Short
But Steep
As I approached the end of Summit Lake it was now light enough that I just kept
my headlamp on to try to catch the reflective trail markers, and not because I
needed it to see the dogs or the trail right in front of me. I had been somewhat
warned about the hill which the trail climbed to get up to the Denali Highway
from the Lake. What I began to discern on that hillside as I approached wasn't
very comforting.
From a distance I began to make out a dog team struggling on the hill and as I
got closer I saw the musher in the front trying to pull the dogs up the hill.
After a minute or so the line of dogs and musher collapsed and literally rolled
and slid down the hill a ways in a tangle of dogs and lines and a quite frustrated
musher. As I got closer I also recognized a few items strewn out on the hillside
below: sleeping bag, cooker, bags of food, etc. It looked as if the musher had
jettisoned as much weight as possible in an attempt to get her team up the hill.
If I was on a down hill ski slope, I'd say she'd had a yard sale with gear everywhere.
Needless to say, it didn't look good.
I didn't really have a sense of how steep the climb was because the flat early
morning light didn't provide much contrast, but given the situation on the trail
ahead I figured I had best stop and think through how I was going to approach
the climb. I figured that stopping for a few minutes would also give the musher
a chance to regroup and either get to the side of the trail or get lined out in
case she got the chance to follow my team up if WE were able to make it.
I thought through who my best leaders would be in such a situation and switched
a few dogs around, taking special care to bury Goldie deep in the team because
of her propensity for turning around and looking back when the going gets tough.
I also put a few of the stronger dogs up front and some which hadn't been taxed
as much since they had been running in the middle of the team. I left Dale in
lead and put Gertie up with her; Dale as the most powerful hill climber and Gertie
as the best dog for keeping the team lined out and never turning back. Steele
and Kali were in swing and Monty and Mars were behind them. I figured this was
the best lineup I could have to get up the hill and pass another team while doing
it.
So I pulled the hook and we finished crossing the lake and started up the slope.
The other musher hadn't moved much and by the time we had pulled up along side
her on the hill, she was still in a tangle and just trying to hold her team off
to the side so they wouldn't get tangled with mine. We got right up next to her
team and my team stopped. Ugh.
I didn't bother to set the hook as the slope was such that the team wasn't going
anywhere without some help, so I trundled up to the front of the team and pulled
Gertie and Dale up the slope a bit till the line was stretched out and then made
sure there weren't any tangles. Then I took a deep breath, stumbled back down
to the sled and with some encouraging words called them up and at the same time
gave the sled a shove up the hill. The dogs dug in and after 63 miles of trail
including a big hill climb, they didn't balk. At this point I wasn't able to help
much as the slope was about 45 degrees and had been quite churned up by the previous
teams. I also was running out of steam myself and when I couldn't keep up and
stepped on the runners, they stopped - about 1/3 of the hill conquered.
Here's where the dogs really shined. Good ol' Gertie and Dale kept the line tight
and while they all looked back and were probably thinking things like "Can't
you get off the runners and help us out a little bit you out-of-shape galute!"
they didn't collapse the team. I kept encouraging them saying "ready, ready,
ready" in-between my gasps for breath and after I was sure I wasn't going
to pass out, I called them up again and gave the sled another shove. Stumbling
behind I realized they were following a side hill to the right and at the same
time heard the musher below exclaim "stay to the left!" So I called
Haw and they dutifully wandered over to the left back onto the main trail, all
the while continuing to climb.
I reached my limit once again and had to step on the runner or lose my footing
and again the team stopped, this time about 2/3 of the hill behind us. Replay
the same gasping for breath between "ready, ready…." with Gertie
and Dale holding the team out beautifully and finally with one more "Hut!"
and a big shove we were on our final push and crested the hill with me literally
dragging behind the sled hanging onto the extra necklines I had wrapped around
the handlebar. We dropped down onto the Denali Highway and I didn't have a chance
to look back at the view as I literally took about the next 10 minutes trying
to catch my breath and get my breathing to something less than hypersonic.
The only time I dumped the sled during the entire race came on this last stretch
into Paxson and it was due to just plain laziness. At a point where they trail
was restricted in width in order to send the teams across a bridge my left runner
rode up on the side of the bank a little and dumped the sled over on its side.
I went over with it and after calling for the dogs to "woah", I flipped
it back up on its runners and we coasted the rest of the way down the highway
into Paxson - a huge grin on my face and a feeling of amazement and gratitude
for the way the dogs had performed. I truly was the limiting factor on that last
climb, but we had made it.
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