On Top Of Copper Mountain
FASTRK Registered Siberian Huskies. Terrace, B.C. Canada

It was a cool -3 degrees C., drizzling and not a lick of snow on the ground. Where do you go when there is no snow? That’s when you look up, way up........up the mountain trails where the skidoo trails are. They will be well packed and lead you into the alpine.

I had planned on leaving my main leader at home today, but who could say no to those pathetic blue eyes. If she was to vibrate anymore her bones would rattle loose. So with just seven of my trusty Siberians off we went to climb 4100 ft.

We rolled into the parking lot as we usually do, dogs screaming, truck rattling and gear piled to the roof top. There we saw two snowmobile's coming into the parking lot from the trail. They nodded at us and we just continued to make noise as I unloaded the sled and hooked the dogs up. As I hooked my last dog onto the sled I decided to walk ahead and see which way the trail went. We were on a strip of snow which had not melted yet and led us to the trail entrance, there seemed to be a fork in the road and I wanted to make sure we hit the right road. With seven fresh dogs and one being a rookie, I wanted to be sure there were no mistakes, at least as little as possible.

A short prayer and we are off. Before you can say this is a snap, we are going straight up hill and there is a one runner strip of snow to run on. Finally after running behind the dogs there is enough snow to put the other side of the sled down on the road. There were several kilometers of road like that, but with a leader with a good head, you will go from strip of snow to strip of snow. That's my Kiska, she would prove to be invaluable on this trip.

We huffed and puffed (actually I did all the huffing and puffing)our way up. We finally came to a steel shed and once around the corner it went from rain to snow. The dogs and I were so excited that we forgot how tired we were and ran several yards. Sanity returned, we resumed our slow plod upwards. Every once in awhile we would get spurts of energy, these became more frequent as it became cooler and more snow. I had the camera with me and every once in awhile there would be a break in the clouds, the view was like looking out a plane window. I kept putting off taking a photo then hoping to take them on the way down.

The trees were bigger and the snow was deep. I kept telling the dogs we were almost there, finally we came to the edge of the top and there were so many trails, they were everywhere. It was beautiful, we slowly made our way up to a pull over spot and caught our breath. My cue to go is always the wheel dogs, they bounce, scream and tug when its time to get going again.

So far we had not run into any snow machines on the trail, but we knew there were one or two up here somewhere. There had been another truck in the parking lot with a trailer. I was hoping to avoid them as much as possible, I really didn't want to have one come up to us full power and possibly run into us. I'm sure they had no idea we were up there and were not expecting to see a dog team up there at all.

We traveled on what seemed the main trail, it was so beautiful and the fact that it was pouring rain farther down and this pristine alpine up here, WOW. We were in sledding heaven.

Oh, Oh, our peace was to be brought to reality, there was the sound of a machine coming. With all the hills and dips it was hard to pin point where it was actually coming from. I decided to trust the dogs, their hearing is so much better then mine and they soon had it figured out just where it was coming from. Sure enough there he came down a steep hill straight towards us,

RussianGermanFrenchSpanish
Home | Meet The Team | Puppy Gallery | Photo Gallery | Photo Gallery Part Two | Our 98 Litter of siberian huskies | Newborn Pictures | Dogsledding Adventure Stories | Tipis For Dogs | Links | Puppies, dogs teams for lease or sale | Webrings and Clubs | The Deep Creek Recreational Reserve | Advertisements and Banners | Free screensaver of Fastrk Siberians. | Hiking Page | X-Back Harness Making Manual & full size pattern | Bootie Making and Gaitor Patterns. | Canadian Slip Collar manual and pattern. | Canadian Semi-Slip Collar manual and pattern |