Flying over the Alaska Range in a Cessna is a trip! The two hour flight is filled with incredible scenery on clear days – including an awesome view of Denali. The mountain wasn’t out today but there was plenty of scenery going over Rainy Pass. Traveling above the trail as it runs above the Dalzell River Gorge and on to the Rohn Safety Cabin.

Within a couple of hours, the first musher will be into McGrath. It looks as if Aliy Zirkle will be the first woman in recent history to collect the Spirit Mask awarded by PenAir to the first musher into McGrath. Aliy is a perennial top finisher in the Last Great Race and is the only woman to have won the Yukon Quest, another 1,000 miles wilderness race. Her husband, Allen Moore took second in the 2012 Quest by only twenty-six seconds to Hugh Neff. Many of Allen’s dogs are running the current Iditarod with Aliy.

It’s way too early in the race to make predictions about who’ll make Nome’s Front Street first. In the meantime, Zirkle is having a great race. Defending Champion John Baker left Nikolai with Zirkle but she’s moving a little faster and is a couple of miles ahead of John about fifteen miles out of McGrath.

Born to Run,
Sanka W. Dog