Sled Dog Party

A sled dog party on the trails at Keyser Creek today!

One of the dog trucks with 5 of our friends unloaded and waiting for the party to start.
"I LOVE sled dog parties!" exclaims giddy Max happy to be at today's party.
"So cool. I have to take it all in!" states intense Zorro getting ready to join the party!

We met up with our group of sled dog friends at the Keyser Creek Trail this morning. Counting Max & Zorro, we had about 20 Siberian Huskies at the trail ready to pull sleds and/or skijor. Many of the dogs were from Sno-Magic Siberians along with a handful of "others" like Max & Zorro. It is so fun to meet up and have a sled dog party - Max & Zorro absolutely LOVE it!

We watched two sled teams hook up and leave before us. Max & Zorro were dying with anticipation watching the party start before them. They kept asking me, "Our turn YET?"....

"Come on... Our turn YET?" ask my occasionally patient pair waiting for their turn to go.

Then, finally, it was our turn. Ok boys, pedal to the metal...

"Go, go go!!!!!" as we launch out the gates to start the party on the trails.

We met up with one of the teams at our turnaround point of the day. I was going to help with a slight issue with the sled; but Max had other ideas. He was a bucking bronco wanting to keep the party going; so all I could do was hold Max back until the sled was set and ready to go. You try explaining to Max that the restart would have been faster if he had shown a little cooperation :-)

"Noooooooo! Let's GOOOOOOO!" states impatient Max determined to make it impossible for
me to help with any issues!

Coming in strong to the finish (the trailhead is just across the bridge in front of us).

"Zoom, zoom - love sled dog parties!"

Oh yea, we did a little solo skijoring to start the day as it takes a lot less time to hookup two skijor dogs than unload, prep and hookup dog sleds. We did a quick up & down an untouched side trail before joining all the dog sleds on the main trail. The best part about breaking a trail up is that you are prepping it for a fun run down....

Breaking trail in 8+ inches of powder up a side trail.

Fun little video of us using our "up tracks" for a faster down run. Look closely and you can see the parallel tracks in front of Max & Zorro that we set on the way up to reuse down - wheeee!

[watch on youtube if no video loads below]

A great sled dog party day covering 8.9 miles with 700 feet of elevation climbed and a top speed of 17 MPH.

2014/2015 Season to Date: 38 days on the trails covering 312.0 miles with 33,950 feet of elevation climbed.