That's a lotta' Moose
Willow Weather -
Current temp 8.7F (-13 C)
Sunrise/Sunset 8: 46 am/5:44 pm
Precipitation in the last 24 hours
When I was a child I spend a lot of time in vehicles. My Dad loved going
for drives and once we moved West, we spent many weekends driving around
exploring the mountains. I would sit in the back seat, staring out the
window and scanning the landscape for wildlife. I spotted all kinds of
animals, but never saw a moose. Each swamp and lake I'd longingly search
with my eyes hoping for a glimpse of one of the majestic beasts. Now I know
why I never saw one - the damn things were all waiting for me in Alaska. If
I never see another one again that would be fine with me.
Yesterday's moose encounters involved me being dragged down the trail with
my feet trailing out behind me after a big bull moose jumped out in front
of my team and proceeded to run down the trail in front of us and an
'Alaskan stand off' with a big cow and 2 calves. That was the really scary
one. We were about ½ mile from the truck on the way home when we ran into
the moose family. Momma showed no inclining to move when she saw my team,
in fact, I thought she was going to charge - as she had turned to face us
and had her hackles up. Mark pulled up next to me (because he couldn't get
his team stopped any sooner on the ice) and it seemed she did the math - 2
humans, 18 dogs vs. a ton and a half of moose and decided to back down.
Lucky moose aren't good at math, 'cause I figure we all didn't add up to
her weight alone - forget the 'kids'. As soon as she turned a fraction to
the side, I said to Mark 'GO' and we got the heck out of there. Luckily,
the dogs seemed to realize the seriousness of the situation and didn't
attempt to chase her or her children! PHEW!!
Other then that our 65-mile trip out of Willow, over to the Big Su River
and up the Yentna with 2 - 9 dog teams went very well. We even were serenaded by a lone wolf for a bit - that was pretty cool!
We didn't go all the way to Yentna Station, but will plan for a trip there
early next week.
Today is Drop Bag Day for us. We are going to try and recruit some of the
folks in the house to help out and figure we will be able to knock the task
off in about ½ a day, as most everything is ready to be thrown in bags.
The weather has been a little mild, so once done the bags
will get trucked to Underdog Feeds in Wasilla where they will be hard frozen to try to
minimize the chance of any thawing of them out on the trail.
Well, it is 5:30 and I hear Mark moving around upstairs. That's probably
because I somehow set the alarm on my clock radio the other day and can't
seem to figure out how to now stop it from going off at 5:30 every morning.
Oh well, we need to get a good start on the day anyway!
Karen
PS. And remember Alaskan moose are bigger and meaner then most! Although I will
say the one I saw the other day was not a really big one.
You might want to check out my diary entries for the 2000 Iditarod, specifically
the leg from Cripple to Ruby for an interesting story! :)
Cripple
to Ruby 2000
Ruby
to Galena 2000
Karen
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