Short Trip

We were planning on taking a short trip today, something uneventful to get the dogs out, have fun and check out a new trail for our tour clients. Miriam also came along with us today so we decided to hook her up with her own team of three dogs, Reba, Gaea and Coyote.

Our take off from the trail head was a bit crazy, as usual, nothing too crazy but Sookii is still learning her trail manners and Hermes is still perfecting the art of lining out. Hes got it down pretty well but if we have to stop and adjust anything, the longer we have to wait, the more insecure he is about staying up there.

Then Gaea attacked Coyote (both who were in Miriam's team) and neither would back down. It was mainly a lot of posturing from those two and I had just taken my snowhook off the post so I was stuck. Nita came to the rescue though and broke them up while it gave me a bit more time to resecure the sled and address Gaea myself. There is a dynamic I have seen in the way the dogs work with me and the way they dont work with others. I dont let them get away with much and they know it but I always have to follow through with them so they still know who wears the 'pants'.

After we got everyone sorted out I took off, followed by Miriam, then Nita... all was going well until we had to stop again on the trail so Miriam could fix a tangle in Nita's team without either of them getting off of the sled, which is what we have had to do many times since our snow hooks aren't holding in the low snow pack we have this year.

Miriam's team suddenly took off and my sled was too far over on the side of the trail to catch them. I didn't think twice, grabbed my sled and took off after them. I had faith that Nita and Miriam would know what to do while I caught up with the smaller team. The only problem was when I had caught up with them Hera pulled my team to one side while the rest pulled to the other and we ended up pushing them down the trail!

When I said to whoa to the other team my team slowed since they didn't know I was really talking to the smaller team ahead of me. There was no way I could command both teams at once since I needed one to stop and the other to speed up!

We ended up getting into a tangle along the way and had to stop while the smaller team took off. I took a few seconds to readjust my energy level to a calmer state and took off after them again. I had thought I would be chasing them for a while then here comes Gaea, leading the team back towards me!

I am under the asumption that she was the one to turn them around since Reba had given up leadership and had fallen back to wheel next to Coyote he was keeping up just behind Gaea. She must have heard my voice and headed back but I have no idea how she got the sled turned around and it was still upright! We may have another extremely talented leader on our hands!

The travel of the new trail was pretty uneventful but a very nice trip. I hadn't been down that way in a very long time and it will be nice to incorporate it into our tours. We need to do a bit of trail maintenance but its looking very nice already.

On the way back we had to do some restructuring with the dogs but it was a major turn in the trail that dumped both Miriam and Nita when they took their turn around. It nearly dumped me as well but I managed to hold onto the team even though I was riding the runners on my knees!

Nita fell pretty hard and even though her injuries were minor we erred on the side of caution and loaded her into my sled for the trip back. Miriam did very well with five dogs on her gangline and driving two sleds at once! It was quite the sight, I will share photos in the next post...

But since everyone came back safe and sound we all considered it a great run and we are looking forward to the next!

Total miles: 11.5