Busy Chaos

Busy Chaos
Jan 18th 2008
wolfmoonsleddog
Southeast
Location: Northwest GA
Time - 9:08am
Temperature: 37 degrees
Conditions: Cloudy, damp
Forecast: Mostly cloudy with up to three inches of snow tonight, snow tomorrow

You can see from the forecast what’s causing me to go crazy. For once, there is actually a good chance of snow here at Wolf Moon…and we won’t be here.

The good news is, we’ll be in VA where there is a good chance of snow accumulation too. But it’s gonna’ kill me if, for instance, we get more snow in GA than in VA!

But anyways, we are insanely busy packing and getting ready to head out at noon. It’s all kind of a whirl but I don’t mind. We’re going to a weekend of dog mushing! Find out more on http://www.siberianhuskyassist.com/

Wish us luck!

Oh, and check out this article from: http://www.gotricities.com/content/article.dna?idNumber=5209

Winterfest a recreation of 1925 serum run
By Jessica Fischer



Event will feature dog sled races, lumberjack contests and a ‘Meet the Mushers’ dinner

Years before the birth of the Iditarod sled-dog competition, 20 mushers teamed up for a relay race in which first prize wasn’t a Dodge truck or a big check; rather, it was saving the lives of children in Nome, Alaska, where an outbreak of diphtheria threatened to sweep through the small, isolated town.

On Jan. 27, 1925, a railroad conductor in Nenana, 674 miles away, handed a 20-pound cylindrical package wrapped in canvas to Wild Bill Shannon, the first of 20 mushers to move the diphtheria antidote closer to Nome.

Near midnight, Shannon started his nine dogs on the 52-mile trip to Tolovana, where he would hand the serum to another musher. The temperature was 35 degrees below 0.

Shannon and the rest of the mushers, including champion racer Leonhard Seppala and a wiry native known as “Jackscrew” who carried the serum 40 miles from Kaltag to Old Woman Cabin, successfully transported the package to Nome in five days, seven-and-a-half hours.

The weather won’t be as harsh and the stakes not nearly as high, but competition will be just as fierce at this weekend’s second annual Winterfest, featuring a re-enactment of the 1925 Alaska Serum Run and the Blue Ridge Dryland Challenge, sponsored by Eagle Pack Pet Foods and organized by the rescue group Siberian Husky Assist.

“The reason we are hosting the event is as a fund-raiser for our rescue, to educate about the Siberian Husky breed and to promote rescue, volunteerism, pet care and so many more good things that come with the historic serum run,” said Siberian Husky Assist founder Marcia Horne.

“We like to promote rescue and volunteerism in our events, as this is what we do,” she said.

The re-enactment will begin at 10 a.m., Saturday at the Virginia Creeper Trail head on Pecan Street in Abingdon, Va. Creeper Trail president Link Elmore will be aboard a steam locomotive when he passes the “serum” to Jim Kaser, the relay’s first musher, who will drive his sled team to the Watauga parking lot for the hand-off to musher Jeff Blewett of Paducah, Ky.

Blewett will pass the package to Fayth Smith of Gastonia, N.C., around 11 a.m., and her team will deliver it to the Iron Horse Campground, where all of the mushers will set off on the last leg of the journey in a parade of dogsleds.

The mushers and their precious cargo are expected to arrive at Damascus Park in Damascus, Va., between noon and 12:30 p.m., where Mayor Creed Jones will accept the arrival of the “life-saving serum.”

After catching the finish, onlookers can enjoy a day full of demonstrations, instructional seminars and other winter-related events at the park, including Alaska Lumberjack competitions hosted by the Virginia Tech Forestry Club; a winter hiking and survival talk by Steve Webb of Sun Dog Outfitters; and, at 1 p.m., a Doxie Derby — a race just for Dachshunds — sponsored by Pet Partners of Bristol.

Registration for the derby must be completed by noon, Saturday; to pre-register, call 276-591-5730 or 423-968-4126. Entry fee is $10 per dog.

“Since last year’s event was so popular we added more rescue groups and excitement to what was already an exciting educational event, with other rescue groups for pets and even people rescue groups, such as Intermont Search and Rescue, with their ‘Hug A Tree’ presentation for kids on what to do when you get lost in the woods,” Horne said. “Also, K-9 Jake, who is a cadaver search dog, along with his trainer Cynthia Bales, will show how he does a search pattern.”

Folks can also compete for several winter-related items up for grabs in the silent auction, including a T-shirt autographed by Lance Mackey, winner of the 2007 Iditarod and Yukon Quest.

At the inaugural Meet the Mushers dinner later in the day, Iditarod veterinarians Al Townshend and Sonny King, who’s also an Iditarod musher, will give a slide presentation on the storied relay and discuss extreme canine sports medicine.

The cost to attend the dinner, to be held at 5 p.m., Saturday, at the Iron Horse Music Hall, is $12 a plate. Tickets can be purchased Saturday morning at the park.

“We also combined in the weekend a dryland sled dog race that we had last year two weeks after the re-enactment,” Horne said. “Several of the mushers would have liked to be in both, and to drive a great distance twice was not easy with the price of gas, so we combined that all in one weekend.”

Mushers from across the Southeast are expected to drive their dogsleds down the Virginia Creeper Trail as part of Sunday’s Blue Ridge Dryland Challenge.

One- and two-dog teams will run two-and-a-half miles from Iron Horse Campground to Damascus Park, while the four- and six-dog teams will race a five-mile route, from Straight Branch to Damascus Park.

Both races start at 10 a.m., with teams expected to reach the finish line at the park between 10:30 a.m. and 12:30 p.m.

Admission to both days of festivities is free.

For more information, visit siberianhuskyassist.com.

Second Annual Re-enactment of
the 1925 Alaska Serum Run
and Blue Ridge Dryland Challenge
WHEN: 10 a.m., Saturday and 9 a.m., Sunday
WHERE: Damascus Park, Damascus, Va.
COST: Free admission
CONTACT: siberianhuskyassist.com

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