On Saturday we all went to the Harley dealer for service. We all had oil changes, and Pete had a new front tire installed and Mark & I had rear tires. This dealer is also a Honda & BMW store as well so this place is very busy. They don't take appointments so it's first come first served which we checked on the afternoon before when we got into town as the dealer was across the street from our hotel. We were there at opening bell which is 9am and we we're all done by about 2pm. Mark was not planning on a rear tire just yet but after his service we were waiting for my bike which was last to be done, he was looking at his bike and happened to notice there was a split within the tread of the rear tire. He had the extended warranty and the tire was covered at no charge! We asked the guys at the dealer about going on the Dalton highway to the Arctic circle. They said none of them had done it. We asked why. They said that they see day in and day out the bad stuff that happens to folks who try it. The lucky ones can ride back in, many are towed and some have died. Two this year so far. They admit they don't know how many make it as they only see the problems but has convinced them not to try it. As we're waiting for our bikes 2 guys (father & son) on V-Storms from Maryland come in with beat up bikes. They had both crashed with a Caribou on the Dalton highway. They said they were lucky to not be seriously injured and managed to fix the bikes enough to ride out. The road was nearly impassable basically because it had been raining for most of the ride and was difficult to even see the road never mind keep an eye out for wildlife. This convinced us that the Arctic Circle isn't in the cards. We finished the day by having a late lunch and relocating to the hotel were the ladies were. Mark had to go back after lunch to get his rear tire done. It was nice to have a day to hang out. I think we all slept well last night. I know I did. Sunday we did some tours around Fairbanks. One was a paddle wheel boat on the Chena River and the other was the El Dorado gold mine. The riverboat stopped at Breaking Trails kennel which is the home of former 4 time Iditarod champ Susan Butcher who has passed away but her husband still runs. These sled dogs are amazing as they live and love to run. For summer training he hooks them up to an ATV. (see pic) A team of 12 will pull the 600 pound machine about 25 mph! Another pic today from the boat is where the Chena meets the Tanana river. If you notice you can see a distinct line where the Chena is the clean water but the Tanana is fed by numerouis Glaciers and is mostly muddy silty water from the Glaciers weight moving across the earth and scouring the ground like sandpaper and the runoff from the melt becomes the river. This creates a navigation problem for boats because the silt settles out and the channel is constantly changing. We also stopped at the Aleyeska Pipeline visitor center which is today's other pic.
3 comments:
This is Jeff Alling again, It would be an honor to meet up with you guys while you are here in Fairbanks; to shake your hands and congradulate you all!! Please give me a call at 907-456-1383 or email at alcanbld@mosquitonet.com.
Thanks again, and CONGRATS!!
Thanks Evert from a friend of Joe's for taking the time to continually update your blog enabling those of us back here in CT to have current information on the trip.
After seeing Joe's hot date I now understand why the guys working the Alaskan Pipe Line went on the Oprah show in search of wives.
Your writing skills are greatly appreciated.
The Iditarod is terribly cruel to dogs. For the facts, visit the Sled Dog Action Coalition website, http://www.helpsleddogs.org.
Here's a short list of what happens to the dogs during the race: death, paralysis, frostbite of the penis and scrotum, bleeding ulcers, bloody diarrhea, lung damage, pneumonia, ruptured discs, viral diseases, broken bones, torn muscles and tendons, vomiting, hypothermia, sprains, fur loss, broken teeth, torn footpads and anemia.
At least 136 dogs have died in the Iditarod. There is no official count of dog deaths available for the race's early years. In "WinterDance: the Fine Madness of Running the Iditarod," a nonfiction book, Gary Paulsen describes witnessing an Iditarod musher brutally kicking a dog to death during the race. He wrote, "All the time he was kicking the dog. Not with the imprecision of anger, the kicks, not kicks to match his rage but aimed, clinical vicious kicks. Kicks meant to hurt deeply, to cause serious injury. Kicks meant to kill."
Causes of death have also included strangulation in towlines, internal hemorrhaging after being gouged by a sled, liver injury, heart failure, and pneumonia. "Sudden death" and "external myopathy," a fatal condition in which a dog's muscles and organs deteriorate during extreme or prolonged exercise, have also occurred. The 1976 Iditarod winner, Jerry Riley, was accused of striking his dog with a snow hook (a large, sharp and heavy metal claw). In 1996, one of Rick Swenson's dogs died while he mushed his team through waist-deep water and ice. The Iditarod Trail Committee banned both mushers from the race but later reinstated them. In many states these incidents would be considered animal cruelty. Swenson is now on the Iditarod Board of Directors.
In the 2001 Iditarod, a sick dog was sent to a prison to be cared for by inmates and received no veterinary care. He was chained up in the cold and died. Another dog died by suffocating on his own vomit.
No one knows how many dogs die in training or after the race each year.
On average, 53 percent of the dogs who start the race do not make it across the finish line. According to a report published in the American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine, of those who do cross, 81 percent have lung damage. A report published in the Journal of Veterinary Internal Medicine said that 61 percent of the dogs who finish the Iditarod have ulcers versus zero percent pre-race.
Tom Classen, retired Air Force colonel and Alaskan resident for over 40 years, tells us that the dogs are beaten into submission:
"They've had the hell beaten out of them." "You don't just whisper into their ears, ‘OK, stand there until I tell you to run like the devil.' They understand one thing: a beating. These dogs are beaten into submission the same way elephants are trained for a circus. The mushers will deny it. And you know what? They are all lying." -USA Today, March 3, 2000 in Jon Saraceno's column
Beatings and whippings are common. Jim Welch says in his book Speed Mushing Manual, "I heard one highly respected [sled dog] driver once state that "‘Alaskans like the kind of dog they can beat on.'" "Nagging a dog team is cruel and ineffective...A training device such as a whip is not cruel at all but is effective." "It is a common training device in use among dog mushers...A whip is a very humane training tool."
During the 2007 Iditarod, eyewitnesses reported that musher Ramy Brooks kicked, punched and beat his dogs with a ski pole and a chain. Brooks admitted to hitting his dogs with a wooden trail marker when they refused to run. The Iditarod Trail Committee suspended Brooks for two years, but only for the actions he admitted. By ignoring eyewitness accounts, the Iditarod encouraged animal abuse. When mushers know that eyewitness accounts will be disregarded, they are more likely to hurt their dogs and lie about it later.
Mushers believe in "culling" or killing unwanted dogs, including puppies. Many dogs who are permanently disabled in the Iditarod, or who are unwanted for any reason, are killed with a shot to the head, dragged or clubbed to death. "On-going cruelty is the law of many dog lots. Dogs are clubbed with baseball bats and if they don't pull are dragged to death in harnesses....." wrote Alaskan Mike Cranford in an article for Alaska's Bush Blade Newspaper (March, 2000).
Jon Saraceno wrote in his March 3, 2000 column in USA Today, "He [Colonel Tom Classen] confirmed dog beatings and far worse. Like starving dogs to maintain their most advantageous racing weight. Skinning them to make mittens. Or dragging them to their death."
The Iditarod, with its history of abuse, could not be legally held in many states, because doing so would violate animal cruelty laws.
Iditarod administrators promote the race as a commemoration of sled dogs saving the children of Nome by bringing diphtheria serum from Anchorage in 1925. However, the co-founder of the Iditarod, Dorothy Page, said the race was not established to honor the sled drivers and dogs who carried the serum. In fact, 600 miles of this serum delivery was done by train and the other half was done by dogs running in relays, with no dog running over 100 miles. This isn't anything like the Iditarod.
The race has led to the proliferation of horrific dog kennels in which the dogs are treated very cruelly. Many kennels have over 100 dogs and some have as many as 200. It is standard for the dogs to spend their entire lives outside tethered to metal chains that can be as short as four feet long. In 1997 the United States Department of Agriculture determined that the tethering of dogs was inhumane and not in the animals' best interests. The chaining of dogs as a primary means of enclosure is prohibited in all cases where federal law applies. A dog who is permanently tethered is forced to urinate and defecate where he sleeps, which conflicts with his natural instinct to eliminate away from his living area.
Iditarod dogs are prisoners of abuse.
Sincerely,
Margery Glickman
Director
Sled Dog Action Coalition, http://www.helpsleddogs.org
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