My lead dog was a lesbian - Brian Patrick O'Donoghue [96]
Westrum was nearing White Mountain, about 85 miles from the finish line, when his team was illuminated in the glaring headlight of a snowmachine.
“It came head-on,” the musher told reporters later. “I thought it was all over. It hit the dogs and then glanced off to one side and went right by. It sounded like he had the throttle wide open. He didn’t even slow down.”
The collision left Westrum cradling a dog named Jeff, who was crippled, and weeping over the loss of four-year-old Ace and eight-year-old Bandit, his favorite lead dog.
The grim toll should be placed in perspective. Approximately 1,400 dogs chased mine out of Anchorage. The fallen six were magnificent athletes. They died giving all—too much, perhaps—pulling a sled with their teammates, as breeding and training inspired them to do.
We began descending into a ground blizzard less than a mile out from Unalakleet. So this was the haze I had noticed in the distance. It started with a flowing white carpet, which broke into streamers on contact with the paws of the dogs in front. The carpet steadily swelled to a foot deep, creating an illusion of a chain of disembodied heads floating on the gang line ahead. I could only guess what lay concealed in the approaching white tide. It kept rising until it swallowed the dogs, the sled and, finally, me.
We weren’t in any immediate danger of charging off a cliff. Not crossing these flats. I knew it couldn’t be more than a few miles to the clear area I spotted near the hills. It wasn’t even that cold. But my headlamp was useless in this soup. And where were the markers?
The wind was kicking up all kinds of debris: snow, chunks of ice—I even tasted gravel on my lips. I had to content myself with glimpses of the leaders. But I noticed they were acting a little odd. Rainy’s ears were up, but the bossy little lesbian looked unusually tentative. Damned if Harley wasn’t leading her for once.
The team suddenly bunched in a mass tangle. Harley was to blame. The big dog had stopped, with his nose thrust into a half-buried plastic bag, ignoring the other dogs piling into him. As I ran up front, Harley wrenched the bag loose and furiously shook it in his teeth. The plastic tore as I snatched the bag away, spilling empty cans, used coffee grounds, and other trash.
Pig and several other dogs lunged for the scraps dancing on the gusts. I threw the bag away, but the wind caught it and slapped it back at the dogs. It skipped across the ground to Digger and Spook, which triggered a ruckus in the middle ranks. More dogs grabbed loose scraps as I snatched the bag away again. This time, remembering my merchant marine days aboard S.S. Sam Houston, I heaved the damn thing with the wind. Most of the garbage had already spilled, and the feather-light bag took off like a punctured balloon, flapping and sailing on the currents. Bouncing up the side of a tall berm, it finally left us.
Dragging Harley forward by the collar, I sent him on down the trail. Where were those trail markers? The garbage bag should have been a clue. But I was too rattled to digest the surroundings. I was more in the mood to nurse my sufferings this morning. Give me a marker please!
I should have noticed that we weren’t on a trail—it was a snow-covered road. The lesbian had been flashing me concerned looks. But Harley seemed so confident. His head was high. He had the team really rolling. So I ignored Rainy’s silent protests. That was my big mistake. As if Harley ever gave a hoot about anything but his stomach. He was following his nose toward El Dorado.
Disaster struck quickly. Scar sunk his teeth into one of the mounds and yanked out a trash bag. Rat, Harley, Cyrus—in a matter of seconds