My lead dog was a lesbian - Brian Patrick O'Donoghue [80]
The only one with a chance to stop Butcher that year was Martin Buser, an intense Swiss expatriate who was making his first appearance in the Iditarod’s front pack. Swenson was rooting for him, indeed, for anyone who could halt Butcher’s drive for three straight wins. He sent word that Martin should go ahead and use the lightweight racing sled he had waiting on the coast.
Leaving Shaktoolik, Buser actually led Butcher by nearly an hour. The sun was sinking, throwing rosy shadows across the ice. Photographer Rob Stapleton and I followed Butcher out of town on a snowmachine. She was all business in her red jump suit. Her team looked strong. Her lead dog, Granite, owned this section of the trail.
Then a ground blizzard swept across the front pack. Buser became disoriented and was lost for hours in the whiteout. When it lifted, Butcher held a commanding lead.
“I’ve gotten sleep all over the place,” she said, claiming the crown. “I don’t even feel like I’ve been in an Iditarod race.”
Looking haggard and disgusted, Swenson trailed her into Nome, saying that he “felt a little bad about beating Martin.” Buser finished a distant third, his face a wind-burned mask of regret.
In the three years since that disappointment, Buser hadn’t ever come close to duplicating that showing. Other mushers faulted his breeding program. Too much hound in those dogs, they said. The breed can’t handle coastal wind.
Watching Susan and the others retreating, Martin Buser reeled from the opportunity now before him. Far from being frightened, he heard a magnificent, enthralling, victory song riding this storm.
Back at White Mountain, Butcher described how she had marked Swenson’s last known location with an X in the snow, in case snowmachiners launched a search.
“If Rick’s got a leader with the will to get him through, more power to him,” she told a Times reporter. “I don’t think he had much hope when I last saw him.”
At the tail end of the field, Barry Lee made a deal. Two villagers in Grayling would bust a new trail to Eagle Island on their snowmachines, and he agreed to pay for their gas. The last musher in the field repacked for the Yukon with new determination. Next stop, Eagle Island.
Right off the bat, Lee noticed that his dogs looked feeble. The team’s confidence was shot from the recent turnabouts. It was a dispirited bunch that stumbled out of Grayling along the familiar river trail. Barry resorted to the easy two-hours on, two-hours off, schedule he had used during the first days of the race. This time it failed to perk up the dogs. The team’s progress remained dismal. Twelve hours of effort netted Lee barely 20 miles.
Less than an hour past our wretched Yukon camp, we found the cabin Doc had talked about the night before. The owners, David and Mona Blackburn, had amazing news.
“Have you heard? Swenson passed Butcher in a storm.”
After they became separated, Swenson apparently figured that Butcher had made use of the blinding conditions to pass him. That suspicion seemed confirmed since his leaders soon regained their confidence, acting as if they were chasing another team. The wind faded as Rick neared the cabin at Timber, where the snowfall reminded him of flakes in a Christmas ball. The 12-mile trip from White Mountain had taken three hours. Now the musher was presented with a mystery. Eight inches of fresh snow rested on the ground, and it was completely free of tracks. How could that be? Swenson wondered. Was Susan lost?
After a brief rest, Swenson continued. Emerging from the sheltering trees, the trail reentered the wind. There weren’t any markers to follow, and the team strayed into a willow patch. Swenson cautiously backtracked until he found a reflective marker. He was again on track, but the musher knew he had to be careful. Visibility