in the shadows in the foreground of Kickstep mtn and below the bowl to the left of kickstep. Kickstep is the peak to the right, Sure feels good to get the skis on again and get out.

Crusty down below 1600 feet, nice powder above that. Surface hoar everywhere. I hope something comes in wet to take that away or we are in big trouble this ski season.

Portals of Love

When you build something yourself you can take the time to build in stuff you'd like to have to make life easier. So I added Portals to the deck railing so the dogs could look out and see what's going on outside their yard. Here's Ganik looking out one of the portals.






this is one of the portals looking towards Flattop in Chugach State Park.

















And the actual portal Ganik was looking out when I took the picture.

every dog I know that has lived in porcupine country encounters them sometime in their career as a dog. Some are worse than others. Here's Valley's encounter with the bristley beasts. Ha! 3 quills. Not too bad. I've had to pull hundreds out of dogs before. Lucky us. Ganik ignored the thing and Babe(jago) trotted way out of her way to avoid the thing.

This weekend marks our 4th anniversary with Babe(Jago). No other dog has changed our life as much as she has. To live with her we saw that we needed to change the way we lived with dogs, particularly a shy dog. From a malamute who stayed in her dog house for a year, she's now falling asleep on our thighs and chest. From a dog who blew our her adrenal gland in fear, she now leads runs around confident and happy. Thanks Babe for all the positive things you brought to us!

Hiking up Tincan.

Its always nice to hike up and see the places where we ski. We get an idea of the "true" slope of the hill for avalanche purposes, and we can see the anchors hold the snow, plus its pretty neat terrain. Here we are up on Tincan, for our annual cleanup trip. We collected a pair of Bolle sunglasses and lots of dog booties, along with all the beer bottles, pop cans and more. The number one item continues to be energy drinks. Down low on the mountain are the water containers and energy drinks. Up high its beer (in bottles!) and energy drinks. We've found a car battery, shovels, shirts, shoes and socks.



It was snowing when we got there. By the time we left the sun was out and we were able to nap in the sun. It'll be awhile before we get to telemark ski here. But Old Man Winter is knocking at the door.

TR: Devils Pass Cabin

Six of us and 7 dogs (all rescues) hiked up to the Devils Pass Forest Service Cabin this weekend to enjoy a weekend retreat and a bit of fun. 10 miles in on a relatively sunny day. Cloudy and a bit cooler on the way out, nonetheless fun! For dinner it was Shrimp Fettucini with giant shrimp from Florida. Breakfast was eggs and hashbrown with bacon. Yum Yum.



Here's Tom at the Pass before the Cabin. I don't know why but he kept trying to drive a motorboat up the creek and into the cabin while we were all trying to sleep :) He can really motor.













This is Babe (Jago) and Valley at the cabin, hanging out pretty much where the spent the night sleeping. Valley in the foreground, Babe in the background, and Devil's Pass behind them. They were the only dogs who slept outside.
















Billy and Pharoah at the cabin right before we are going to head back after spending the night.













Ganik!













Siku at the cabin.












Yvonne and Billy right before they left us to run an errand in Hope.













Ginny.













Saint Nicki!












Happy Valley with her brand new pack. She was a bit shy on the way up but warmed up the next day. I think she was happy to let everybody pet her.












And finally Valley Again!

Valley's first off leash run

We took all three dogs to a baseball diamond with closing gates. This means everybody can run off leash and if they don't want to be tied up to go home, we can catch them in a confined space. Ideal for a shy dog who hasn't learned the value of human companionship. Here's Valley running around on her first time offleash out....the expression on her face says it all!

TR: Tombstone Mountains YT

here's a link to a short TR of a backpack into the Tombstone Mountains in the Yukon Territory.
http://www.alaskamountainforum.com/viewtopic.php?t=904

there are pictures and a map as well.

Get Ready Set Go!

Fundog Valley up at Rabbit Lake.
Babe who's hanging out while we take our skins off near Valdez.
Here's another fundog named Ganik who happens to be wearing his goretex suit.

The funhog likes to have fun with his fundogs. :)