Saturday, June 1, 2013

Season Finale

Today was our Season Finale for the 2012/2013 Skijoring Season.

We pulled out a "June 1st Outing" for one very good reason - today is Zorro's birthday! We were all hoping the end of season melt would hold off just long enough for us to get a small June 1st Birthday Finale - and it did!

"June 1st and we have the sled out on snow! What a birthday bash for Zorro!" exclaim
happy Max & Zorro at our turnaround point on the trail.

Truth be told: our last serious skijor outing was really May 10th. But, we were able to get a couple of fun little sled outings since then. "A little sled outing is better than no outing because that means we still have some snow!" declare Max & Zorro.

So, what do the conditions look like on June 1st? Well, first of all we were on the sled, not the skis as the terrain was far from skiable. Second of all, well, you can see for yourself below:

It looks remarkably good as we started out on the trail.
But, looks can be deceiving in June....
We had many puddles occupying part of the trail or cutting across the trail as
you see above.
We had many sections with nothing more than a "sloped shoulder" of snow as pictured here.
This is a tough one on the musher - the Siberians do not need to slow down; but I need to
ride the right runner on the sled hard to keep the sled on snow.
And, we had a fair number of "exposed ground" sections of trail. The sled can move across
this terrain if there is not human on the runners. So, every time we encountered a patch of dirt
like this I had to hop off the sled and run to keep up with the Siberians!

So, there you have it: some sections of all snow, many sections of growing puddles, many sections of narrow snow shoulders and occasional exposed ground. The outing was certainly worth it for Zorro's birthday, but it is certainly our last outing of this glorious 2012/2013 season.

Our season totals: 1024.9 miles, 137,500 feet of elevation climbed, 120 days on the trail and a top speed of 26 MPH. Wow, what a season! I am soooo proud of my 1000 mile Siberian partners!

A few parting shots from this last day of a great season...

The last outing would not be complete without our usual "cool off" antics at our turnaround:
(1) Max rolling a snow angel to cool off.
(2) Zorro chomping down on snow cones to cool off.
Happy faces as we cruise to the finish. "It has been an incredible year!
We love being '1000 mile huskies'" say cute Max & Zorro.