The Case of the Frostbitten Skier and the Big Sticky Things

(Lou, Yukon)

Our dog has a Hansel and Gretel complex. Homer thinks one day we will take him into the twisted, tangled woods and sneak away, leaving him to the wolves and witches, like the evil parents of the fairy tale.

Frosted forest

He stays very close when we are out working, getting firewood or cutting trail, so we can’t escape. He tried sitting in the trail at first. We couldn’t get away but he couldn’t get a nap without getting thumped on the head with a log every 30 seconds.

He soon sussed that we always bring our equipment home with us so he stands beside that.

When he’s harnessed to the dogsled he snoozes with one eyebrow raised and twitching, in case we cut the tug line and tip toe away with the sled.

If we have the snowmachine, he sits right in front of it. Mightn’t we slip it into gear, push it silently across the snow and abandon him whilst he sleeps?

Taking no chances

One day we stopped the machine a few miles away on the river, Homer curled up in front of it. To his horror, we crept away and left the big growler out on the ice (it had broken down). It was weeks before it found its way home.

"Oh no! They left you!"

When Homer comes inside the house he will not go near the woodstove. Maybe it’s too hot or maybe he thinks we’ll push him in it and cook him for dinner, like the witch of the story.

As far from the stove as he can get, worried expression

So you’d think he’d be reassured by his travel box, but no. Sometimes being with us is a fate worse than being abandoned.

We are planning a two hundred mile round trip by snowmachine this week to visit friends we have not seen since last winter. Homer is coming too, but has been reduced from the status of beloved pet and trusty sled-puller to luggage.

Five days' travelling and multiple opportunities for fuck-ups means a lot of things need to be strapped on to our sled. Gas, oil, a winch and tools for the machines is a load in itself, let alone an anxious dog in a coffin-like box, emergency equipment, dog kibble, tooth brushes and spare knickers.

Preparatory gas run to our Alaskan friends who are kindly storing 200 gallons of gas for us.

There’s always something that just won’t fucking fit on and usually it’s snow shoes. We’ve never had to use them in an emergency and hopefully never will, until the one time we don’t take them. Taking them is an insurance against needing them.

We’ve packed and unpacked the sled several times now trying to fit the load to the limited amount of space, ratchet straps and bungees. Homer’s worst fears may be realised as his box is in danger of slipping off mid-journey, leaving him to the wolves like a packed lunch, unless we find another strap.

He refuses to go near the half-loaded sled for fear of being grabbed, stuffed in the box and strapped down. Which is exactly what will happen. Clever dog. But not clever enough to overcome his greed. A handful of kibble will have him scampering over, fears forgotten.

Umm.. Kibble. So tempting

We have various articles and missions for other people. Mysterious sealed boxes, pork, empty jars, dog food, dried shiitake mushrooms, letters, bananas to be deposited with folk along the way. Our bush community is sparse and spread across more than 150 miles of river but there is a community, and when you are travelling you carry whatever needs to be sent in that direction. When we return, we will bring back whatever needs to come this way.

Throughout the winter people brought us mail, snowmachine parts, butter, more snowmachine parts as they passed by, now the favour is passed on and we are the delivery guys.

All of this is facilitated by satellite internet. “We are going to town. What groceries do you need?” “The Rangers brought your mail here. I’m sending it with Charlie when he goes by to check his traps.” The messages go backwards and forward in the ether and mail, hardware, groceries get shifted through the wilderness by snowmachine and dogsled. It’s quaint, old fashioned, beautifully high-tech and just wonderful all in one go.

We’ve made this journey before but as far as we know no-one has travelled the first 50 miles of trail since we did 4 weeks ago, apart from 3 dog teams. It might be blown in by now and so we might not see it.

Homer is great at locating trail so he will find himself promoted from luggage to lead dog, out of his box and guiding the snowmachines if the going is rough.

That’s if we make it. Sometimes we are so dumb I’m surprised we are allowed to live here by ourselves.

Mysterious cleared land, Neil looking mental

We have a strip of cleared land reaching from the river to the creek across the whole property about 20’ wide. Who cleared it? Why is it there? Maybe it’s an old First Nation walking trail? Or one of the dogsled post office trails from the last century? Or is it a trap line? But it is far too wide for a path and we just couldn’t work it out.

The cut trees were thrown into the woods. Why go to all that effort then just throw the wood away? Must be… a gang of people who hate trees. Yup, that’s it. We could come up with no explanation all of last year and decided we might build a log cabin there to store the snowmachine and our jerry cans of petrol.

Neil had a sudden attack of intelligence this winter and realised – maybe… it’s a fire break!

Neil is having an idea. You can see it forming as a big icy snot ball in his moustache

Yes. Well, it seems obvious now. With a wild fire burning up in the hills, a fire crew flew in and rapidly cut a corridor through the spruce trees to prevent the fire spreading to the house, throwing the cut trees where they could. (See footnote)

So rather than build an explosively flammable cabin we have decided to cut out the willows and spruce saplings that have grown up in the past 10 years and keep it as an effective fire break.

We spent days hacking and cutting. Not knowing what to do with all the cut brush, we stuffed it to the side of the break in a series of piles. Like bonfires. Yup, so then it occurred to us, aren’t we creating a big fuck off fire hazard?

Throwing brush over the bank

So we’ve been pulling all the brush back out of the woods, loading it onto our sled and hauling it down to the river in multiple snowmachine trips.

We have left it in big tangled piles to wash out with the ice in the spring.

Working at our usual rate of efficiency, we’ve managed to break one chainsaw chain, one axe and my parka whilst doing it, all of which now needs fixing.

More fixing

I wasn’t sure how to end this blog, but luckily a perfect storm of our incompetence and Homer’s anxiety occurred last night as I was trying to find an ending.

Having sat typing for a few hours, I decided to take Homer for a quick walk down to the river. It was late, 10pm. Northern lights were hazing over the mountains but there was no moon and it was very dark. 

Homer got to the ramp and stopped still. He stared at the river, sniffed the air and refused to go any further, fur bristling. I ran back to get Neil and a rifle. “Neil! I think there’s a wolf on the river. Or a moose. Or something!”

We slid down the ramp, me clutching a rifle. I took the safety catch off the rifle then slipped, slid and almost fell over Homer, potentially shooting my foot and the dog in the process. I put the safety back on.

Homer stopped dead still at the base of the ramp. We crept behind him and scanned the ice with our headlamps. Homer scanned the trail with his nose. 

Tracks! Over there, off the trail! Something came by.

Not a wolf, but something much more unusual. A person! On skis. Yes, there are the tramline ski tracks and dimples made by poles. With a dog! But who is it? Are they OK? Why would anyone ski almost 40 miles out of town and not come up to the cabin? Why ski off the trail in the deep snow? They must be delirious with frostbite and hypothermia, perhaps we should go after them?

We all stared nervously towards the woods. What to do?

Hang on. I think I… didn’t I ski over there yesterday? With Homer. It was me and Homer. That’s right. Panic over.

But what is Homer scared of? There must be a wolf in the woods.

No. He hasn’t seen the piles of cut brush we dumped on the ice. He doesn’t know what they are. 

So, Homer is scared of twigs and I am scared of my own ski tracks. Sherlock Holmes’ Case of the Frostbitten Skier and Big Sticky Things solved, let’s go back inside.

And so we depart tomorrow to travel 100 miles into the wilderness. What could possibly go wrong? Next week’s blog, thoughts on the reindeer herding communities of Kamchatka as we take a left turn and head into Russia by mistake.

Footnote - We had a wild fire nearby this summer. Read about it here Wild fire and here, Phew