While things were getting readied for the mushers arrival here in Kaltag I took a much needed nap. Slept in the Octagon community hall. Its funny, how those places feel like home. After all for the past 9 years I have gotten a wink of sleep here each March, almost on the dot on the same day, each Saturday. One of my favorite parts, which keeps me coming back, even without my dogteam, are the local people. The happy greetings: “ eh Schnulle, where is your dog team “. Eh Sabastian you got yourself one heck of a nice looking dog there “ and so on. It can be any time of the day, and there are happy faces in the villages waiting for news of the trail.
Now with a few hours of sleep under our belt, I realize how lucky we got last night. Its one of those situation where when you are in it you just push on and deal with it. For much of the way out of Eagle Island we ran quite a ways off the trail, as going swimming in one big water hole was enough excitement for me for one night. But god knows what was actually under the surface on the trail we punched in, now that I read the reports from “ wall to wall overflow “ I few times I could feel the machine being really sucked down. Usually I was hanging on to the throttle wide open, in low gear and getting about 20 mph.
The race dynamics are sure changing. Martin Buser is slowing being reeled in, as there is a steady stream of musher lining the trail up the Yukon River. Within 7 miles there . The rear of that group is Joar, Aaron and Jake. Jessie Royer is a few miles ahead, but she has not taken her 8 hr layover yet and will have to do that here in Kaltag . It currently shows Mitch being stopped and Aliy moving ( and gaining on Martin Buser) steady.
It is blowing pretty steady here with about 15 mph out of the southwest, so the trail is going to be blown in. But over all the weather is improving, looking much nicer than it has been. That trend is supposed to keep up with the winds subsiding. That will be a huge advantage for the teams coming from behind, as the current leaders are acting as trail breakers. Speaking of which. Considering the condition they had to deal with, the trail breakers have done an outstanding job. There was always markers to be seen on the river. After initial reports of them running out of Lathe, they must have backtracked after arrival in Kaltag, because when we came through early in the morning, the trail was well marked. The temperature sits at at 23 Degrees, that is much colder than it has been, which means some of that water and overflow will freeze up for the following teams. The trend is already visible. While Martin Buser slogs along at around 5 mph, the chasers are around 7 mph and than yet another few hours back Dee Dee Jonrowe and Ray Redington are already moving at 9 mph. A real surprise to me is starting number 38, Ramey Smyth. He is on his way to Eagle Island, so clearly behind the lead pack. I had him much higher in my predictions. Looking at his tracker, man what an awesome tool is that, I can see the temperature being 25 F before Eagle Island, that is MUCH cooler than it was for the teams last night. At midnight the temp showed 39 ABOVE on his tracker and now where its supposed to be “ the heat of the day “ it has steadily dropped. Subsequently you can see the “ green-speed-line “ on his tracker steadily rising.
Talking about steady rising. Dallas Seavey had the fastest runtime to Eagle Island ( Jake was only 4 minutes slower ) and has been steadily rising in the standings. He is down to 10 dogs, but with 10 dogs, the care an maintenance is much more efficient, specially those 10 dogs are maintenance free. I start to keep my eye on him for a bit….
Time to head back down the river for a few pictures!
