As I told Mitzi, I think that Murphy has taken up residence in our trailer..............

 

I know you will all be shocked to hear that we are in the middle of a valley, with no cell service, at the race site that they cancelled the race for because it’s too cold………..we have been here 36 hours without a soul except 2 people from the wrecker service to come and try for 2 hours to figure out what is wrong so that the truck won’t start =  I have to tell you it’s a pretty weird feeling to go into your trailer and the next time you look out the window ever single vehicle in a huge parking area filled with trucks trailers and cars is empty in this desolate valley!!!!

So let me go back to where the last time I think I wrote in the blog…………..Saturday I think…………..We drove from Teton (where I think you know Randy ended up about 5^th from the bottom of 18 drivers) to Lander – the drive was supposed to be a 2 hour enjoyable trip through the pass…which turned out to be over 4 hours and in a lot of snow on the road!  We let Aeja our granddaughter (who is going to college in Lander at the Wyoming Catholic College) know that we were  in town and she came to see us in downtown where we were parked to be able to show the townspeople what sled dogs and drivers look like………..she brought 2 friends and we had a short but wonderful visit!

Next morning , Sunday, we had already driven to the race start site and Aeja and 4 different friends arrived to help us get Grandpa started!!!  They all helped with everything and from Aeja’s last year’s racing experience she was a huge help and knew what to do before we could even ask!!!  Grandpa went out 5^th (they reversed finishing order from the day before) and the teams started coming in……………and coming in…………and coming in…………..and coming in…………and finally after over 3 hours he finished – with a dog with a sore shoulder in the bag and one that had had a seizure on the race trail……….

There was a lot of vet attention and conversation – they disqualified the 3  year old dog that had never had a problem before and gave advice about the sore shoulder .  we said goodbye to Aeja and headed for the next race site, Pinedale .  This was no small accomplishment……….the road we took was closed beacause it was too dangerous……….they have us special permission to use the road and we drove over in a caravan!!  Most was okay but slippery.

They gave us free tickets for a food concession trailer in Pinedale and we enjoyed a delicious dinner of pork ribs – then set off for the race site following Bruce because I couldn’t get the instructions on my phone for some reason! 

We still don’t know the actual temperature or the wind chill temperature ………….but first they delayed the race until 10……….then 11………….then 11:30 and then decided it was too cold for dogs and mushers------ and then that’s when everybody left us, because we couldn’t get the truck to start !!!  So it wasn’t total abandonment – they have a guy named Bob who took most of the day to find a wrecker/fixit service to help us and they did come last evening and in 2 hours didn’t figure it out .  Now I said it was cold – the day before at Lander Randy frostbit 3 fingers and his ears and the guy parked next to us frostbit his hands………..so this was worse here than it was there!

Today we kept warm in the trailer, fed and watered dogs in the boxes and let them run around the parking lot for fun!!!

It’’s 5:30 and within the hour there will be a semi wrecker here to pull us back into Pinedale and figure out our problem – so will let you know more when I do!!!

Needless to say, we missed the starting chute time today so we are out of the race………

It’s Wednesday morning and we just had breakfast in the restaurant they brought us to and unhooked from the truck and then took the truck to be fixed – don’t know for sure what’s wrong = it was 11 oclock last nite when we got here so they are just now at 9 am starting to look at it.  The thoughts so far are fuel pump, geled diesel fuel or fuel filter – we shall see!!!!