Cruisin the Yankner

  The super cub bounced down gently on the gravel bar.  The oversized tundra tires looked like they would fit on a Boeing 737.  They were under- inflated purposefully to absorb the uneven terrain and did a beautiful job of setting me down in God’s country.

    “Brent and Brian are right up around the corner.” Tom pointed upriver to their approximate whereabouts as I helped him pivot the plane around.

    The breezy afternoon had made for a bouncy flight and he couldn’t land in the same spot that he had when he dropped them off the day before.  I grabbed as much of my stuff as possible and headed up river to find my buddies as the black and yellow plane took to the sky and disappeared in the distance.

     The mile-wide river bottom was a myriad of braided channels. Only a few of them contained the silty waters of the Yentna.  It was easy to see that during times of high water the whole floodplain could be underwater  but for now it was easy hiking on beautiful gravel bars.  Twisted white driftwood of all sizes was littered on every bar like it was sprinkled from a big shaker high in the sky. The mountains of the Alaska range hemmed in both shores and overlooked the river valley from all sides.

      I had agreed to this trip with enthusiasm.  In the name of filling-in-the blanks of my geographical sense of place, this one was huge.  Approximately 100 river miles up the Yentna river via the West fork, we were tucked up into the Alaska range with rafts and time and beer.  Oh yeah, we had guns and fishing poles too.

     All three of us have cabins on the lower Yentna (some 80 river miles downstream) and seeing its source and all the new country appealed to all of us. The plan was to make our way down the river all the while looking for black bears and good clear tributaries to fish.

   Sure enough, around the corner sitting among the giant pile of gear was Brent Mason and Brian Gornick.  They were both lounging in their camp chairs and had situated themselves in the middle of a big pile of gear.  With the wind at their back and the sun in their face, it looked like they’d been there a while.  Each was clutching a beer.  “Hey guys, I couldn’t wait for the plane, I decided to walk-in.”  I was betting that they hadn’t heard the plane land around the corner in the 20 knot winds.  I knew that I looked ridiculous wearing my orange float-coat and my bright orange helmet. I had a giant green water-proof bag on my back and I was carrying two cases of beer.

    “Welcome.” said Brian as they both got up to help shuttle my gear.

     At least part of my interest in the upper Yentna region stems from its early exploration by those who were in search of high places.  

In 1906 Dr. Frederick Cook, Belmore Browne, and the good Professor Herschel Parker were among seven hardy souls to set out to be the first to the top of the continent.  Like me, they had a desire to tromp their way to North America’s highest point: Mt. Mckinley.  

      Unlike me, they weren’t fortunate enough to have K2 aviation buzz them out to the East fork of the Kahiltna glacier landing them at a comparatively comfortable striking distance from the mountain.  Their story was a little different.  They had to route find their way from tidewater. The West fork of the Yentna was their first guess as to how to penetrated the Alaska range.

       After sailing to Seldovia from Seattle and steaming over to Tyonek, they split their party in two.  One group had twenty burly pack horses, the other had a wooden skiff with a shoal-draft motor boat  The plan was to meet at the headwaters of the Yentna which was precisely where Brent, Brian, and I were staged.  

    “The conquest of Mount McKinley”, by Belmore Browne is an interesting and detailed account of their efforts. If ever I thought that my wilderness forays were remotely burly, tough, or impressive in the slightest, all I need to do is pick up this book and refresh my memory of what the true definition of hardship and adventure really is.  

     After a month of bushwhacking their way up stream, their West fork aspirations ended when it narrowed into a harrowing canyon with steep walls and crushing glacial rapids.  Their efforts at this point were riddled with near-drownings with horse and man.  Their food supply was dangerously low, so Belmore shot a giant Brown bear that he’d spotted on a hillside. When he discovered that the bear had a series of infected slash wounds from an obvious bear-fight and couldn’t stomach eating it, he left it for dead.  It was at this point that Belmore Browne declared something like, “This sucks.”

     Eventually after being slapped-down again and again they retreated back downstream, crossed all the braids of the West fork and endeavoured to try the East fork.  At this point one passage sticks out:  “The quicksands were our principal difficulty and some of the pack horses sank so deep that only their heads were visible above the water...”  When we floated by their possible crossing point near the confluence of the East and West fork we pulled over for a sandwich.

Belmore Browne's horses don't have shit on Brent

Puffing up the rafts

    “Michael rowed the boat ashore Halla-loooooo- yah!”  I pushed off down stream in lackluster form.  Someone had tied my left oar into the gear pile and after a brief panic I managed to pull it out and collected my self....It must have been Brian.  Off we went commencing downriver progress winding our way out of the Alaska range slowly joining with other braids of the river, splitting away from others.  “Michael rowed the boat ashore....” The age old childhood jingle repeated itself as I negotiated my way downriver.  Occasionally a bad decision was made and we would have to hop out and drag our inflatable canoes over the shallows.  These times were few and far between.   Mostly our travels were long stretches of easy going.
Both boats were equipped with mini stereos and I suggested that Brian should be in charge of the music selection for the trip. He phoned me before we left to inform me that his computer wasn't talking to his I-pod and that we would be relying on Brent for music. "I hope you like Willy and Johnny."

     Slowly we made our way downstream.  Lacking the ability to speed-up, we were resigned to taking it all in and catching up with each other.  It had been a long time since I’d been able to catch up with these two friends.

    I had dropped a few pins on my GPS on the flight in.  I hoped to mark some of the clear water tributaries that we could fish.  On the second night we set our sights on one of them and were rewarded when we found a nice back-eddie chock full of Dolly Varden and Grayling.  We set up our tent on a nearby gravel bar and quickly discovered that the fishing was pretty good right outside the tent door too.  For dinner that night we had pasta primavera with chunks of Dolly Varden- Dolly Primavera!

     That night around the campfire we watched a pair of beavers slide in and out of the water in front of us eating mouthfuls of green leafy twigs on the bank.  A pair of swans honked and as we turned to look also noticed a cow moose and her calf crossing the river on the upstream side of the sandbar.

    In the morning after coffee and a little more fishing, we pushed off back into the Yentna and continued our journey towards our cabins.

    Although we had enjoyed a wonderful float trip thus far, our adventure was far from over.  We made our way down past Youngstown bend where we encountered our first power boat.  From this point down, there were lots of interesting cabins.  We shared our opinions on what we thought each cabin owner did right and wrong in the creation of their own Yentna river palace.  Some of them looked like shacks that had been abandoned, while others were nicer than our homes.  

      I was excited to check out an old paddle-wheel steam boat that was anchored in a clearwater back-slough above Fish Lake Creek.  I had seen it when I flew over it on the way in.  I was hoping it was the S.S. Alice Susitna, an old sternwheel steamer that serviced Talkeetna in the early nineteen hundreds.  The Alice was reknown in Talkeetna history for ferrying loads upriver from Susitna Station.  Brian Okonek who spoke last winter at the Belmore Browne slide show said that it was rumored to be rotting in some slough around Lake Creek.  This little nugget of history had me pretty excited when I spotted a floating sternwheel steamer from the air.  “Hey, I think I found the Alice!” I told them one night after recalling my discovery.  My enthusiasm was met with blank stares as I went on to explain my limited knowledge of legendary sternwheeler the Alice Susitna.

      It turned out to be a different boat; the Susitna Belle.  I climbed around on it and took pictures. Preliminary research hasn’t turned up any information on it yet but it looks cool.  I am amazed with the idea of these big paddle wheel boat being able to push up through the swift waters of these glacial rivers.  Some stretches of both the Yentna and Susitna are extremely braided, shallow and swift moving.  I can’t imagine these giant boats making headway upstream but they did and they routinely pushed big loads of supplies.

    Finally we made our way down past cabins and lodges until we arrived at the mouth of Fish Lake Creek.  The kings were in as we cast shiny lures from our inflatable canoes.  Brian had two fish on.  One got off and the other broke his line.  Bummer.

    All was not lost because an hour later as we were back-trolling a sweet mixing line of the mouth of Lake Creek he hooked into another one.  Coincidentally I hooked one at the same time but as I was trying to hold the rod and maneuver the boat around an overhanging tree, it broke my line.  I was resigned to “support crew” and I quickly rowed over to the bank to help Brian land the dime-bright 20 pound king without a landing net.  Hell yeah!

   Once again we pushed off the bank and resumed our progress.  We would be back at Brent’s cabin soon grilling up a delicious King salmon dinner.   Little did I realize that, to cap off the trip I would get to shoot a nice six foot black bear the following morning which was not nursing infected wounds and was delicious.

   

        

The Last Woodchuck Festival

Bernie Woodchuck-an artist's rendering.

    Bernie was a Woodchuck and he was as clever as they come and most agreed that he would probably grow up to be a wise Woodchuck elder.

    The Woodchuck is a curious animal with many peculiarities and idiosyncrasies.  Firstly, and quite contrary to their name, they don’t eat wood (at least on a volunteer basis.)  Woodchucks prefer eating nuts when they are in season otherwise it’s mainly leaves, grass, and small insects they eat, but there’s a lot more to the Woodchuck than their dietary preferences.  

    “There’s a lot more to us Woodchucks than our dietary preferences.”  exclaimed Maddy Woodchuck one day as Woolary Woodchuck listened attentively (he had a crush on Maddy ever since their family burrowed-in next door.)  “..and by the way, we don’t eat wood." she concluded.

Maddy and Woolary 

    So strong, in fact, is the Woodchuck’s aversion to eating wood that some of them even despise their own namesake because of it. A few years back there was even a movement (albeit quite lackluster) among some of the Woodchucks to adopt one of their other nicknames so-as-to disassociate themselves entirely from wood and or wood like materials.  The name Whistle-pig and Land-beaver were supported by some but not enough to facilitate any sort of change and it was unanimously agreed upon that the scientific name of Marmota Monax was a disagreeable thing altogether.  

      The peculiarities and idiosyncrasies of the Woodchuck are as varied as they are abundant and as it turns out, they are staunchly traditional animals and, in the end, downplayed any manner of name-change and agreed almost unanimously, that they should stick with the name Woodchuck from here henceforth and that would be the end of it. 
 “We shall stick with the name Woodchuck henceforth.”  declared Elmer Woodchuck largest and oldest of the Woodchucks.  “..and that will be the end of it.”

A local publication details
the events of the Woodchuck's
 fall election.

    Also, Woodchucks are very social animals and tend to spend the lion-share of their time closely alongside other Woodchucks.  This is true most of the time except for when the owl is around then it’s much more of an on-your-own social structure.   In the time-of-the-owl, most of the Woodchucks hunker down in their burrows and sleep-it-off until the owl has left.  Bernie, who was clever as they come, could never sleep during these stessful times and would use the downtime to think and to plan stuff and sometimes to worry.

      Nevertheless every Spring the elder Woodchucks would gather with their grey whiskers, wise remarks, yellowed teeth, and slow purposeful movements in the biggest of the field’s burrows.  Bernie’s dad Roger maintained the great burrow, as it was called, and it was agreed upon among all the Woodchucks that it was the tidiest and grandest burrow that anyone had ever seen.  

     “That Roger Woodchuck sure maintains the tidiest and grandest burrow that I've ever seen.”  exclaimed Betsy Woodchuck one day to her best friend and confidant Louisa Woodchuck (They became best of friends after their parent’s burrows living room walls collapsed into each others.  Louisa’s dad fell into Betsy’s mom’s lap but that is another story.)

    “Yes Betsy.”  Louisa said but she was notorious for her awkwardly long pauses between thoughts.  “I do believe you are right.”, and after a full minute had passed, she continued.  “It is quite tidy”, and then after another minute or so of quiet contemplation she finally finished. “I think it’s probably the grandest burrow ever.”

     There, inside the tidy and grand burrow so well-kept by Roger Woodchuck and ready for business were the elders.  The gathering would take an entire day like it had every Spring and there was no sense of hurry.   The order of business was the same each year:  plan and organize the Woodchuck field’s only annual celebration, the Woodchuck festival.  The annual Woodchuck festival was centered around one activity and one activity only: The wood eating contest.  None of the elders ever entered the contest themselves instead taking great care to select young male Woodchucks to compete instead.  It was a great source of pride for the elders to kick off such a traditional and joyous event.

    “As you all know it is a great source of pride for us elders to kick off such a traditional and joyous event.” announced Elmer. The opening ceremonies had begun and Bernie tried to make himself small. Elmer was front-and-center and he was beaming with pride and joy. He reached up to pull down a curtain of moss from the ceiling revealing a large ball of woven roots.  Inside the root ball was an assortment of branches in all differing sizes and varieties.

Elmer Woodchuck in his
younger and more spry years.

“Our first contestant is....Bernie!”

    “Drat!” thought Bernie as the crowd vocalized their support.  One by one the other four contestants names were presented with much fanfare that included lots of whistling, cheering, and obligatory chirping.   The conclusion of the naming of the contestants marked the official beginning of the festival that was always punctuated by song.  Quietly and slowly it began. It was a rhythmic chanting of the festival's motto by the entire Woodchuckery.  It was a jingle all the Woodchucks knew by heart and it was one that Bernie hated.

“How much wood

could a Woodchuck chuck

if a wood chuck

could chuck wood?”

“How much wood

could a Woodchuck chuck

if a Woodchuck

could chuck wood?”

    Faster and faster and louder and louder the Woodchucks would recite this jingle until finally all the words ran together followed by more whistling, cheering, and obligatory chirping.

   “God I hate that.” Bernie said out loud.  Roger was nearby and overheard Bernie’s comment.

   “Sorry son.”  Roger’s face crinkled as he faced his son.  “ You know Bernie, I had to eat wood when I was your age.”

    “How was it dad?  Was it tasty?” Bernie shot back.

    “Look Bernie, this is a tradition that...”  Bernie was visibly upset.  He turned away from his dad and made his way up and out of the great burrow and into his own. The obligatory chirping, cheering and whistling continued to echo from the great burrow as Bernie doubled-over and lost his lunch which consisted mainly of nuts, ( they were in season) but also leaves, roots, and insects.  

     No one could have predicted the untimely arrival of the owl that day. The high pitched screech of the owl brought the opening ceremonies to an immediate stop.  As if on cue everyone scurried off to their own burrows and settled in for a long nap.  The Woodchuck festival would have to wait.

    

Demitrius Woodchuck practicing
for the wood-eating contest.

 As his fellow Woodchuck brethren slept, Bernie sat in quiet reflection thinking, planning stuff and worrying.

****************************************************

    “Three.....two.....one.....go!” Elmer Woodchuck pulled down on the root ball as hard as his old claws could manage.  It was three days later and with the owl long gone from the field the Woodchucks were eager to return to their one-and-only Woodchuck festival and its one and only activity: the wood eating contest.  

    The carefully wrapped ball of woody branches came tumbling down from the roof of the great burrow landing in the middle of a carefully drawn circle.  There were four contestants other than Bernie all waiting on their marked spots for the games to begin.  Behind the circle of contestants were the rest of the Woodchucks that filled the burrow to capacity.  With standing-room only,  the burrow was vibrant with Woodchuck enthusiasm.  When the root ball fell and busted open on the ground, the contestants scampered to the pile to begin their rite-of-passage: eating wood. The crowd cheered, whistled and chirped their encouragement. All the contestants scampered to the wood except Bernie.  

       Betsy’s brother Carl got there first and grabbed a branch of birch and began gnawing on it. Soon after, Lanny and Danny Woodchuck (twins) arrived and tied into either end of a rather thick branch of cottonwood.  The next to arrive after tripping over his own tail was Demitrius Woodchuck and he grabbed the first thing he could, which he regretted later because it was a green spruce branch.  Beads of spruce sap gathered at the corners of his mouth as he chewed his way down the stick all-the-while sporting a particularly sour look upon his face.

     Bernie, standing steady at his starting spot didn’t budge.  He watched as the other four Woodchucks worked and chewed and gnawed at the woodpile.   Although Bernie knew all of them well, each of them had unrecognizable facial expressions as they each tried to endure their trial by wood.  Bernie, who was supposed to be along side his Woodchuck brethren chewing and choking on wood took in a few glares from the crowd but held steadfast on the edge of the circle.

     The chirping, cheering, and whistling intensified with each passing minute and still Bernie didn't move.  The pile of wood was getting smaller and the contestants were looking more and more sickly as they continued their workings.   As it turns out eating wood takes a bit more energy than eating nuts, leaves, grass, or small insects and along with getting ill, they were also getting tired.  Finally with Bernie holding to his position, Elmer sounded the final whistle bringing a quick silence to the crowd except for Woolary who was still squared off to Maddy in the crowd engrossed in mid-conversation.   The contestants stopped eating the wood and turned towards Elmer.   Maddy elbowed Woolary as the entire burrow centered its attention on Elmer.

    “Ladies and gentle chucks,”  He began.  “ Today we...”

    Just then Bernie produced a bushel of various branches from behind his back and flung them towards the ill-faced, and bloated contestants.   “Begin round two!” he shouted.

    Betsy’s brother Carl, who had probably eaten the most of the wood and who's cheeks were profoundly rounded and was already swaying began to regurgitate.  A collective “Eoowh!” came over the crowd as Carl doubled over too, in front of all.  Lanny and Danny were next as they also gagged and hacked up a rather large pile of soggy wood chips.  Finally Dimitry Woodchuck, as if on cue got sick all over Lanny’s tail.   Bernie's sense of timing couldn't have been better:

    “Well I guess that settles it.” he exclaimed in a statesman-like voice.”  Bernie turned around to face Elmer and the rest of the Woodchuckery.

    “Settles what young Bernie Woodchuck?” asked Elmer as the crowd hushed and leaned-in.   

    “It settles the question.” Bernie responded to Elmer in deadpan.  By now the occupants of the entire burrow were hanging on Bernie's every word including the four sickly Woodchuck contestants.

   “ To which question are you referring ?” Elmer asked, now clearly irritated.  Bernie pulled the trigger.

  “How much wood could a Woodchuck chuck, if a Woodchuck could chuck wood. That question.”  You could hear a pin drop in the great burrow.

     “You see Elmer,  we Woodchucks don't chuck wood very well at all, it's quite tough and tastes awful and as a matter of fact we all despise the stuff, but as you can see here today we are quite good at upchucking it.”  Woolary cackled out-loud prompting another sharp elbow from Maddy, but mostly the crowd moaned and groaned at the general distastefulness of the scene that had unraveled in front for-all-to-see.  Nothing else profound was said by anyone that night and slowly the crowd, turning away, dispersed up and out of the great burrow and eventually back to their own.

     Although the Woodchuck festival continued after that, (mainly because Woodchucks are staunchly traditional animals) that was the last year of the wood eating contest.  The next Spring Bernie was instrumental in organizing the Woodchuck festival's first annual nut eating contest. It would become the one and only event of the Woodchuck festival and it was wildly popular. Bernie insisted that the contest be open to all Woodchucks on a volunteer basis only. Males, females, young and even the elders were encouraged to compete. After that it was generally agreed upon that Bernie would probably grow up to be a wise Woodchuck elder.

     “That Bernie Woodchuck will probably grow up to be a wise Woodchuck elder.”  Said Betsy and after several quiet minutes Louisa weighed-in too. “Yes Betsy, I do believe you are right Bernie is very wise.”

A Day's Fishing

A Day’s Fishing

A review of Strike Zone fishing charters Maui Hi.

“Hey the sun is coming out.”

“Yeah, time to put on the BBQ sauce.”  Corey and I had ventured up to the wheelhouse and were rubbing-elbows with Captain Jay.  He was right, BBQ sauce, A.K.A sunscreen was a necessary evil.  We had woken up at 5:00 AM in total darkness so we could be on time for our charter.  The sun was just now peaking over Mt. Haleakala and was immediately felt on the skin.

     Captain Jay was a character.  Earlier I had overheard him deliver a well rehearsed joke involving a Catholic Priest and a Jewish Rabbi that had found themselves seated on a plane together.  The punchline, which I missed, had something to do with the resolution of whether or not one or the other had ever succumbed to the temptations of the flesh.  The noisy wave action and distance to the joke-teller precluded me from the punchline which produced raucous laughter from the two gray-haired gentlemen that were privy to the good Captain’s humor.  Darn!

    We were on a combination fishing trip out of Maalaea Bay on Maui.   Captain Jay and his two junior captains, one of them ironically named Junior, the other Carlos were excellent dudes and all three were very good at their jobs.  I am always an admirer of those who are good at their jobs.  Wait staff, carpenters, bank tellers, whatever.  It’s a beautiful thing when people happily excel at work they are good at.  

     Upon leaving the harbor, Junior quickly rigged six trolling set ups; four on the surface, two guided by down-riggers.  Two massive outriggers  completed the boat’s sportfishing setup as we powered up and out of the bay.  We would troll for an hour or so on our way to the bottom fishing grounds where we would have more of a hand in our own fate.  On the way out all sixteen of us drew numbers.  If we were lucky enough to hook a MahiMahi, Oni, Tuna or Marlin, Capt. Jay would call out a number.  If you were the lucky one then you would sit in the “fighting chair” and comense battle for the benefit of all.  Prized meat would be filleted and divided among all we were told.  God I wanted to be that guy!  

    Alas, no Marlin today.  We motored passed the Molokini Crater on our right and a nudie beach on our left called Little Beach. Corey made some joke about wishing for binoculars, but I knew that more than likely the beach would be occupied by a bunch of naked gay dudes, not what he was hoping for.  Several humpbacks surfaced nearby.

We finally settled onto our fishing grounds where we actively fished for a few hours using small strips of squid for bait.  One by one we all had our hand reeling in a smattering of fish the size of rubber-duckies.

Junior helping Corey 

    Meanwhile Junior was busy rigging the bonus-rods out the back.  

   “Number Fourteen!” A high school kid shuffled to the back of the boat and assumed the position. He fumbled his way through the fight taking tips from Junior.  In the end the seven pound Grey Bass was divvied up for all of us which amounted to exactly two fish tacos for us that night.  Way to go kid.

 The guy next to me was from Texas.  “Where you from?” He asked.

“Alaska”

“Wow, Alaska.  In Texas we love one Alaskan very much.”  Here we go. Maybe he followed the Iditarod and was a Dallas Seavey fan. No such luck.

“Sarah Palin.” What a shocker. “We just love her in Texas.  Texas is a very conservative state you know.” No shit?

“Well you can have her, so what’s the weather like in Dallas right now?” Thanks to my clever diversion, our polite little political conversation came to a screeching halt before it even got started. If  I had heard the punchline to the Rabbi joke I could have one-upped him with a bit of sacrilege right-back-atcha style.  It wasn’t meant to be though as the conversation turned to less volatile subjects like the unrestricted killing of feral hogs in Texas which apparently have gotten out of control.  Last summer one of them ate his wife's flower garden.

 “Final final.” Captain Jay shouted.  Junior and Carlos knew that meant last drift and they encouraged us to freshen our bait.  Corey and I did as we were told but, in the end, were unable to add to our pile of two rubber ducks for the day.  Our vision for a fish taco feast was fading.

Rubber Ducky your the one. Nice bass Corey!

    Once again Junior sprang to action rigging the sport fishing gear.  All his fluid movements were done barefoot and it was was obvious that he’d done it many times  before. The boat made a big loop around and everyone oohed and awed  at the whales that were now frolicking and rolling as we trolled our way back to harbor.

  Suddenly the engine was cut way back. “ Number eleven!”

  “Shit, that’s me!” Nice luck.  My fishing brethren made way as I skirted my way port-side.   Rounding the corner I was ready to take my throne.  I was ready to do battle for the village.  I wanted to fight for my peeps and to feed them proper.  For God’s sake, let me feed them!

   But as I rounded the wheelhouse I could see that something was amiss.  I made my way to the stern and it was like a scene from Old Yeller. Long faces, upturned palms, I think I even saw a tear.....shit.  Junior held up the leader-line that was pockmarked with tooth cuts from the wayward Ono.  I sat back down next to Corey along with everyone else and endured the growing chop that had increased considerably on our way back to the safety of the harbor.

   “That will be $27.95.”  The lady at Safeway was smiling and happy and had an easy way about her.   She was good at her job too .  She efficiently swiped my items while seamlessly making small talk about a certain seafood product that I was purchasing on our way back to the condo.  

The sun rises over Mt. Haleakala illuminating our Maalaea Bay fishing grounds as viewed  on a trail run along the Lahaina-Pali trail.

     

Molokini can be seen on the left from the safety of Kamaole One.  Can you pick out Tamra and the kids?

2014 Iditarod- A report from the field

Iditarod 2014

 -A report from the field.

   “Do you want a hot dog?”  He was one of the last.  The grind of the snow-brake brought him to a tidy halt.  

   “Is there any pork in there mon?”  The follow-up questions along with the Jamaican accent was unmistakable.  Newton Marshal.  For the second year in a row he was taking-up-the-rear and gently refusing our offerings.  

   At this point we knew that at least with him, our efforts were futile.  We want them all to take a dog.  It serves as humble validation of what we do.  We wished him well. He thanked us as he pulled the hook and his dogs took him down the trail into the darkness.  I wondered how many pork offerings he would have to turn down before passing under the burled arch in Nome.  Note-to-self: bring one boca-dog next year.

     It was late.  Our party of 15 was disintegrating rapidly.  Supplies were being packed up under the starry night.  Kids were fading.  Hazelee was fast asleep under her mom’s beaver hat in a lawn chair by the fire.  She would protest her exit from the scene but sometimes moms know best.  

     The giant standing spruce tree had bucked up nicely and by now was a burning juggernaut of light and heat.  The bottom four foot section had a big burl and it had served well as a counter-top table and perennial conversation piece.  

Are these big enough?

    Earlier we all watched the Aurora Borealis belt across the sky adding to the already impressive light show put-on by the stars.  The big dipper was easy to pick out along with Orion and Venus then something else caught our attention;  a big owl flew over head.  We had heard the owl the night before. It was hooting in the woods around the cabin.  Maybe like us, he couldn't resist all the activity.  Maybe he wanted a hot dog or two.  I’ll bet that pork would be okay by him.

     Newton Marshal was one of only two nay-sayers this year.  The other was the illustrious Aliy Zirkle. Everyone else took a dog.   Some friends of mine have cabins ten miles down river and they are huge Aliy fans.   Like us, they also build a snow block wall and maintain a bonfire presence each year but in addition to our efforts, they also fly an Aliy Zirkle banner and tend to an unofficial Aliy Zirkle fan club page on Facebook as well.  They always pack-in a big crowd and are notorious for their carryings-on.  The good news is that after overcoming early years’ misunderstandings of intention, Aliy is no longer leary of this crew, who, as a side-note, sometimes come dressed in costume; astronauts, cowboys etc, like the Yentna River’s version of the Village People. I was willing to bet that the Village People fed her.

      As for our camp- we are well and good.  Posting the highest percentage of hot dog handouts ever, this year’s efforts were perfunctory.  So perfunctory in fact that extra time was afforded to shooting-the-breeze, howling at the moon and stoking-the fire (not necesarily in that order).  Perhaps most of the affirmation though comes not from the patting of one’s own back as I am doing here, but rather from the musher’s themselves who make-a-point of thanking us for our efforts.  “ I was so looking forward to this!”, or “ Oh, good you guys are still doing this, thanks!”, or “ I look forward to this every year!”

  Note to the galley:  Martin Buser took a dog from us this year for the first time ever!  He must have read my blog entry from last year’s race.  We would find out later that he would lead the race all the way to Nicoli before taking his 24 hour rest.  Powered by pork.  Best of luck to him.

Amanda Harrison making the handoff

   Adding to the depth and scale of our efforts, we once again conducted our beloved Fantasy Iditarod Drawing.  The “Draw” pits contestants knowledge of mushers along with their ten bucks in a guessing game of Iditarod finishes.   Last year’s winner was my wife Tamra who was proud-as-punch. She used her winnings to purchase a propane-fired camp oven.  Her selfless act brought our operation to a new level.   Keeping the buns warm is now a cinch.  We even baked cookies this year.   Bless her heart, the year I won I think I blew it all on a giant foam cowboy hat and seven cases of cheap beer.

    Alas, another Iditarod has come and gone for us signalling the end of our winter.  I always want it to last longer than it does and feelings of melancholy crop up but are soon dampened by the allure of the springtime sun.  For the Harrison's, traditions such as this one are all part of the rhythm of life and are looked forward-to, planned-for and celebrated.

Hotdog anyone?

Fantasy Iditarod 2014

 Winner’s report:  Last year’s winner Tamra Jo reports that winning was “good.”  

Treasurers report:   100 bucks in the pot from last year.  The other 100 was spent by Tamra. on the following:

 1)$7.50 went to the United way

2) $7.50 went to the “She’s the first” program that raises funds for girls education in Uganda

3) $7.50 went to a bottle of cheap champagne that she drank by herself in the tub.

4) The remainder went to a BRAND NEW OVEN for the hotdogs! ( pause for cheering, hugs, and high fives.  Chest bumping is decidedly out this year. Man hugs are ok.

Rule Changes:

     There are no rule changes from last year.  Below is a recap.

1)     The point value for the winning musher earns ten additional bonus points. 

2)    Rookies’ scores will earn 1.5 times their point value finish. 

3) Red lantern musher earns the same point  value as the winner minus the ten bonus points.

4) A scratched musher earns zero.

5) Dead dog rule:  minus 50….loser!!!!