We were scoping out the venue before the mushers and teams arrived. During this COVID time, everything is under wraps. Terry discovered a small drive on the edge of the landing strip. Toward the river a sign said “ROAD CLOSED” and on the other side of the road it mentioned something about not entering. Ahead we saw a couple of people milling about inside a fenced compound. As we edged closer, it was like someone pulled back the curtain to unveil the carefully organized area with all the essentials for dog care: straw, food, foot remedies. A man quickly came upon us and said, “This is off limits to everyone except volunteers and participants”. Our first COVID event and we ignored the rules. And Terry is in quarantine. This is no joke. I’m ashamed.
To track the races events from a distance, I purchased the Iditarod Insider program for my computer. It’s really busy with information, but it’s great for learning. The only way we know a team is arriving it from the program’s tracker. Each musher is wearing a GPS. One of the TV reporters told us Dallas Seavey would was coming in and would be there some time after 1:30. From the tracker, we knew he was coming. It was hard to estimate when. We returned about 12:30 because we wanted to buy some hot chocolate from the homeschool kid studying in his mom’s Loco Cocoa tent. We could have walked away with two Cocoas and five dollars, if Terry wasn’t honest. Math skills weren’t important to our cashier. Seavey arrived at 4:00. Luckily it was twenty degrees, but we shouldn’t have drunk the Cocoa. Looking for a musher, involves staring into the white, afraid to take you eyes off the prize and letting someone else spot the movement from down river before you. About 15 local spectators lined the narrow snow path overlooking the bank. The trail is almost mid-river at this point, so the view somewhat distant. In Grayling the teams ran right in front of our house and lined out their teams all around us.
After Seavey, we made a quick run home, approximately a mile. I checked the tracker and discovered that three more mushers were due shortly. We were going to do our own estimation of ETA. Every 5 minutes it tells how many miles they are from the checkpoint. We walked down to the river to get closer to the trail. Using the information on how fast teams were moving, we could be within five minutes, if they don’t stop to pee, snack their dogs, etc. Our new vantage point was only 20 feet off the course. We watched the next three until it was almost dark at 7:20. One of them, stopped about 200 yards away. I was filming his approach and my hands were getting cold. Deb had her binoculars, and we finally noticed he was making yellow snow.
At 5:00 AM I watched two more teams, under the headlamp. It’s a gorgeous flow catching glimpses of bootied feet, and long tongues, and crisscrossed halters under a towering light. And that fast crunching tempo on hard packed snow.
I woke Terry and he made it out for two more teams with the waxing civil twilight showing more forms and less ghosts.
During daylight we watched all of the teams, save one that has not yet arrived, the last one, the red lantern team. We were in and out all day, sometimes walking and talking with Elsie. Terry also joined Eva, the ice fishing fanatic, for some good fish tales, but no caught fish.
Yesterday was troublesome for mushers. It was too warm, nearly 30 degrees above. They would rather run in -30 conditions, as the dogs overheat. Also, the wet snow pushed down on the river ice, squeezing water out the edges, which flows under the snow pack toward the center. This is overflow. It is invisible, until a weight pushes down the top snow. That weight is usually a dogs foot, sled runner, or snow machine. Nobody likes cold, wet feet, even dogs. Snow machines can bog down and have to be abandoned. Today was around 10-15 degrees, with some overflow still lurking. Tomorrow will be around -20 and the pace will pick up.
The mushers will return Friday.
Mountain Peace 