Two Weeks To Go!!

My time in Alaska is just flying by. I can hardly believe I have been here for over a month. Joe and I are having a great time, training, getting our teams to travel together and learning each others’ tendencies, strengths and weaknesses. The last few training runs have been phenomenal. My usual partner, Tim and his family have been wonderful, helping us get ready. Tim, despite his broken leg, has managed to train a top-twenty team for Joe. We are training every other day, running 30 to 50 miles, Tim and his kids help us get ready then he rides a snow machine out on the trail and tells us which way to go and at the end of the day, Joe and I have a meeting of minds in the hot tub.
Last week we did food drops, which is a very exciting process. First we gather and bag all of our personal stuff- anything we might need, for ourselves for ten days: extra clothes, chore gloves, food, etc- about 150lbs for each of us. Then it's on to the dog stuff. Each of us packs about 400lbs of kibble into 16lb bags. Then we each pack about 1,200lb of meat and fish into 10lb bags. All of that goes into big woven plastic bags and is trucked up to Anchorage where it is sent out to 18 checkpoints along the trail. Food drops can be very stressful but Tim having already done 25 food drops has a way of making it fun. His wife and two younger kids came and helped us bag stuff up and provided some good comedy for us as you can see.

Yes, Daniel has allowed Marissa to wrap him in shrinkwrap and spray paint a target on his chest. In fact, it was his idea.

Over the weekend we did EKGs and blood work on our teams, a long, tedious process that must be done every year. We were at the Vet clinic virtually all day, drawing blood, micro-chipping the dogs and trying to get 46 Alaskan huskies to be still- what a riot.
Now all we have to do is figure out our final 32 dogs, do the final vet check and go. We only have 11 days before the big race. I am so excited.
I miss you guys, loves and hugs for everyone
Happy trails ~ Rachael