Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Carl gives us the short version of Mushing 101. He demonstrates the claw anchor and
the two-pronged brake. The basket of the sled, where the rider sits, is filled with snow.
There are rubber treads on the runners where the musher stands. Shifting body weight is
the key to steering. “The most important thing,” he says, “is never let go of the sled. The
dogs will run away with it and you'll be stuck walking back.” I commit this to memory.
Dinner is angel hair pasta with Alaska scallops, broccoli, and roasted tomatoes fol-
lowed by a dessert of baked apples in chocolate sauce, followed by a walk back to our
cabins through a star-filled night.
Saturday morning the sunrise is like an orchestra warming up to a Beethoven overture,
and I rise early in a futile attempt to capture it on film. I've said before in this column that
it's hard to find a bad view in Alaska, but Winterlake Lodge, set like a jewel on the vast
frozen expanse of Finger Lake in a curving string of steep, blue-white mountains, is a
place I can only describe as magical. Wolverine is the closest mountain, Trimble the
nearest glacier. The sky is a deep, rich blue from horizon to horizon. The air is perfectly
still. There are no jets overhead, no sirens howling past, no cell phones ringing. If there is
perfect peace in the world, it's found at Winterlake Lodge.
Breakfast is McBagels like you've never had at McDonald's. We all eat more than we
should. Carl decides we'll work off our breakfast on snow machines.
Here we must pause for a moment while the eyebrows of all my friends descend to their
normal level. This is because I hate snow machines and I'm not afraid to say so, even in
Alaska. They are noisy, smelly monsters that destroy the peace of the wildnerness, and
only people who really need them for travel, supply runs and subsistence hunting trips
ought to be allowed to use them. This is my standard speech, I trot it out whenever the
subject of snow machines arises, and those friends who use snow machines for recreation
generally don't say so in my presence for fear of the ensuing rant.
Well. Carl rolls out a snow machine for each of us, and leads us down the hill in front
of the lodge and out on a fifteen-kilometer loop that takes us to an up close and personal
view of Denali and Foraker. Denali, known to people from Ohio as Mount McKinley, is
20,320 feet high, Foraker a miserable 17,400 feet. I can see them both from Anchorage on
any clear day, but they inspire a little more awe when you have to tilt your head back to
look up at them.
