The Cure for "Cabin Fever..."

...is the Yukon Sourdough Redezvous!! This end of February winter festival is supposed to chase away the winter blues. But I tell you, with the weather and snow we've had lately, I'd be totally OK with the whole year being like this. Seriously. Beautiful sunny days, BOATLOADS of snow (that is a lot, by the way, I knew you were wondering about that), LOTS of daylight, daylight, daylight, what more can one ask for??

Ok, so this picture of the dog lot does not show the SUNNY days and daylight, it was a pretty crappy windy day for a race actually. But we're tough mushers. We can race for 5 miles in that, nooooo problem.

How could you be annoyed with more snow?? Ok, we've had a lot of snow this winter, and I have to admit I was even saying "enough!"  But that was mostly because it took me longer to drive to town in the mornings to get to work and anything that comes between me and my sleep is not something I take to kindly...



Jon helps Laura bib up!!  The 6-dog sprint race went out first. There were nine teams in that race, good to catch up with all the local mushers and focus on something other than the Quest! (which was totally great and exciting and congrats to my "neighbour" 20km down highway, Sebastian for the WIN! I like him, he regularly has way more dogs indoors than me, we're talking like 15-20 at a time, amazing!)


Grey, one of Laura's leaders! She's a beauty, very vocal too!


Ronnie, another cutie.  I would describe her as "robust." If she was an early hominid, she would totally be a Zinjanthropus boisei or I guess as it's now referred to as Paranthropus boisei (see below).

See the resemblance? It's obvious! Or is that just me??


Anyhoo, check out Team Snow Pigs - my arch nemesis in the white truck flying his flag... grrrr.....

It's Esther and Loki!

I really just wanted a shot of my "scared" looking sled dogs hiding under the truck, but he would only hide under my arm while I was taking this photo.  Esther WAS under the truck lots, but the little bugger would pop out everytime I came near to get a picture because she was hoping for a pet!!!   I LOVE the animal rights folks who are so freakin' brilliant in their observations when they say that sled dogs hide under trucks because they're so horribly treated.  So please note above - freaky Loki who I enjoy beating regularly...

And here is the other Loki. And Esther who was also under the truck earlier. 

Just gotta be there for the right photo ops you AR bastards!! 

Ok, back to the fun!

Esther was soooo stressed she was pretty much catching a nap standing upright before the big race!

There was one *minor* mishap with my team and gear... I forgot all my lines. And racing with no ganglines, necklines, etc... is not an easy task. I remembered everything else and left those in the cabin in a heap on the floor, argh!  Thanks to Laura, I borrowed hers. But these things are never easy, I had about 5 minutes after she returned to unhook her dogs, steal her lines, hook up my dogs and me... and go!! Thanks to Dave, Heather and Laura for helping out! Or was Dave taking pictures? Ah, it was all a blur really.

Matt, my competitors' dogs. I love the skijoring group - the dog trucks/cars, the stakeout lines (bumper corners), minimal gear... very low maintenance.


Ok, most of us are low maintenance... Jon and his fancy ski package thingy. He even WAXES his skis, he's just that dedicated.

So I don't have ANY pictures of me on the run, in fact, opposite of me usually, I didn't even think of snapping pics on the run even though I had my camera with me.  I was working SO hard, as were the dogs, that we didn't have time for photos!  Plus, ok, I was really recovering from my massive wipeout in the first 30 seconds of the race!! We went down a slight bump to the river, and I almost made it but right at the last second lost an edge or something on the skis and flew into the DEEEEP snow on the side of the trail. I was stuck under like 3 feet of snow, the dogs were super fresh and yanking me to go. I was pretty sure my legs were going to rip off when Steve the race official and a photographer (wonder if he got any wipeout shots?? He must have been hanging around that section for a reason) had to help dig me out of the snow and hold the dogs so I could get up.  Crap that was brutal. I had a face full of snow flying off and melting as we got going.  I yelled a soggy "thanks!" and zipped off down the trail.

The dogs were flying, but we had about 7km to go in total and I think our longest run this year was 7.7 km. I hadn't skijored more than a few km's with the dogs. I forgot - training is a good idea sometimes.  I was hoping they could keep it up and I skate-skied my butt off to help them out. Loki and Ripper were awesome in lead and Esther was equally awesome. We hit a bit of ice then a bit of slushy overflow that slowed us down. Then we passed Jon and again, into the freakin' deep snow. Our pass went well, Esther veered over far enough to make me nervous, but let Jon and dogs pass ok.  However, I didn't pass ok as I once again fell in the deep snow. I rarely fall skijoring, so I don't know what was up this day. I was able to partly get up and the dogs kept going of course, so there I was on one knee. I had my left knee resting on my left ski, and my right leg was propped up as we zoomed down the trail. I was actually going pretty good like that and wasn't sure that I wanted to risk another wipeout by attempting to get up.  But it all worked out!

So we did the loop and were on the hunt, I knew we had made up some good time on Jon at that point, which actually shocked me. The dogs and I had a mission: catch that team!

On the way back we hit the overflow and did ok, then Loki was looking like he was slowing down a wee bit. I stopped to give them (ok, and myself) a fast break and we were off again.  We made it to the end, the finish chute was full of army cadets (who I just about fell in front of, damn I need to work on my equilibrium!) and lots of spectators. 

And Jon ended up winning and beating my by only twenty seconds!!!!!!! Wow, close race. Congrats Jon... it was great fun! :)

Esther wanders around after the race like she owns the joint. I swear she was acting cocky and was totally hyper and whiny like she was ready to get out and do that again.

We ended up with a medal (as did everyone, I think even the dogs in the howling contest got one) and $50!!! Woohoo! After paying $25 to enter, I come out $25 ahead! Ok, so I won't get rich on this racing stuff very fast... but it helps with the gas.

Assman gets a post-race stretch. Torture, pure torture to that poor dog... and you should have seen his tail wagging as he hung limply from Jon, ha.

My crew, good times, let's do it again eh? Maybe next year. One race/year is just about enough for us.

The craziness of Rendezvous! I have loads more pics on the day and the freight pull, stay tuned!

As I was driving, I was trying to get a photo of the three tired pooches in the back. They were totally passed out and slumped all over the back of the truck on their little doggie blanket and harnesses. This was the best I could do and after 3 flashes in a dark truck, I guess I woke Loki up. He doesn't look too impressed with me there does he?? Ha!