Finally........an update!

Back to Tuesday – worked all day on the computer and I got to run the 7.7 mile 6-dog race course – Rand sent me out again saying “trust your leaders” (of course they had run it 3 days in a row) and it was very fast and wonderful – didn’t see any moose –kind of wanted to but didn’t want to get attacked either!! During the day Beth Gambrell stopped by – her husband is a Lt. Colonel and is in Georgia for deployment training to Iraq – she broght us coffees and visited and then came back later in the day with a whole bag of goodies (souveniers, food from Alaska, key chain, beer, something called a “wine beer”) she felt bad we had not been able to come to dinner but was so sweet to go to the trouble of shopping for us!! and then to Tim MacDonald’s for dinner – oh man!!! Grilled salmon he had caught in 3 different grilling flavors!!! Plus noodles with scallop sauce ( I asked but he didn’t catch those!) Tim and Shirley have spoiled us rotten…….so I thought of a way to partially pay them back…….here they are in Alaska and never have been on a dog sled!! So tomorrow will be their big day!!!
Wednesday: more work on the computer and Shirley and Tim showed up on time at 4:30 ready for their “experience”! Tim went out first with my 2 lead dogs with Randy out on the trail ½ mile to turn him on to a short cut – Shirley taking movies (Tim is actually the movie taker and Shirley got lots of movies of the snow and her feet…….sorry Shirley, knew you would love it if I teased you!!!) and Tim says coming back the dogs looked back at him like “aren’t you going to help?????............so he even pumped! Then Shirley went out and also had a great time ……they may be addicted!!! We offered them a couple of dogs to get started but no takers…………..
Also today Mark Hartum from near Edmonton, Canada was here to train with his family – a delightful young man and very fun to talk with – he took out 8 dogs with his little boy on the runners and his daughter on a sled behind him and his wife with 8 dogs and a daughter on a sled behing her!!!!! And away they went!!! 5 Hartums, 16 dogs and 4 sleds!
Thursday up at the crack of 9, worked, went to the store to buy some things that will be ever more so expensive once we leave Fairbanks (like milk and we bought another space heater half off which makes you wonder how much Walmart is jabbing you the rest of the year – and then the space heater doesn’t do what the old one did!!)- stopped at ColdSpot feed cause we won’t make it all the way home with meat so bought some dry dog food/kibble. Finally got underway to Tok – stopped at McDonald’ to use wifi and saw a Tillman Trucking from Fremont, MI !!!! it is such a small world!! --- neared Delta Junction where our friend Jan Fairbanks lives and we tried to call to get directions on the cell phone (last time we were here was 1998) and no service – by the time I had service we were already 25 miles past her house!!! Next year Jan!! Got to Tok after driving through some beautiful mountainscapes and tried to get pictures with the sun setting by don’t know how successful I was – stopped at the same gas station we stayed at a month ago and just this afternoon moved over to the musher’s club house for the pot luck and draw tonite!!