Training Update

On The Edge

Sarah · October 23, 2014 ·

In the quiet moments between living I’ve been rewatching Ken Burns’ The National Parks: America’s Best Idea. It reminds me in many ways why our life is so blessed. We live in such a beautiful place — where mountains and ocean and ice meet. Right on the edge of a place so wondrous that we as a nation decided no matter what secrets were hidden there, they were not worth revealing. The mountains are enough. The oceans are enough. The rivers of ice, slowly melting away, are enough. The natural world does not need altering to have value.

Our house sits on the edge of Kenai Fjords National Park but is also just a 5 minute drive from downtown.We live carefully balancing life in society and life out in the wild, balancing past and present. Often we go days without leaving home, lost in the quiet rhythms of our lifestyle that seem so antiquated compared to the fast paced of modern life.

We get wholly absorbed in work that fills our days and leaves our bodies aching. I don’t understand how you could or why you would want to live faster than this.

Training, Life, & Sled Dogs

Sarah · October 12, 2014 ·

The weather has started turning. We’ve seen snow once or twice now, brief flurries but it doesn’t really get our hopes up just yet. It’s still early for snow, especially in Seward. Although our friends further north in Fairbanks are on sleds, we wait and take the ATVS out with the sled dogs. We’ve continued finishing projects from around the house and kennel. It’s amazing how much work there always seems to be: building dog houses, fixing things, putting things away. The days seem both long and short, we look forward to bed but never seem to have accomplished all we have hoped to complete. Everything is always ending too soon.

My cellphone went missing earlier in the week. We have a thief in our midst – a cute two year old part sled dog dog named Max who, by now, I know was the culprit. He’s taken many things from us over the past two years we’ve had him: balls of yarn, our house phones, knives, kitchen plates, empty beer bottles… and now my cellphone. It hasn’t been that big of a deal: I am not a huge talker anyways, but I do miss being able to take pictures and videos — especially because we have Pippa, a young 6 week old sled dog puppy, living inside and she is always doing something adorable like falling asleep on my slippers or curling up next to Betty. On more than one occasion Pippa’s gone “missing” only to be found in the dirty laundry pile or under a heap of blankets.

Things continue to go well and we are slowly heading in the right direction. Today I went for a walk and discovered that there were 24 salmon in the small drainage ditch by our house. Considering that the ditch is less than 2 feet wide and less than 2 feet deep in most places, I was fairly impressed. There were also lots of other fish, which I am assuming were fry (young salmon). We pass by this area frequently with the dogs but the dogs usually scare most of the fish away — with good reason too. Last year, our dogs Bud and Weiser (the Clydesdales) both caught themselves fish on a few different occasions. I’ve seen a young pup look at the fish with a tempted eye but we no longer stop our teams near the fish as we want to promote the run — even if it is in a ditch.

Our house dogs are also doing well. They seem to be getting older and we are reminded that the only fault our dog’s possess is that their lives are far too short. We watch Archie struggle to get on the couch more and more frequently. Still, he seems undeterred. Any action, of course, is surmountable if there is plenty of kibble involved. He is an old dog though, 13 or 14 by now, and well travelled too having run in numerous Iditarod’s and Junior Iditarods and countless 200 & 300 mile races. Often, we find that he will go in the dog lot and steal another sled dog’s house and make them curl up outside. When we run, he is always there. He barks at the dog team while we hook up and chases us when we leave — never far — but enough. I’ve watched Perry, his partner, shiver with excitement when the dog team rounds the corner into the yard and gives him the opportunity to chase. Old sled dogs, perhaps, but always young at heart.

October, with the cold air blowing down off the mountains and the leaves fallen off the trees, is a month that leads to wistful thinking. I’ve thought a lot about my dog Chena, who will have been gone three years at the end of the month. She was with me for such a short time but impacted my life in such a profound way. Dogs, I suppose, will do that.

We leave now on another adventure… a story, perhaps, for later on in the week.

Gearing Up The Dog Team

Sarah · October 2, 2014 ·

This week has been full of projects. We end our days tired with movies and puppies playing at our feet. We’ve been working on our enclosed trailer. It’s a 24 foot trailer we are going to use to transport our dog team and will hopefully allow us enough room where we can bunk in it if needed. We started by putting a fresh coat of paint on the floor and are now building the dog boxes to go in it. We are hoping to have 24 boxes in total in our trailer. Because we live in Seward, we spend a lot of time on the road training our dogs. On the plus side, our dogs love to travel, can all run loose outside the truck, and get to experience tons of trails all around Alaska.

Training runs are starting to take up more and more time. I’m running 12 dogs per team and have been working on finding good partners for each dog. Great chemistry makes a great team.

We’ve both been trying to work with leaders who haven’t had as much experience at the front of the team. We’ve had a few surprises early on with dogs. Bud is a 4 year old male who has never made the race team but this year is showing incredibly potential. It seems like his gait has really changed and he’s finally found his feet.

When not running dogs, we’ve relaxed watching netflix and hanging out with our younger pups. They run around inside, crawl and climb over everything, and, in general, have way too much energy. We enjoy watching them learn and play together. It will only be a few months before they are running too — a good reminder of how quickly time flies. Nothing is permanent, our life is always evolving.

Today Seward saw heavy sheets of rain slipping from the sky. The dogs sat outside their houses looking up at the sky as if to ask, “Where is the snow?” Our friends, further to the north have posted about snow flakes and flurries. Some are even on sleds! For us, the snow remains up high, coating the mountains that peer down at our house and kennel.

All too soon we will see snow of our own.

Tying Up Loose Ends & Starting Fall Dog Sled Runs

Sarah · September 30, 2014 ·

September has come and gone, almost. We’ve spent most of the month tying up loose ends around the kennel, trying to finish all the projects we started but hadn’t quite finished yet. I’m excited that our new website is finally done. So many hours were poured into it– I hope it shows.

Travis and I have felt overwhelmed recently. Our dog sled runs haven’t quite hit a solid rhythm yet of wake, run, rest, run, sleep but we are slowly moving towards that goal. The little things that have left us feeling disorganized are starting to fall in place: the piles of stuff in our basement left over from last mushing season have finally been sorted through and are sitting on new shelves that we installed. Our summer glacier gear for our glacier dogsledding camp has finally found a home and been mostly put away. And, it seems, we are finally remembering the little things: cooking real dinners like Chicken Parm and spaghetti and meatballs, rather than simply getting by on ramen noodles and pizza which is what we ate for most of the summer. I wish I was lying but when you are busy it seems the first thing to go is a nice home cooked meal!

Travis has been excited because our second ATV we use on dog sled runs had a few upgrades made to it. Although the machine doesn’t actually run, it’s perfect for running dogs with. He recently found some new fenders for it on a trip to the dump – what a score. He then pulled the fuel tank out and made a thermos holder. Also new — the padded backrest. May not look it, but it’s a pretty sweet ride!

We are back to the quiet life of fall — no more tours or help around — and it feels good to finally sit down and settle in, the warmth of the wood stove radiating throughout the house after a dog sled run. Our Friday nights have consisted of netflix and puppies romping around through our living room.

During our quiet moments at home we’ve allowed the young dogs to run wild through the yard, their squirming endless energy exciting the kennel and keeping everyone’s tails wagging. They are so much fun right now. It’s a great age.

The dog sled runs we have gone on have shown lots of promise. We’ve been working with new lead dogs and some of our younger sled dogs who were born last summer. Today, we ran Marlowe who just turned a year old in lead. To say he was amazing would be an understatement. He is a confident young dog who simply loves to go. From the first moment we put him up front he was an absolute natural. I’m so excited to be working with him and a couple of our other young sled dogs this year. I had so much fun free running them and bringing them inside last year while Travis was training. Watching them develop athletically into talented sled dogs has been exciting.

It’s still warm out but we’ve started doing 10 mile runs with the team. Hopefully, we’ll be able to head north to longer trails soon. The loops we run at home aren’t long but they at least provide some training and there is plenty of water in creeks along the side of the road.

Well, Travis has finished his coffee so we are going to head out on the trail again. We’ve been having fun running together.

The New Dog Barn

Sarah · November 21, 2013 ·

By now it’s no secret, but we recently built a new 10-dog indoor box (picture 10 cubby holes big enough for dogs) so that our dogs could come inside on less-than-favorable days. While I can’t say I am an exceptionally good wood worker, I will say I have certainly enjoyed the process.

What started off as a way to distract myself from Travis’ absence grew into a fun project that now has me, I will admit, somewhat obsessed with building things whenever I can seem to find the time. (which is never)

The process itself was somewhat bizarre. Two years ago we had started a 15-hole dog box for a small one-axle trailer that Travis had spent the summer living in. Although no gem, we were excited to have a way to transport our dogs. Well, long story short, although we built the box it was actually too heavy for our small trailer and we never finished it. There was no top piece and none of the “boxes” actually had sides.

So, for the last two years it has sat in our garage collecting dust, power tools, and any other object that needed a temporary (or even less-than-temporary) home. Well, all that, changed. With the help of a friend, I cut the top row off using a sawzall and now had the parts to what would be a new 10-hole dog box, to go in our basement, as well as a 5 hole dog box, also to go in the basement.

I know what you are thinking: But you have SLED DOGS…why do they need to come inside?

Believe it or not, there are several reasons mushers bring dogs inside during the winter. One of the biggest reasons is to work on the dogs — maybe we have a dog with a foot problem and we need to keep applying ointment or maybe one of our dogs has an ongoing sore muscle — regardless of what the problem is, being able to bring them into a warm environment is very beneficial for the healing process. Another reason is if dogs get sick — we recently had several sick dogs in the kennel which really rushed me to finish the box. Perhaps the least “practical” reason but perhaps the most important, was the simple fact that we like bringing our dogs inside to hang out — not just with us but also with each other. We believe it’s important for a team to have good camaraderie both on and off the trail. Plus, the whole reason we have dogs is because we love dogs…the more time we get to spend with them, in our eyes, the better!

So after cutting the the top part off, I moved the 10 whole piece inside. I then had to cut side pieces, a top, and make clips to ensure that the dogs stayed in their cubby hole…we need to maintain some sense of order after all 🙂

Here is a picture of it being put to use:

It’s been especially having fun all the puppies inside…the one thing I forgot about however was there need to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night so usually when they come in I have to get up every four hours because they have tiny bladders. Well worth the extra effort in my opinion 🙂

This picture was taken after many of the dogs had been inside for awhile (at like 3am) and were tuckered out from playing. Faraday, the big grey and white siberian husky in the middle of the picture was not feeling 100% because she got into an open bag of kibble, gorged herself and had a rather full stomach. On the top from left to right we have Kip, Odin, Meena, & Faraday (sorry I can’t remember who the last dog in the right hand most hole is and I can’t tell from just the leg!). On the bottom we have Gracie, Coda, & Chesney.

Some of you may be thinking…”Wait…none of your puppy names go together?”

Yeah…so what! While I am not completely opposed to “themes” I would rather find a name that fits the dog even if it means waiting a little longer. We have had themes in the past but only if the theme really and I mean really fits the dogs.

Ok well hope you enjoyed the update!

P.S. As you can see, our dogs enjoy their blankets. If you have old fleece blankets, sheets or towels and live in the Seward area our dogs would certainly appreciate the donation. I like to change out the bedding and end up doing a LOT of laundry…someday we will have a washer and dryer just for dog blankets, harnesses, and booties. I just wish that day would get here sooner!