Homer again

First run
By 11am this morning we'd already been out on a 20 mile loop into the mountains, packed up everything and had eggs frying ready for breakfast number two. It was, without any doubt, a thought to be up and out into the cold by 6.30, but the dogs need to be juiced before running and they need some time to let it settle before they head out. And we need some wake up time.

Linda took the team out and I was quite glad to not be on the runners right at take off. This is a poor snow year, and they've had some unusual drifts which has created humps and bumps in the trail that were never there before. I think first time I take the team out from take off, which is when they are full of energy and not slowing down for anyone, it'll be an exciting ride this season. I never settle my nerves until I make it safely down the gully for the first time. It's a kind of a steep ravine and a bit of a nemisis in my mind. I have been down it headfirst once and would rather not repeat the experience. The trail is hard packed and fast. It's hard to slow a team of 9 dogs down, especially when they are running downhill and have full power packs to burn.

And, the worst thing on a dog sled is to be tense. You have to let all the curves and funny angles and bumps wobble through you, but that is sometimes a tough mental game, especially when the gully is approaching rapidly and you will going over it, ready or not. Sometimes the dogs are charging as fast all the stress is retrospective.

Back in the land
I love that that the area is mapped out in my mind and it doesn't take long at all to remember eventful moments at certain tree stumps, or the amazing views from the top of the hills. Each place and corner and trail has a name and association for me; newspaper trail, green cabin, malamute run, first valley, half tree turn, the anchor, beaver dam, dry hole, powerline. And so the vastness of the back mountains slowly becomes and ordered grid of routes, more or less challenging, offering views or techincal runs, flat sprints or steep hill work that the mushing community can talk about and share trail experiences easily. I love the way we as humans create our cultures and languages so instinctively. I know the different kinds of mushing snow now;  the kind that the dogs need booties on their feet, the kind that will stick and slow the sled runners, the kind we can't afford to slip off the trail from, the kind where I will not be able to set a snow hook so I pray I don't have to stop for anything, even good hard, which is fast, and bad hard, which is out of control and lots of stress injuries.

Jogging by 8am
Linda had me take the team up the series of hills to dry hole. It's hot for running, 30F+. It meant I had to help the dogs out and kick the sled as much as I could up the hills. I was also overheating by the time I reached the summit and was glad I'd put those couple of weeks in running at lunchtime.

Polar coincidences
So I'm back in Alaska and in a land full of great people who live big lives. Amazingly even on the flight between Amsterdam and Minnespolis I was sat next to the President of the Inuit Circumpolar Council Alaska http://www.iccalaska.org/servlet/content/home.html His wife is Greenlandic and he splits his time between Nuuk and Anchorage. As we flew over Greenland, talking about pack ice, Franklin, Peary and tribalism, we learned we'd both spent time in Liverpool Land in Western Greenland. Hurry Fjord is one of the biggest sea inlets in the world. At it's top is Constable Pynt which has a tiny airstrip which he helped build while he was working for ARCO. He had great stories of traditional beliefs, their drumming, the stories of their traditional dances. He told me they believe every animal has a human face and one of their legends is of a particularly cruel dog musher who used to beat his dogs until one day as he whipped his lead dog, the dog turned and peeled off his animal face mask to reveal the same face as his own. From that day he became kind - because he had seen his own reflection. A kind of arctic version of Scrooge.

Little Blueberry Picker
His Grandmother was called Little Blueberry Picker. Her brother had murdered someone from their village, so before retribution blood was shed, she and her 3 brothers fled. They walked 2 years from North of Nome to Barrow where she settled and had 14 children. Just another, fairly typical, Inuit story. They are, as he said, highly adaptable people. And now many new issues are arising alongside climate change, of mineral and oil rights, navigation through the North West Passage and the future of their livelihoods. He was returning from an international conference in Copenhagen to be part of the global negotiation of their futures. 

Reinforced planes
I was extremely glad that the hour long flight between Anchorage in Homer, though in the 12 seater plane - I poured the coffee out the thermos for the pilot who sat in front of me - was perfectly smooth and just offered fantastic views of endless mountains. We dropped past old friends Sharon and Wesley on the way home. Sharon remembers flying out to the Aleutian Islands in planes that had reinforced lateral struts to cope the extreme winds they constantly flew in.

Jet lag
Best thing for it is to keep going. We went out for a ski in the afternoon and met Libby Riddles out on the trail who is a neighbour here. She was the first woman to win the Iditarod. The race has just finished and Trent who I worked with a couple of years back, just completed his 4th race and is dropping by Homer to check his property and catch up with us all. He lives most of his time in Idaho. He had a great race, came in 25th instead of back of the pack. It was a fast race this year, unlike the Yukon Quest which was brutally cold. No doubt when we have everyone over for dinner tomorrow night there will be plenty of big stories being told. Not big because they exaggerate, just big because this is big country and the truth often is spectacular enough, like Little Blueberry Picker.