My lead dog was a lesbian - Brian Patrick O'Donoghue [44]
The first time I met him, Vaughan was stretched out on the ice at a checkpoint, crawling from dog to dog, inspecting each paw, rubbing in ointment and placing on booties. He used the belly-down approach to compensate for his bad knees. The colonel wasn’t about to let a slight physical disability force him into retirement. Not Norman Vaughan, the only U.S. airman to earn battlefield honors by dog team, by retrieving a top secret instrument from a downed plane in Greenland during World War II. Sixty years after dropping out of Harvard to handle dogs on Admiral Robert Byrd’s expedition to the South Pole, Vaughan was Alaska’s ageless adventurer.
Contemplating my bruised thirty-five-year-old body, I knew the colonel was tougher than I’d ever be.
I was strongly inclined to take my 24-hour layover at Rainy Pass, a scenic horse ranch overlooking a lake high in the Alaska Range. But the lodge was closed to mushers this year, and the checker wasn’t encouraging.
“This really isn’t a good place to stay,” he said. “There are no facilities. Not even a tent. Yesterday it snowed and rained on the mushers.”
It was day 4 of the race. I’d slept a total of about six hours since leaving Anchorage, and I wasn’t thinking clearly. I badly needed a nap. Climbing a mountain pass in this foggy state sounded crazy. Yet I couldn’t rest. There was talk of a storm on its way. I didn’t want to get caught on the wrong side of the range. Rainy Pass might stay blocked for days, and my race would be over right here.
I packed and repacked, agonizing over whether to move on. Medred came over to interview me. It was so bright out that I had to squint to bring the reporter into focus. Finding his questions difficult to follow, I answered with grunts.
Ace was camped nearby. The veteran said he was going to try to beat the storm over the pass. That sealed my decision. We agreed to rest our dogs a few hours, then pull out about 6 P.M.
Mushing the Iditarod Trail, it was tempting to think that the dogs and I had cut all ties to our lives back in town. But the mundane world hadn’t forgotten me. A personal check for $145, written in payment for Dr. Leach’s veterinary services, arrived Tuesday at National Bank of Alaska. Last-minute supplies and unexpected expenses, like the vet bill from Rat’s fight with Daphne, had pushed the total cost of my participation in the Iditarod over $16,000. My personal account was already overdrawn by $3.56. All my bank accounts, including the special Iditarod account, were tapped out. The check written to Dr. Leach was returned unpaid. An overdraft notice was mailed to Deadline Dog Farm.
Ace came over to talk while I was getting ready to break camp.
“I don’t want to scare you,” he said, stroking his thick beard, “but take a little extra food, a little extra fuel, and prepare yourself in case we don’t make it.”
Ace spoke from experience. His first race he had weathered a long night in the pass, trapped mere yards from a shelter tent that had been rendered invisible by the storm.
I had 15 dogs, which meant that I had 60 paws to prepare. The situation was not helped when Rat and Cyrus pulled their booties off. Ace mushed out of the checkpoint. It took me an additional 45 minutes to get ready. Several veterinarians came over and helped guide my team out of the checkpoint. The dogs looked good, including Denali, who had been treated for his bites. I sensed that the vets were more concerned about my own haggard condition and blatant incompetence.
Despite the rumored storm, it was bright out, with hardly a cloud in the sky and a calm, warm 20 above zero. Trail markers led us to a steep hill, perhaps 150 feet high. Rainy and Harley