Opening Day

Today was our opening day for hiking. A glorious warm day but windy on Turnagain Arm. Last week was the last day of skiing for the dogs. Today was our first day of hiking. Not many trails open but more by next weekend.

Another Day, Another $

Temps stayed low, freezing at night so another weekend to go after the money. skied out to the Lane on Sat, then over to the Nordic Ski Patrol Party. Sunday skied up to Green Lake and enjoyed the overcast day. Another fun filled weekend of skiing with the dogs. Day 81 for the funhog.

weekend fun

Back from 3 weeks of skiing and ski joring. figure I ought to put some pictures on here before they take this away from me LOL.


Here's Valley on the trail out archangel Valley.





















Here we are up Valley past the trailhead to Reed Lakes taking a short break before going on.






And finally back at the trailhead.

things are still below freezing at night but that won't last long. Which means the end of dogs on snow...another good season.

Full Evening Light

Lots of light in the evenings after work. Almost daylight till 9 pm. So when new snow falls like it did tonight, its great to get out on a tour with the dogs.

Ganik Today

Nice extended weekend skiing in sunstorm and starbright conditions. My face hurts me more than it hurts you. Highs in the 20s F, and lows in the negative teens. gotta love a dog who will sleep outside in the snow in those conditions :)

Why kids like Malamutes.

For one, they love to get towed while out touring.













Things don't always go well but we recovered.












He wanted to go faster but Ganik only has one speed. LOL.

3 and 20

We skied up the 20 mile river today. The railroad wind gauge at Portage was reporting 20 mph winds with a temp of 0 deg F. But when we arrived at the 20 mile it was evident it was blowing much harder. So we beat feet up the valley hoping it was going to die down and it did. After about a mile, it was dead calm and warm. Heading back to the car, the wind kicked in about a mile from the highway and it was blowing even harder. Later we found out the temps warmed to the mid teens, but the wind jumped from gusts of 30 mph at the start to 45 mph on return.


The snow was icy crust with several "ponds" of pure ice west by the mountain side. So we stayed near the trees by the river. Good fast day made better by a nap in the middle.

Denali Dogs Chapter 2

Skijoring under Denali along the Susitna River. Cold but fast conditions, great for skijoring that's for sure.

Denali Dogs

We needed to take a malamute up to an adopter in Fairbanks and bring a malamute down to Anchorage for another adoption. So we decided to meet partway in Denali National Park and spend the weekend skijoring.




The first day was snowing, lucky us 4 inches (10 cm) on a crust. This made for some fast going. (click on the pictures to enlarge)











Ken adopted Ricki (malamute on the right) and his daughter Callie changed the mal's name to Gracie. In order to control overflow on the road, they plow one side of the road so they can get road machinery to access and control the overflow. Skiers Right is the unplowed portion, skiers left is plowed. They left enough dust on crust to make for fast skijoring (who wants to break trail if they don't have to.)








You can see Ken's traveling rig--The Chariot-- with his daughter in it. She would climb in and out. This particular day she loved her new dog, who also loved her and Gracie forgot about me LOL.







Here's the malamute we picked up, Kilitoq or Tuk for short. Long legged, sturdily built with great paws. He's one of the most efficient pulelrs I've ever met. And he loves people. He's a dog everybody loves and because of his pulling ability they want him on their team. When he moves out, so do you.





You can see Sunday was a different day than Saturday. It doesn't get better than this: sunny, crisp air and fresh light powder on a fast base. Five people, nine dogs and a whole lot of fun. We ran into 2 small groups of people on Sunday and nobody on Saturday. Its a winter destination waiting to be discovered.





Dogs are allowed in Denali National Parkonly in the winter. Its one of the few national parks where this is allowed. Patrols were accomplished by dog when the park was first established to stop poaching. Mt. McKinley (Denali) National Parks first superintendent, Kid Karstens, hauled Charles Sheldon around by dog sled for his invaluable biological work and subsequent political work to establish the park. Two excellent books on early Denali (Mt. McKinley) National Park are "The Wilderness of Denali" by Charles Sheldon, and one of my favorite books of all time, "My Life of High Adventure" by Grant Pearson and Phillip Newell. In wintertime Denali, you have give right of way to dogsleds on the trail.

Ski Club Sunshine

What could be better? A Ski Club ski, sunshine and The Dogs!


Ganik and Kickstep


















Jago and Lyons Creek.

















Valley relaxing under Kickstep

Snowflakes

When the snowflakes fall, the fundogs have so many enjoyable things to do:




Like skijor sastrugi.




Or pull over a snowbridge.




Biteneck at lunch.




or simply contemplating the snowfall.




Sunday in the Chugach.

Pupsicle

Oh boy, another trip to Mendeltna. 3 days of ski touring with the ski club out on the Mendeltna ski trails. Trails which couldn't have been better. Yippee! We had our own cabin where we could keep the dogs with us and dined from excellent cuisine of the lodge. First day great trails but new snow the next couple of days made skiing even more enjoyable. What a treat. Thanks Mabel and Russ!

Snownose

Temperatures down around -10 deg F (-23 deg C), a bit of lightly falling snow mixed in with a ski tour, we can see what the malamutes look like with snow nose. For sure they can handle the cold, its nothing for them and they love running along on a ski tour and would go again at the drop of a hat.

My latest snow job.

Here we go, another snow storm. 17 inches (43 cm) since midnight and it's still snowing. I did the driveway last night before going to bed, this morning before work and again this evening after work. No time to ski :(








Here's Valley's house snowed in.












Jago's house snowed in. I had just shoveled the door way yesterday.

















And their condo. I guess they've given up using that. The tip of the roof hits me about chest high so you can see how much snow we've gotten this season.
















And finally the back fence, lets hope they don't decide to climb it.

WooHoo!

Five years ago we brought home our first rescue. so afraid of life she stayed hidden in her dog house for well over a year. She left only when I sat on the ground, planted a foot on each side of the door and pulled her out to go out for walks and skijors. When she was out on the trail she'd crawl up into a treewell as far away from us as she could get and shake. She walked in back of us, as far as she could get, because feet made scarey sounds in the snow and they kicked rocks making even scarier noises. For several years Saint Nicki and I wondered out loud about her. but we knew if we let her go and gave up on her, she was gone for good, and she deserved better than that.

Christmas 3 years ago, her adrenal gland gave out. Too much fear. But that was the beginning of her sunrise. I guess she finally decided maybe, just maybe she could trust us. Since then she's never spent the night out in her dog house, hasn't wanted to.

Roll forward to this fall when she let me throw my arms around her for a hug. By now we've had her for 5 years and we were giving and getting our first hugs! Life is good. Until last night...when things got even better as you can see from the picture.

I am pretty sure I'd never gotten involved with rescue, volunteering at the local SPCA, and starting a malamute rescue group without Babe's assistance and her guiding light. Several phrases come to mind when I think about her, "you can only move as fast as the dog does" and "always stay with the dog, they won't let you down". There are plenty of people who've told both Saint Nicki and I what a wonderful job we've done. Maybe so, but I really think Babe was the guide. She was the one who led us onto better things. She's the one who started it all. We were lucky enough to have our eyes open and pay attention enough to follow.

Happy Howl-idays

Happy Howl-days and WooWoos to you! Our best wishes for a happy new year and healthy and prosperous year ahead.

Ski Club Skis

Once a month or so now, more often in the spring, we lead backcountry tours for the ski club. With winds approach 25 mph, cloudy skies but temps near freezing we headed up the South Fork of Eagle River. With days as short as they are, its nice to get out and enjoy the little daylight we have.


Looking up at Cantata Peak



Lunch!


Babe loves running free during the ski outings. A far cry from a year or 2 ago where she tried to get as far away from folks as possible. She now walks around them, taking handouts whenever they are offered.

Obligatory Skijor Picture

Everybody who skijors seems to have these kind of pictures on their blog. So I guess I better put one on her too.

Our latest foster malamute Kilitoq



I prefer looking at their face through, the backend of a dog really does nothing for me :)



Here's one of Valley, gotta get one of my crew in here LOL.

Skijor the fundogs

With fresh snow and warm temperatures, what's a funhog to do? Skijor the fundogs!