We got a little bit more snow today...............

 but not nearly enough for what we need for the trails to be "sled ready"!!!  We will have to see how much more we get over the next few weeks - first race is here on the first weekend of January!!!!  Right now we have about 3 inches and that's not nearly enough to hook down on a sled!!!  We did go 27 miles today on new snow and went on many trails we don't usually use so it was fun!!

These are the wolf tracks the next day after we saw them crossing the trail in front of us!!!

Beautiful embroidered towel that I received from my sister-in-law, Donna, for Christmas!!!  She can do amazing things on the machine that my brother got her as a present!!!!

Our early family Christmas -----

On the Narnia trail there were 2 guys camped out in a huge green tent up from Indianapolis to trap for the week last week - they were very friendly and having a great time - we stopped to talk to them a couple of times when we were training dogs on the trail - they showed us the pine marten they had caught but I didn't have the camera with me - we saw a pine marten in our lean-to last year - it stayed around for a couple of days- I guess they are pretty aggressive...............

Nice picture of the team training with he trainer!

Randy decorating the "Narnia Christmas tree" - we had to run over it once with the 4 wheeler and the team and the next day we cut it out of the trail with the chain saw - the top of the tree was so nice Randy decided to "plant" it and then I bought a start to put on top - then we got really carried away and put red pine cones and a snowflake decoration on it!!!  We haven't told anyone we did it and are waiting to see if anyone mentions it!!!!

You've heard of people playing "elf on the shelf" at Christmas - well this is our version------"Gome in the Home"!!!!!!  I told Randy I was going to start and before I could he hid it from me in the bathroom!!!  now we are taking turns hiding it until Christmas  - plus on Randy's there is a treat in his lap when he finds him!!!!

George and Ansel thinking they can beat Grandpa at arm wrestling!!!!

Annabelle with the best green mustache you will ever see!!!

The beautiful cupcake wreath that Dee made us for the party!!!

family picture missing Elaina and Annabell who were in the bathroom!!!

We went to eat our take-home cupcakes in the truck and found someone had put a Ninja turtle in one of them!!!

Snakeskin pants from Mitzi and Keyon for Christmas - not real...................

Classic present from Nate!!!!  the light fixture that the father wins and displays i the front of the home in the movie "Christmas Story"!!!!!

Showing off my "Aurea Manicure" from Saturday nite!!!

Got off to a good start on Saturday to travel downstate for our annual DeKuiper family Christmas party!!!  Left at 10:30 and that wasn't bad considering we had gotten up at 9, had to load the truck, load the 5 puppies into the crates in the back of the truck and get ourselves ready and eat breakfast!!!

Roads were good once we got into Newberry and away from most of the snow - stopped first to Dee's our neighbor downstate, and dropped off the 5 8 month old pups for her to take care of for the rest of the winter - even though they are running excellent, we don't want to take a chance in running them in a race too early and hurting their bodies or their heads racing them - and that is just 5 less dogs we will have to drop 5+ times a day when we are traveling!

Nent stop - the Perf Marquette Lodge in Baldwin!  We found out on the way south that the other DeKuiper family was also going to be staying at the lodge Saturday nite as a surprise for us and that they arrived before we did!!!  Went to dinner with Moe and Lydia and after they went to Mass were joined by the DeKuiper family (absent Aeja as she in in college in Wyoming!!)  And that's where the arm wrestling event took place!!

Back to the lodge and had a wonderful time playing games and doing nails in the common room - wonderful Christmas decor and very rustic with tons of mounts of fish and game!!!

Good sleep and up in the morning to church for Mass - got out and my brother and his wife were there (had been in Mass but we didn't know it) so we visited until the folks from church cleared out the dining room area from coffee and donuts so we could decorate for out party - did that went and got pizza and pretty soon all 27 of us were there and had a blast!!!! Lots of fun presents, played Christmas bingo and lots of hugs and kisses!!!

Left just past the time we had scheduled ourselves (fed dogs before we left Saturday and then when we got home Sunday nite - 4.5 hour drive one way...) and were home just before 9!!!  Couldn't have asked for things to go better and it was wonderful to see everyone after being gone for 2 months up to the UP!!

Today we trained and are being plagued with some injuries on a few of the dogs which is really bothering Randy- you purposely plan your training in slow increments in the best conditions you can but inevitably, things happen and now we have a couple that will have to get some some "extra special" attention!

The really big news is that while we were training today, Randy saw something ahead of us on the trail crossing and thought it was a dear.......but then realized it was a wolf!!!  Then we saw another one staying in the trail that looked to be about 90 pounds and then another one crossed the trail!!!  We knew there were some wolves around us but had not seen them (we have it on good authority from a local that there are about 3 wolves in out area but that south of us closer to Newberry there is a pack of 20 to 30!!!!)  So tomorrow I am going to take a picture of the track that we say from the last one of the three!!!

Went to Jan's tonite for dinner for homemade beef stew!!  Delicious!!  She's getting a cold from being south by Ann Arbor with her family Christmas - so hopefully none of ours or Jan will share the germs with us!!!

It's looking a bit more like December now..............

training one of the 2 teams of 10 going through the entrance to "Narnia" because it looks kind of enchanted!

One of the pups we will be taking down to Dee to watch for the rest of the winter - they are only almost 8 months old but as big as full grown dogs!!!  this one is marble

The dog yard up in the UP

Our very handsome and strong runner Cool - he is a son of Yeti out of Streeper Kennels

Doesn't Watson have the most beautiful blue eyes??!!  He and one girl that we got in Quebec that is a daughter of a dog we gave our friends Mario and Suzanne (Greg) are the only 2 we have with the blue eyes

This year's Christmas tree - we have had it for a month already but just put it up on december 4th

the last week or so has been pretty busy - going to Escanaba to get more dog meat, dinner at Jan's for chicken and dumplings, to town a couple of times to get a new tire for the trailer because Randy discovered it was flat!!!  (and it was a brand new tire 2 months ago!!) getting the snow machine we just purchased up and running, writing Christmas cards, lots of wrapping and getting ready to come downstate to see family for a Christmas gathering on December 11th and also bringing the 5 pup that are 8 months old but all as big as adults!

We had a foot of snow when Mitzi and her family were here for 2 days so we were able to do a lot of the dog=related activities they were looking forward to (one dog sled runs, runs for a mile behind the snow machine and Mitzi for a 4 dog team 4 miler and got to watch Grandpa training dogs 2 days!!).  Then we lost the snow but now are getting it back very slowly............way less snow here than we have seen in the previous 4 years we have stayed up here!!

The dogs are going around 26 miles currently and we want to get them up over 30 in the next couple of weeks to be ready for the first race the first weekend of January up here - but if we don't get a lot more snow that is even in question!

There may be a storm this weekend to drive through so we will just have to say prayers that it doesn't stop us from getting see family this weekend!  More later..............

 

 

Hope you all had a wonderful Blessed Thanksgiving day!!!

We had a great week all week!!!  Tuesday Mitzi, Keyon and the 2 kids came up to visit us for a couple of days!!  They rented a house an hour away from us - they arrived Tuesday just in time for them to go out with Grandpa and ride the snow machines watching him train a team - then we came back and they each drove a one dog team down the driveway and then I pulled them around a one mile course on the dog sled behind the snow machine!!! great fun!!!  

Later we went out to dinner in Hulbert at the restaurant we have been to before where they feed the deer herd right outside the windows next to your table -----unfortunately because of deer season they  were not allowed to feed deer so we couldn't see any................

Wednesday they came back over and Mitz rode around the trail training dogs with her dad and the kids and Keyon and I stayed back and made 7 snow people to greet Grandpa and Mom at the end of our driveway when they came back from training!!!

That nite we went over to their rental house and had an early Thanksgiving dinner!!  delicious with all the trimmings!!!

They left Thursday morning early because Keyon had to work Friday = we went to Carol and John Waltman's and had another nice turkey dinner!!!  pretty hard to stay on a diet this week!!!!

Saturday was church and we have been training every day but a little later because we have had to wait until the slush that froze overbite to thaw out a bit so the dogs didn't hurt their feet - as of today, most of our foot of snow is gone - some left on the trail  but not much!  We were training and noticed that Gear was having trouble keeping up so Randy left Gear and me on the trail side and we started walking home - she certainly pulled me hard enough she didn't appear to be injured!!!  It turned out that I walked her for 2 miles!!!  that was some exercise wearing winter boots!!!!

It must be Thanksgiving  because the lights in Newberry are on!!!!

First time to use the snow machine to train!!!

 since Thursday we have gotten even more snow (not like New York state though...............) and we were able to run the snow machine to train the dogs on sunday!!!  It was a lot less bumpy and more comfortable for me to ride on!!!  You don't feel all the holes and roots in the trail as easy!  There's about a foot of snow on the ground and enough that Randy plowed the driveway with our plow truck - 

We ate out at the Wolf Inn - which is a restaurant on the way to Newberry that has been closed for a while - once whitefish that was delicious and once nachos supreme - new owners and management and the menu is good!!

Monday we started out at 6 am to drive to Detroit for the funeral service of Bill's (our son-in-law, Amy's husband) mother.  We expected that it would take 6 hours and that's what it was - got there in time to have some family visiting time, stayed for the service and then drove back home to feed dogs at 10p!!  The roads were good all the way except for the 1/2 hour drive from our house to Newberry and we used 4 wheel drive on the truck!

the angry straits of Mackinac - it's usually pretty calm but the winds were from the right direction today to make white caps and 3 foot waves!

Coming back across the bridge tonite - less wind and pretty with the bridged lighted for the holidays!

Tomorrow Mitzi and her family are here for for a couple of days so the kids will be able to see how training dogs goes and maybe some winter fun activities!!!  Have to take some good pictures!!!

Maybe winter is here to stay................???

 

the buck pole in front of the American Legion in downtown Newberry - some nice racks there!!

Picture from training in the part of the woods trail the locals all call "Narnia"!!!  10 dogs on a 12 dog line

 the last weeks has gone by fast --  Saturday nite, church then Sunday training 1 team and the 7 month old pups and dinner at Jan's with Waltman's;  Monday training both 10 dog teams knowing that we would not train the next day because of opening day of deer season ( Grandma managed to slip on the snowy step of the 4 wheeler getting on to start and got run over by the wheel so we are working hard on the lyrics to a brand new Christmas favorite, "Grandma Got Run Over by the Dog Team"); dinner at Waltman's on Tuesday nite after a trip into town; Tuesday no training because of hunters in the wood (though there are not many hunters or deer around here!!) and finally Wednesday with no training and another trip into town because the pull cord on one of the 2 the snowmachines we just got from trading our 2003 Harley in September!

I have finally conceded that it's time to take the Halloween decorations down because today I wrapped Christmas presents and watched "White Christmas" (until Randy came back in the house and nixed it!!!)

Tomorrow we plan to train one team as we are supposed to be out in the woods only from 11 to 2 - that leaves us just about enough time to hook up and go the 18 miles we are planning!!!

I have tried to get the movie to work that I took the last time we trained, but it doesn't seem to want to play once I have it downloaded into the blog - any suggestions??

Will let you know how tomorrow's training goes!!

IT'S JUST NOT GETTING COLD!!!

 

Let me please introduce, Rosie the Robot!!!!  she is new at the Pine Stump Junction bar!!!  She is just settling in there and actually they are having a naming contest, so for me to call her Rosie is just a throw-back to the Jetson's and their housekeep "Rosie"  we didn't see her in action tonite when we went to dinner with Laura and Bruce (they were not very busy so the waitress said she hadn't even had to "warm her up" and use her today!!  Mostly she delivers orders and picks up the dirty dishes...........pretty amazing to see out here in the wilderness!!!!  They purchase her because they can be swamped at peak times for snow machines and side by side/4 wheeler seasons!!!

It's a little difficult to pick out the actual reason for the picture from all the decorations, but this is what it looks like to be out of power and wanting to plug in and run as many electrical things as possible in a power outage!!! (tv, internet, computer, microwave, lights, fan for the furnace, etc..............)

Good last couple of days of training before it gets too warm and rains for a couple of days - ran 2 teams yesterday 14 miles and decided that it had been far enough for the 7 month old pups to keep training - they are doing super good but we don't want to go to far for "developing" bodies - even though 2 of them are bigger that most of the 20 adult dogs we have!!!  So yesterday we only hooked up 2 10 dog teams and it was incredible how much less work it seemed!!!   You would never imagine just running 5 dogs less would make a big difference but it really does!!!  especially not having to harness Marble, who is like harnessing and octopus!!!

So today we thought it was going to warm up too fast and be raining when we could train in the cooler morning - so I am just to about to get into the shower and Randy changes his mind and says lets go train.....so I start getting dressed...........then it starts pouring.........then we're not training...........so I'm almost in the shower...........and were going to train..............then it starts raining again..........finally we did not - instead I vacuumed and made chocolate chip keto cookies for Randy and we went out to dinner!!!  Not much planned for the next couple days but we will see how the weather is and may be training ======  only 11 weeks until the Stage Stop race in Wyoming!!!!

Speaking of that and indecisiveness..........Randy said yesterday that maybe the price of fuel is going to be too high to travel up to Alaska this year, even though it will be the 25th anniversary of us getting married there!!!  so we shall see............

Back again!!!

First off I am going to show you some pictures from our time up in the UP so far this year............

Rainbow that we say last nite getting gas in Newberry after church - and then the storm came that has left us without power for the last 24 hours!!!  Thankfully Randy is a wizard at connecting the generator to multiple cords so we have all the essentials.........heat, microwave and tv and computer!!!!

My first of three pumpkins to be carved this year - I was trying for a scary face!!!  the flowers we got on Halloween and there is a spider and web decoration in the bouquet!!

this little guy was parked in town when we went into the lot for the senior center - we had stopped for me to shop for material to make this year's Christmas ornaments!!!  The guy that owns it had gotten it in Wisconsin for $400 and drove it back to Newberry for the kid's Halloween party at the community center - he was going to make a haunted trail and the kids would have to walk through the legs of the skeleton!!

i

Some of the beautiful color up here............sadly every bit of color is gone now!!!

my Halloween decorated arrangement outside our back door-- see the ghosts hanging? more to come on them............

 scene from one of the lakes that we run by training the dogs

the poor dead bodies of my ghosts retrieved from the garage where a red squirrel brutally ripped them from my decoration tree and dragged them across the floor and left them in shreds!!!!!!!  who knew a red squirrel would climb up that tree to grab my ghosts to use for bedding!!!???  the next day I sprayed them with bleach and there were no more murders!!!!

Well we arrived here at Deer Park in the beginning of October - so far the training has been pretty good - I think we have only missed about 4 days of training due to the weather - there was a time in the beginning that we were trying to do each dog 2 days on and 1 day off but with the warm weather it hasn't 't been that easy - actually pretty hard to do just every other day..........but we are happy

The big training session was last weekend = there we're about 16 teams here to train and both saturday and sunday we left from our side of the road first to train so we met every team head on coming back!!!!  In retrospect, it was a bit much for the puppies that we are running in the team = they were intmidated by the other dogs but eventually got over it and went by fine -  there were probably 40 people there for the pot luck in Bruce and Laura's pole barn and the speaker was a vet from Colorado and she did a great job of doing a preliminary and secondary physical exam of dogs when they have come back from a run to check for injuries

We haven't spent any time sight seeing and have gone to Marquette once for dog medicine and once to Escababa to get dog meat.

When I think of more I will tell you in the next post!!!

Last race report!!

I can’t remember for sure where I left off communicating so I will do a brief update of the last week – as we speak we are sitting at the last race of the year in Quebec at St. Christine (like the name…….?? no resemblance!!!) 

We trained only one day on Wednesday but trained 2 teams – one ours and the other some dogs we are looking at from Claude – we went to Walmart once in Shawinigan and the rest of the week just continued to recover from being sick – it may well have been covid but we didn’t test so we don’t know………

We did also go out to the local restaurant with Bellerives and Hermel and had great conversation and good food!!  Randy got all his favorites- a cheeseburger, poutine and sugar pie!!!!  Not on the diet but we are planning to resume that when we get home!!

Oh and when we got home from eating out I felt a very very sharp back molar- at first I thought my filling had fallen out but it was the tooth that had broken off!!!  Time for a crown and $1000!!!

Plus we got out bill from our telephone provider and I thought we were paying more for international service but didn’t know HOW much!!!! This last month was $339!!!!

The race this weekend has been a mass start and a very snowy trail here with blowing and drifting (especially in the 4 mile field section) .  Randy and I were on our own yesterday since everybody starts at the same time so there are no “extra handlers” walking around to plead for help with!!!  We managed to get them all hooked up and Randy left on cue with the flag drop and was not the last to make it to the trail but I couldn’t really see what was going on so far away (everybody starts in a big semicircle _we chose to be all the way on the right side, then they drop a flag to say “go” and every team vies to reach the actual trail first!!! The start of the trail was maybe a /1/4 mile away and down a decline so hard for me to see) there were 13 entered in the 10 dog and the first day Randy came in 10^th – both Claude and Hermel had trouble in the drifted part of the trail yesterday so they opted not to come today.  We don’t have he results yet but are quite sure he moved up at least one place – he had a good run, it was just a hard trail for the dog but he was very proud of how they ran!!!  Especially the old leader, Yeti – he is one heck of a dog!!! 

 

Tomorrow morning is our traditional goodbye breakfast with the Bellerives – and then on to Michigan!!!  It’s been almost since my birthday in Septmeber since we have been home…………so really looking forward to the hot tub and mostly seeing all of our family and friends!!!!  I will write again to let you know we got home safely!!! 

If we get a knock on the door of the van it means that the big snowstorm traveling here from Texas is canceling the race this weekend!!

 That's what Claude told us today as we were having dinner at the local Charerete eatery!!  Big snow storm coming in the next 2 days and don't know how that will effect the race trail.............more updates coming!!!

oh well...........

 News flash (that was for you Scarlett!)!!!   It did indeed start freezing raining and they are canceling the race for today = so no second chance for us……………. We will start driving to Claude’s and see how the roads are and if they are bad we will just stop!!!!

Not as we had hoped.............

Big day today!!!!  Claude Bellerive’s race in St. Luc.  15 miles with 6 of our dogs and Claude loaning us 8 from Hermel’s (his handler) team!!!  We should be fast but the only problem we might have is that our best leader, Yeti, isn’t feeling well – so we are putting in Grace, another leader but not as fast as some as our other dogs, because if Yeti can’t do it he will have to switch Grace to run lead!

He left the chute and looked like everybody was running good – se we will se what place he is when he is finished – he went out 13^th out of 13 so the trail might be a bit chewed up by the time he is on it but it started out quite hard – the high for today is only 26 so it should have stayed good even after the first 12 unlimited teams and all the 6 dog teams this morning – tomorrow it’s supposed to snow for a few hours and then switch to freezing rain and then rain – so it’s a possibility it may only be a one day race!!

Well………….it didn’t work out so well – the worst problem was that our leader Yeti was sick and didn’t run as hard as he usually would and one of the dogs neck lines came unhooked during the race so Randy figures that when you stop and hook down that you lose a minute – so we are last with not too much time between us and the few teams ahead of us…………

Disappointing to say the least …………..we will see if there is another time to redeem ourselves tomorrow……………. 

Update for the last of February!

It’s been a pretty calm week – trained twice – both times bitter cold but a good trail (except for the day we trained and had to go through foot high blow-in trail because it was so windy!!)  All the dogs are looking good except for Briget (who seems to have gotten really old really fast and can’t keep up) Cool, who injured his ankle going through the deep drifts – we think- and Sidney, who just has been continually acting injured when we run him in the team and who probably won’t race this year.

We went to dinner at Melanie’s on Wednesday nite – and thoroughly enjoyed our time together – actually 4 hours!!  And they all had the annual entertain the customers event the following day (snowmachining to a resort and then ice fishing and dinner and many other fun things…………)

Thursday we trained and everybody looked good.

Left at 10 on Friday to go 1.5 hours to the next race at Pont Rouge and it took a bit longer to get there because of some blowing snow and snowy roads – had to ask where the race start was and had I spoken French I would have been able to understand that the race site was across the highway from the address given!!!  Met a little girl Gabriel and her father Guillome while we were dropping dogs for supper – he spoke limited English and she was four and none – quite cold – and windy!!

Rand y went out 6^th and had a hard race for 10 miles because his leader, Grace was just not pulling (found out later she had some fissures on her paws so that was the reason) and he came in last – the next day was not much better and he stayed last of 13 teams.

The really good news was that we got to both our long-time friends-dog-racers-but-not-doing it any more- Suzanne and Mario!!! It had been 2 years and we were happy to catch up = and also our friend from Maniwaki, Cat, was there on Sunday because she came 5 hours to see and help her friend Jean and to see her family in the region (she grew up in Quebec City so she is feeling very warm and homey)

So good weekend with getting to see old friends and then headed back to Bellerives – Randy somehow managed to catch a cold so now he’s congested and coughing – we got a call from the Canadian covid testing company telling us that we needed to contact the (we found out they never picked up the covid test they required when we crossed the border and had to perform on a virtual nurse visit……………) so we had to deal with that for an hour today and found out that Patrick, Melnie’s husband had a positive covid test and now they are quarantining  at home this week!!!  Plus we had something funky going wrong with our generator at the race and the diesel truck ----both of which have been fixed by kind friends!!!

So the plan this week is to train and then go to Claude’s race that he puts on every year in St. Luc about an hour and a half from here and then probably head home to Michigan – maybe things will change if randy doesn’ t seem to get better – he’s on all kinds of over the counter cold/cough meds and albuterol nebulizer treatments so we will see over the next 2 days!!! 

the Maniwaki experience!!

 My goodness – go to sleep with it raining and wake up snowed in!!!!  We got about a foot of snow that blew all over and made drifts all around our trailer and the barn!!!!  Luckily Claude’s business, Cirtech, has a loader that clears all of his personal property and before we were even ready to leave for Maniwaki he had the whole barn yard clean!!!!

We left about 10:30 and the roads (even the expressway is most places) were snow covered and icy – so it made for a bit of a stressful trip = as we got farther up in the mountains (the Laurentides) it actually got a bit better – they didn’t get the heavy rain turned to snow!

We arrived in Maniwaki without incident (oh yeah, except for the one car that pulled in ahead of us on the expressway and then put on its brakes causing Randy to “jump” into the next lane to avoid hitting it!!!!).   We parked next to Claude’s trailer at the hotel on the river where most of the activities were to take place, only to find out that the trail they had put in on the river had been ruined when they let water out from the dam and flooded the river!!!  So we moved out of town to the revised race site at a logging business parking lot!!  It was just us and one other dog trailer there for the nite, parked next to a huge pile of logs!!

In the morning we found out that the new trail they had put was termed “dangerous” by the drivers that went out to look at it on a snowmachine – they decided that they would max the teams at 10 dogs and run the course backwards…….so all this took some time and they finally had the 10am race at 1!!  They also had decided that because the trail was “dangerous” that they didn’t want to encourage competitive racing so they let the open drivers know that the purse for that class would be divided evenly between the drivers  ---  so that made it a lot more comfortable for Randy to run he course much like a 9.8 mile training run – which he did which accounts for his placing the final times.  So it was all good.

The really fun part of the weekend was that we got to see a friend that we made two years ago when we came to this race – her name is Cat (a burst of warmth, positive energy and fun) and she is best friends with a woman named Marie Anik-Elie (spelling?) that we raced with 2 years at the Rondy in 2010-11 (I think those were the years….)  She is a delightful person and was down to Anchorage to race from the Northwest Territory – about as far north as you can go!!!  So we had Marie as the connection and it has just grown from there so that she planned to help us with the team even before she found out that I had an injury keeping me from leading the dogs up to the line and back!  (according to Cat my injury is very common for hockey goalies – she plays hockey- so from now on I am going to call it my goalie injury!!!). Then when she got called away from us to help with organizing teams, a delightful family was assigned to help us!!!  They were here for their first dog sled race but own 30 dogs and have a business giving sled rides – they also have Highlander cows (just like our son and daughter-in-law Jess and Cindy), sheep, chickens and other assorted animals!!!  They were great helpers and then Randy helped them get out with their son Alexi doing the 4 dogs and then they borrowed our Gatt sled (which Colin was very impressed with) for the 2 dog.   The mother and father were Steve and Caroline and we thoroughly enjoyed them and hope to see them at more races!!

I was pretty blizzard in the late afternoon so we decided to "hunker down" here in the same parking lot and drive in the light and better weather and hopefully roads1

So we got our share of the purse from the race director last nite – but because 2 people dropped out of the race (one because of dog illness which we hope we don’t get, and one because of trouble on the trail) we get another $119 for a grand total of $702!!!!  Lots better than a sharp stick in the eye and in Canadian cash!!!!  So right now we are waiting to drop dogs before we leave Maniwaki and for him to come with the addition purse money!!!  Then on our way back to Bellerive’s  and train probably tomorrow and Wednesday and then a race in Pt. Rouge (half way between  Claude’s and Quebec City) for another adventure!!!!

Happy Valentine's belatedly everyone!!!

  

Well tomorrow turned out to be Wednesday!!! (we lost a couple of days of communication!)

Went out to dinner Sunday nite for our treat for Valentines Day to Patrick's Pub again and Randy liked the pulled pork so well from Thursday at the draw meeting that he ordered it again!!

We did get covid test  results while we were still in Laconia – we had left the race site to get fuel and were driving around looking for a place to park wifi so I could work on the ArrivCan website so we could leave as soon as we had the results – after a  few short words with each other because we tried a couple of places to park that would not accommodate our rig and we almost got stuck in their lot, we did find another Walmart out by the expressway – crazily, just as I was coming back from checking out whether there was a restaurant in the Walmart – like so many do- and sure enough there was a Subway.  So we had lunch and I completed the many many pages of forms for ArivCanfor a half hour and received my receipt number – along with the test results form CVS which I screen shotted we were good to go – good roads all the way to the border and things were going peachy until the patrolman asked if we had ever been turned away at the border…………………you see they have all that info in their computer………so they knew we had been sent back in September because we got close to the bridge in Port Huron and then became committed with no place to turn off and hoping against hope would get the results on the phone before we got to the patrol…….that didn’t happen and they detained us for 4 hours in the immigration office and then turned us back into the US with an address of a place that would do covid tests for $100 each – so that is now in our “permanent file” – thankfully Randy answered yes to this border patrolman, but they still made us pull over and come into the office until they could verify that we did as they asked in September and were cleared – whew, we thought we were in for more trouble but they just handed back our driver’s licenses and we were good to go!! {sidenote- wouldn’t you know it that just after we got the $100 test done I got the results form the Rite Aid in Fremont!!!!)

The rest of the trip to Charette and out friends the Bellerives was uneventful= got here about 7 – Patrick and Melanie were just leaving her parents house across the street so they stopped to greet us and then Claude came over and spent some time looking and dogs and talking!!!  They were pretty excited to see us!!! and that made us feel really good!

Yesterday was going on the website of the after-the-border-crossing-you-have-to-get-another-covid test-in-Canada!!!  They randomly chose Randy to be tested again, so they gave us this box at the border and we had to register on yet another website and make a virtual appoint with a health care professional to guide us through the process and observe we were doing it right………….so we did and now today the test kit is hanging on the garage door know of the Bellerive’s house and there is supposed to be a Purolator courier picking it up today between 9am and 6pm – then is 2 to 3 days we have to go back on the website and see what the results are!!!!  What a bunch of malarkey!!!!  And I am stressed every minute of it!!!!

Today we are hoping to run some dogs on the pretty crusty training trail after we hopefully get a little snow this afternoon – we have 6 dogs that haven’t run lately and we need to see how they are feeling –

We did get a call from the vet that performed the surgery on Peeps and MSU lab did determine that the growth on her intestine was cancerous – chances of her living 1 year are 75% and for 2 years 65%-  not restrictions just let her do what ever feels like doing – so we shall see.  Disappointing news to be sure – she is only almost 4 and has lots of potential as a leader – the best of the 4 in her litter.

Last nite was dinner at the Bellerive’s for pizza and dessert called “Queen Elizabeth cake”!!!  never heard of it let alone tasted it!!!  Kink of like a cakey fruit cake……..with carrots and who knows what else in it!!!

Friday we leave for Maniwaki – takes about 6 hours from here –north of Montreal up in the mountains – we are hoping they have good snow at that elevation and won’t get the rain that is predicted for tonite and tomorrow!!!  Will write again this weekend!!!

Hip hip Hooray!!!!

 Well by now you all probably know that Randy had an excellent first day at Laconia!!!  3^rd place!!!  It was pretty warm and 2 of his 12 dogs weren’t working very strong but they came in looking really good – they must have thought it was just a fun run because the trail was only 13 miles!!!  At home we had been alternating 12 and 20 mile runs so this probably seemed short to them!  Today is supposed to be a high of 49 degrees and so far it’s cloudy – so that’s’ good – they took 2 more miles out of the trail because some 4 wheelers had wrecked it – so that is not to our advantage – they will just be getting warmed up and rolling and they will be done!!!  I would love for Randy to hold on to 3^rd but we will see- there’s about 2 minutes between Kenny Chezik and Randy and the same between Kenny and first place, Guy Girard – there’s only a minute and 50 seconds between Randy and 4^th place so here’s hoping!!!!!

 

Saturday was even warmer and the dog team parking lot turned into a swimming pool!!!  Randy left the 2 dogs that were having a hard time the first day off and went with 10 dogs – they started in reverse order of finishing for Friday so he went out 8^th(now would be a good time for me to tell you how much I appreciated the help I got from Sherry Johnson – Neil and Carolyn Johnson’s 23 year old daughter that we have know since she was about 6 years old – she and her dad – who both her dad and mother were excellent open class drivers in Alaska and Laconia- flew in from Minnesota just to watch the race – and rather than go with her dad in the car to watch teams out on the trail she stayed with me so she could run the team up to the start and then back at finish!!!!  Thank you so much Sherry – I don’t know what I would have done without you!!!!  I was still hurting from slipping on the ice Thursday nite and would never have been able to lead them up to the start!!!)  it was about 50 degrees and the trail was very slow and punchy but Randy managed to inspire our dogs to keep up the pace – he would have actually done better times if the trail had been longer- he asked for more from them when the trail was good and they responded to his whistling them up!!!

So Sunday was much colder and the trail had frozen before they could get it groomed  and it was a mess of trenches and holes – thankfully they canceled and we ended up having the awards at the race site at 11 – it was extremely special for Randy to get 3^rd– the best he had ever done at Laconia!!!!  

After all the racers and help left there was just us in the icy parking lot so we decided (actually Randy decided ) that we should go out to dinner for Valentine’s day early and went to the same restaurant we went to for the draw on Thursday – and I got crab cakes!!  Delicious!!!  Tonite we are back at the Walmart parking lot and waiting to get the results from the covid tests we had done yesterday – as soon as we have results I will enter our information into the ArrivCan website and see if I can get it to cooperate with me this time (I had a horrible time in September when we came up to see Bellerives)  We are 2 hours from the border so I will start the computer work as soon as I have the test results and go from there!!

Let you know more tomorrow!!!!!

At least it happened near help.....................

 We got started to Laconia at about 10 in the morning and not even half way to Newberry I started to hear a clunking noise in the yellow truck...........so I stopped and felt the wheels for heat........nothing; got back in and drove another few miles and the clanking got worse!!!!  Stopped again and smelled and felt all the wheels and looked under the truck.......nothing!  Drove a few more miles and started feeling like the truck wasn't steering right; stopped again and this time I told Randy he needed to drive it and see if he could figure out what the problem was!  So that meant that I had follow Randy and had to drive the big blue truck pulling the trailer!!!!!!  Never done that!!!!!!!  At least it was on a relatively clean road with little traffic but it made me very nervous!!!!  Especially when we got into town and I had to make a turn following Randy into the Ford dealership!!  Didn't hit anything (phew!!!) and we dropped the yellow truck off to our friend Frank Caldwell - not knowing for sure what was wrong with it nor how long it would take to fix we just decided to leave it in Newberry.

Not too long after on the road Frank sent us a movie of the truck on a jack and he was able to wobble the tire back and forth sideways!!!!  He told us that the hub had exploded!!!!! and that it could have been "ugly"!!!!!  So a Blessing that it didn't happen farther away going 60mph!!!!!!!

We made it down to Dundee and parked for the nite in the Cabela's lot - got up next morning and shopped and had breakfast at Bob Evans - Tuesday nite we made it to Syracuse NY and stayed in a Walmart lot and then Wednesday pulled in to Laconia late afternoon and parked in the spot we have stayed for a few years - a dead end road going to some kind of city public works............we were all set to stay and got a knock on the door - the state police............!!  Someone had called and complained about the dogs and they told us we would have to move!!!  About a half hour later we found the Walmart and parked, only to find out it was a "no parking" posted area!!!  So we moved again!!!!!  Kind if frustrating!!

So today we are at Walmart and I am trying to figure out the covid testing schedule for us to try and cross the border into Quebec on Monday - plus it's going to cost $139 each!!!!!  That makes the $100 tests that we got in Port Huron to go to Canada last September a deal!!!!

Tonite is the "draw" meeting at Patrick's Pub so dinner out!!

I will write when I get a chance after the first leg of the race tomorrow!!!

Well it looks like we are really really leaving today

 It's 10 am now and we have one more load to take over in the pick up and then the dogs in 2 runs over so and then drain the pipes and we should be ready to head for Laconia, NH!!!

We got more snow last nite (it's almost becoming toooooo much!!!) but it has stopped snowing for now and the roads should be good-- I will be driving the truck down to Mt. Pleasant to leave at one of Luke's friends house so we can pick it back up on our way home!!

God Bless you all and keep you!!!

I will write when I can!!!

We have a plan!!!!

 Whether the border and the weather will cooperate with us remains to be seen!!!

We are going to pack and train once more over the next 2 days and then load the dogs to the trailer across the street and take off for Laconia on Monday - there is a huge storm following the same path we will take driving so we will see how bad it gets!!!

I am not looking forward to packing up the house and then unpacking to the trailer..................it's hard to remember what you have in one place and don't have in another - speaking of which, yesterday we went to Escanaba to get dog meat for the last time this year, and Randy dropped me off at Walmart to get some things we had forgotten in town last trip in.............so I self checked out and left 4 1/2 gallons of almond milk and 3 dozen eggs sitting on the checkout counter- that I just noticed today!!!!!!

Too cold today - started out at -7F and a high of 10!!!  It's not pleasant to be outside even though the sun is shining!!!!

We are back to the "good, the bad and the ugly"...................Q

 So no water for Friday, Saturday, Sunday, Monday, tuesday................

Randy did fix the cracked pipe in the bathroom..................then did put the new heat tape on the exit water pipe in the basement of Jim's house.............then while he was in the basement of Jim's the new morning, I was not feeling the greatest so was laying on the couch and heard this "water" noise......got up rushed into the bathroom and found water gushing/spraying all over from the bak of the toilet and flooding the bathroom and hallway floor...  OMG how did this happen?????????  I turned off everything I could think of or see to try and stop the water but didn't find the right one!!!  I kept running outside and screaming for Randy to come and even tried to honk the horn of the plow truck (the plow truck does not have a working horn) After the flood we used every absorbent item in the house to mop up the water from the brand new floors we had put in the bathroom and the hallway!!!!!! 

then he looked at it again and thought it needed a new valve.............put that on and turned the water back on and another flood!!!!

Finally, no leaks and water to be used everywhere - a week later..............

Trained several days - not the one where I didn't feel great or when it was -23 F.) and everybody is looking good except for the 4 dogs we won't be able to use the rest of the season..............

The trails look very good here and we can easy do a 12 mile training run and plan to jump it up to 20 in the next day or two.................

right now we are thinking to go to Laconia and race and then go to Quebec and race after that - we are entered in 2 races in Wisconsin but will cancel and lose more entry funds! and right now we only have 13 dogs that are ready to race!

will let you know when we make some final decisions about when we are leaving!!!  Stay warm!!!

Missing 2 kids and a spouse and a granddaughter but all the rest are there1111

 

What could go wrong next............?????

 We left Baldwin on Friday as planned and arrived here at Deer Park late afternoon - enough daylight to get into the house and turn the electric back on and get started on warming the house.  Fed the dogs in their boxes and dropped and slept in the trailer -

Saturday we brought all of the dogs back to the dog yard using the same approach as when we left - tie 2 leaders in front in harness and 1/2 the dogs on a stake-out line hooked in by their collars with the snow machine behind them.  That worked good and it was great that they could be released when we got into the yard and most of them wanted to be hooked up in their circle!

We went into town to buy parts for the cracked water pipe we found in the bathroom under the sink and bought some groceries - came home and Randy started to replace the pipe and found he had the wrong size fittings...........back to town and for more groceries I forgot...........got home and fed dogs and Randy asked me to get the new fittings out of the truck..................it was locked with the keys inside............ went over to Jan's to callAAA for road service and they said they would be here in 45 minutes..........not............never came...........so went to Frank Caldwell's on the snowmobile and asked if he had a "break in tool" and he did and would come over in the morning................

Sunday morning Frank comes and gets the truck open and Randy tries to get into Jim's house to turn on the water to our place and he can't get the door unlocked!!!!!  So he decides to feed dogs, tries again and gets the door open and the water turned on...............but no water coming to the house!!!  We at this point don't know if the pipe is frozen underground but don'e know for sure.................

So Randy went around the trail for 2 hours and thought some fix for the water would occur to him!

Meanwhile we had Peeps from her surgery in the house for the first time overnite - she was in a crate that had straw bedding in it and by morning (having taken her out to pee 3 times during the nite) the living room floor was covered in straw!!!!  You cannot believe how loud she was howling during the nite wanting to be let out!!!  Of course Randy never heard her!!!  So not a very restful first nite back!!!! At least it's easier on my body getting into the bed - it was pretty painful trying to get up into the fifth wheel bed multiple times a nite!!!!!

So we are warm and have a trail (almost too much snow.........) the dogs are happy and all we are lacking is water!!!!!  Guess it will be like living in the trailer for awhile!!!!

Wow!!! what a week!!!

 I don’t recall where I left off updating you on the forever changing  saga of the elder DeKuipers………………..so I will just start from about a week ago!

The Tahquamenon race was great, Randy got second in the 10 dog race and Moe (aka Jim Moyer) ran 5 of our dogs in the 6 dog – our lead dog created a little bit of a “off course” maneuver (even though it wasn’t groomed for the race she remembered going gee at the corner while training- most of the race course is on the trails we have used for training for the last 4 months

Oh and I got run over by our dog team…………the man in the chute tying the teams off for the start wasn’t quite practiced yet when Randy went out so he let the team go ahead about 10 feet before Randy stopped them and because I was up holding the leader out I got trampled, popped back up and untangled the dogs that were tangled – the bad thing is that the healing of my pelvic floor muscles/groin that had healed over the last 3 months, was re-injured!!!  Our son-in-law Bill was pretty funny when he heard me tell the tale he started singing “Grandma got run over by her dog team”!!!!!!

So Sunday was a non-walking day and stay on the couch day and anxiety because we intended to leave Wednesday for Baldwin for the next race!  And that means packing up most of our house to go into  the trailer which is ¼ mile from our house (parked in a public parking lot on the west side of the road so we don’t get it snowed in when it’s time to leave!!!)– so lots of loadinng and unloading with the pickup and deciding what to take and what to leave---

Well that process and me being re-injured took a lot longer that what we would have expected so we ended up leaving Thursday afternoon and only making it down to Gaylord at the Walmart parking lot overnite – the drive was a little stressful what with me driving the pickup and Randy with the truck and trailer and high winds going over the bridge and snowing and I ran out of windshield wiper fluid so spent some anxious not seeing too pretty good when a car’s lights were shining on me!!

Made it to Baldwin about 1 and parked in the lot across from the catholic church we belong to and prepared for the celebrity/sponsor race.  The whole race weekend was organized by Moe and Lydia and we had volunteered to help so we provided 2 teams of 2 for the sponsor race – they had dual starts and eliminate for the sponsor trophy – it was very fun and Moe and Lydia had made up fun names (one of ours was the Kettle Korn Express!) for each of the teams and we all had fun – the younger DeKuiper family came for the sponsor race and the driver’s meeting and stayed in town at the Pere Marquette Lodge (and they loved it) because 3 of the kids were racing in the real race the next 2 days. (Aeja, Oak and Aurea all of whom had never been on a sled behind a dog team….)

The first race was bitterly cold but we were all troopers and got the dogs ready for Randy in the 8, Oak and Aeja in the 4 and Aurea in the 3 dog junior using 2 of Moe and lydia’s dogs.

We were a little concerned for all of them as it’s not an easy course and  they no experience – also there was only one other junior in the race with Aurea and we knew she had lots of experience since she had like 70? Miles on her team and had raced at Tahquamenon – 

Well amazingly Aurea came in 2 minutes ahead of  Aubrey without a any problems!!!!

Not so much for Aeja and Oak…………….apparently Aeja fell and lost her team (and never did recover it – it was brought back by a trail helper) and after he went by Aeja , Oak fell and lost his team but did recover it and finished with trail help catching his team!!!  What troopers!!!  (Reminds me of my years racing and falling and losing………..)  As it turned out there ewas a problem with timing the race? And they threw out all of Saturday’s times for the 4 dog race – which meant because Aeja had walked 4 miles to the finish line she qualified to race again Sunday and they both had a fresh start to “redeem themselves”!!!

Sunday was also cold – lots of cold fingers and toes – and we also got to see Mitzi and her family and Luke and his!!!  So out of our whole family we were missing only 2 adult kids and one grandkid!!!  You can bet Grandpa and Grandma had a one-of –a-kind great day!!!!

So Aurea had another trouble free run and wins!!!  And even thought she fell again……….she didn ‘t lose her team and both Oak and Aeja finished 5^th and 6^th (I think/remember?)

We took all the family out for dinner and it was one of those “remember always” days!!!

The next saga in our travels started Sunday when we mentioned to our nurse practioner and vet tech daughter-in-laws the we had a dog having poor appetite and vomiting and diarrhea =we found a stethoscope and listened for bowel sounds and heard nothing and began to think bowel obstruction – so Moe got us an early Monday morning appointment at his vet to evaluate – xray showed a mass in her abdomen 10 cm but he said we would have to find someone else to treat is as he was covering for the vet clinic owner and didn’t have time…………all the vets in west Michigan were at a convention in Florida!!!  Worst timing!!!  We finally got an appointment in Big Rapids with a referral from Moe’s vet calling from Florida and were seen there Tuesday.  More xrays and ultrasound and she determined that she needed surgery and had a cancellation so she could do it Wednesday – which was good because we had been thinking it was life threatening if she developed a leak in this fluid filled mass!

Surgery went well, we brought her back to our trailer where we are parked in the lot next to St. Anne’s and she is eating and acting very well!!!

So the fall out from all this is that we would have left here and gone to Wyoming for the stage race where we have paid a non=refundable entry fee of $1000 but had to notify them we would not be coming – we had only 14 dogs making in the pool we could use and this broke the camel’s back –we also had to cancel snowmachine reservations we had made in Alpine WY where we trained last year to acclimate us and the dogs in advance of the race – we were supposed to get only ½ of our fee of $300 back but she said everyone that worked there is a dog person and they would refund the entire price!!!

So this is Thursday, we have our dog back, and think we are going to a couple of races in Wisconsin so the plan is to go back up to the UP and our rental cabin, open it back up and put the dogs back out in the dogyard and train for a couple of weeks!!!!  And me drive the yellow truck back up because we don’t really have any other transportation to go the ½ hour into Newberry  without taking the 8 miles to the gallon blue truck!!!!

I will try to be more up to date the next several weeks!!!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I don’t recall where I left off updating you on the forever changing  saga of the elder DeKuipers………………..so I will just start from about a week ago!

The Tahquamenon race was great, Randy got second in the 10 dog race and Moe (aka Jim Moyer) ran 5 of our dogs in the 6 dog – our lead dog created a little bit of a “off course” maneuver (even though it wasn’t groomed for the race she remembered going gee at the corner while training- most of the race course is on the trails we have used for training for the last 4 months

Oh and I got run over by our dog team…………the man in the chute tying the teams off for the start wasn’t quite practiced yet when Randy went out so he let the team go ahead about 10 feet before Randy stopped them and because I was up holding the leader out I got trampled, popped back up and untangled the dogs that were tangled – the bad thing is that the healing of my pelvic floor muscles/groin that had healed over the last 3 months, was re-injured!!!  Our son-in-law Bill was pretty funny when he heard me tell the tale he started singing “Grandma got run over by her dog team”!!!!!!

So Sunday was a non-walking day and stay on the couch day and anxiety because we intended to leave Wednesday for Baldwin for the next race!  And that means packing up most of our house to go into  the trailer which is ¼ mile from our house (parked in a public parking lot on the west side of the road so we don’t get it snowed in when it’s time to leave!!!)– so lots of loadinng and unloading with the pickup and deciding what to take and what to leave---

Well that process and me being re-injured took a lot longer that what we would have expected so we ended up leaving Thursday afternoon and only making it down to Gaylord at the Walmart parking lot overnite – the drive was a little stressful what with me driving the pickup and Randy with the truck and trailer and high winds going over the bridge and snowing and I ran out of windshield wiper fluid so spent some anxious not seeing too pretty good when a car’s lights were shining on me!!

Made it to Baldwin about 1 and parked in the lot across from the catholic church we belong to and prepared for the celebrity/sponsor race.  The whole race weekend was organized by Moe and Lydia and we had volunteered to help so we provided 2 teams of 2 for the sponsor race – they had dual starts and eliminate for the sponsor trophy – it was very fun and Moe and Lydia had made up fun names (one of ours was the Kettle Korn Express!) for each of the teams and we all had fun – the younger DeKuiper family came for the sponsor race and the driver’s meeting and stayed in town at the Pere Marquette Lodge (and they loved it) because 3 of the kids were racing in the real race the next 2 days. (Aeja, Oak and Aurea all of whom had never been on a sled behind a dog team….)

The first race was bitterly cold but we were all troopers and got the dogs ready for Randy in the 8, Oak and Aeja in the 4 and Aurea in the 3 dog junior using 2 of Moe and lydia’s dogs.

We were a little concerned for all of them as it’s not an easy course and  they no experience – also there was only one other junior in the race with Aurea and we knew she had lots of experience since she had like 70? Miles on her team and had raced at Tahquamenon – 

Well amazingly Aurea came in 2 minutes ahead of  Aubrey without a any problems!!!!

Not so much for Aeja and Oak…………….apparently Aeja fell and lost her team (and never did recover it – it was brought back by a trail helper) and after he went by Aeja , Oak fell and lost his team but did recover it and finished with trail help catching his team!!!  What troopers!!!  (Reminds me of my years racing and falling and losing………..)  As it turned out there ewas a problem with timing the race? And they threw out all of Saturday’s times for the 4 dog race – which meant because Aeja had walked 4 miles to the finish line she qualified to race again Sunday and they both had a fresh start to “redeem themselves”!!!

Sunday was also cold – lots of cold fingers and toes – and we also got to see Mitzi and her family and Luke and his!!!  So out of our whole family we were missing only 2 adult kids and one grandkid!!!  You can bet Grandpa and Grandma had a one-of –a-kind great day!!!!

So Aurea had another trouble free run and wins!!!  And even thought she fell again……….she didn ‘t lose her team and both Oak and Aeja finished 5^th and 6^th (I think/remember?)

We took all the family out for dinner and it was one of those “remember always” days!!!

The next saga in our travels started Sunday when we mentioned to our nurse practioner and vet tech daughter-in-laws the we had a dog having poor appetite and vomiting and diarrhea =we found a stethoscope and listened for bowel sounds and heard nothing and began to think bowel obstruction – so Moe got us an early Monday morning appointment at his vet to evaluate – xray showed a mass in her abdomen 10 cm but he said we would have to find someone else to treat is as he was covering for the vet clinic owner and didn’t have time…………all the vets in west Michigan were at a convention in Florida!!!  Worst timing!!!  We finally got an appointment in Big Rapids with a referral from Moe’s vet calling from Florida and were seen there Tuesday.  More xrays and ultrasound and she determined that she needed surgery and had a cancellation so she could do it Wednesday – which was good because we had been thinking it was life threatening if she developed a leak in this fluid filled mass!

Surgery went well, we brought her back to our trailer where we are parked in the lot next to St. Anne’s and she is eating and acting very well!!!

So the fall out from all this is that we would have left here and gone to Wyoming for the stage race where we have paid a non=refundable entry fee of $1000 but had to notify them we would not be coming – we had only 14 dogs making in the pool we could use and this broke the camel’s back –we also had to cancel snowmachine reservations we had made in Alpine WY where we trained last year to acclimate us and the dogs in advance of the race – we were supposed to get only ½ of our fee of $300 back but she said everyone that worked there is a dog person and they would refund the entire price!!!

So this is Thursday, we have our dog back, and think we are going to a couple of races in Wisconsin so the plan is to go back up to the UP and our rental cabin, open it back up and put the dogs back out in the dogyard and train for a couple of weeks!!!!  And me drive the yellow truck back up because we don’t really have any other transportation to go the ½ hour into Newberry  without taking the 8 miles to the gallon blue truck!!!!

I will try to be more up to date the next several weeks!!!