Wade Changing to a Hopefully Faster Runner
Before noon, there were two mushers parked on the slough outside the checkpoint. But that would be considered the lull before the storm. The mushers heading to the coast from Kaltag will be arriving one after the other as the afternoon passes. They may have heard that parking in UNK is at a premium and continue on up the trail. Overflow is claiming much of the space used in past years for musher parking. It’s almost comical watching the lead dogs thread their way around pools of standing water – a little right, a little left and the whole team keeps their feet dry. On the other hand if the leaders are looking for a quick cool down, they might run right through like its a little splash pool.
Wade Marrs, the lone musher in Unalakleet this morning was attending to his sled and tidying up his camping spot. Marrs scraped wet snow and ice off his runners with the goal of replacing the yellow runner plastic with black plastic that would be more suitable to the snow conditions. Marrs slid the plastic in place on his left runner then cut a longer than normal portion off and threw it in the scrap pile. Looking just a bit closer, it was evident that runner was significantly shorter that the right runner. Wade only had enough runner for his boot size and nothing to spare. The right runner extended beyond the foot grip by another three feet. Wade was telling tales of the difficulty this broken runner was causing. He didn’t have a sled shipped out to UNK so he’s counting on that one to get him to Nome.
One short Runner on Marrs’ Sled
Ketil Reitan, who’s an Iditarod veteran from back in the 90’s and most recently in 2018 was watching Wade work. Martin Apayauq Reitan is Ketil’s son. Martin’s sled broke somewhere between Rohn and Nikolai. For him, it was a stanchion. Martin put his wood working skills to use and cut a birch sapling to use as a splint. He used poly-rope to bind the splint to the broken stanchion and has a solid repair that’ll get him to Nome.
Michi Konno Into Unalakleet
A short while after Wade went up to the checkpoint to enjoy bacon, pancakes and more bacon, Michi Konno made his way around the over flow patches and parked in the checkpoint. Michi is on the trail for his second Iditarod. He ran in 2018 and finished in 23rd place. His rookie run in 2018 was a great coincidence as his mentor, Joee Redington, was the honorary musher. When Michi was a younger man doing sprint races, Joee encouraged him to race Iditarod and it came together in 2018 as if Michi was himself honoring Joee.
Normally mountains would be visible in the background of the picture of Michi approaching Unalakleet but that’s how socked in the coast has been for the past several days. Light snow and warm weather are making the trails slow for every one at this point. The thermometer outside of the checkpoint read 39 degrees. As the tide ebbs and flows, overflow disappears and appears on the slough. The Iditarod Air Force is getting a break with the weather. Visibility has improved to more than 5 miles so flights are getting volunteers out to White Mountain. Leading teams will be there on Tuesday.
