My eyes hurt from staring at the GPS tracking thingie! It seemed to take forever for the Teams to make it across the ice!
When we last left the Musher and Pretty Curly Tails, they were making their way across Norton Sound to the Koyuk checkpoint, which had icky horrible weather. Winds, cold, winds, and more cold, and just plain cold!
We heard that Hank and two other teams (Jaimee Kinzer and Matt Failor) left Shaktoolik, but then turned around and went back because the conditions were so nasty. They have since left again and are making their way to Koyuk (whew).
Anyhoo, it was stop and go, stop and go on the ice for the Pretty Curly Tails. I even texted Richard for comforting words, and he told me: "Those dogs are amazing when it is truly appalling!" He also was 150% certain that the Musher knew exactly what to do... and I knew that too, but its always nice hearing it again.
It was getting really late, so I decided to go to bed and catch some quick ZZZs fully expecting to wake up, see the tracker at Koyuk and do the happy Border Collie dance of joy.
Instead I see this:
OHMYGAH ARE YOU KIDDING ME??? Then I piddled in the chair... just a little... I was scared!
All those hours and the Pretty Curly Tails and Musher aren't even close to the checkpoint??? I was totally freaking... luckily Heather Minion had posted on the Facebooks and I double checked the Iditarod Website standings and WHEW!!!!
The Team checked into Koyuk with Travis Cooper's team at 22:16 (10:16 pm)!!! WHOOT! It took 12 long hours to mush 50 miles... I bet they are exhausted.
I also received a text from Richard to say he was safely in Nome, setting up Nome North Wapiti and scouting snowmachines to try to get to Safety to take pictures of the team. Another whew!
We still don't know who the dropped Pretty Curly Tail is, Donna Q will bail the pup out today and report.
AND!!!! The Musher posted a comment on one of Richard's stunning pictures of his plane approaching Nome that "she will see him soon!!!" So that means all is fine and on schedule!!!
Wow, what a rollercoaster day it has been so far and its not even lunch time!
Right now our only problem is that we don't know:
- Is the Musher Tracker lost on the ice?
- Is the Musher Tracker simply not working?
- Did the Musher Tracker batteries die?
- or....
More later
- Bet
2 comments:
Whew! Thanks, Bet, and all the Musher Minions for the info. I'm really glad I read emails before I looked at the tracker this morning cuz I stayed up very late, watching that tracker go nowhere. Hurrah for Karen and the Curly Tails - and on to Elim!
We are more and more in awe and respect of Karen participating in the Iditarod. We had no idea how challenging this is. Thank you, Bet, for bringing all of this so close to us! Extra hugs for the Pretty Curly Tales and Musher, and extra Nutella for you for your reporting!
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