This year, Rob and I went together. Our original plan was to ski out to Luce’s Lodge. We’d get to spend the day in the middle of the pack, seeing a lot of the bikers and skiers. We’d stop there for a burger, then turnaround and ski back to the start in the evening, seeing the runners and the rest of the bikers and skiers along the way, and maybe even get passed by the leaders near the finish. That would have been an ambitious day (75 miles), for a couple of spectators. Because of a litany of excuses ranging from head colds to cats, we decided to turnaround just after we hit the Yentna River. So it was only a 60 mile ski.

The race was really interesting, as always. After pre-race rumors of “a foot of new snow”, there were only a few inches at the start. It had been packed well enough that the bikers were able to ride without any problems. But the cold, dry snow didn’t glide very well for the skiers. By Flathorn Lake, there wasn’t any new snow, making the trail even faster for the bikes, but at least by then the sun had warmed the snow enough that the skiing was pretty fast too. The lead bikers rocked it the whole way. Three guys finished around 11 hours. That’s fast. Given the conditions, I would have expected relatively fast skier times as well, but we only saw about have the course, so who knows what it was like the rest of the way. I do know that Chet had some problems with his sled early on, so that was likely a factor for him. But no skiers under 20 hours – I can’t remember the last time that happened.

For us, it was a fantastic day of fun in the sun. Here’s a link to our route on a map. Once again, Rob was the trip photographer.

I had an idea that since we’d be seeing so much of the race, it would be fun to create a little documentary video. So early on, I tried to get video clips of everyone. But I didn’t realize that my memory card was pretty much already full of photos and videos of my kids. So I ran out of card space before we were even got to Flathorn. Bummer! So instead of a cool race documentary, all you get is a little video dump of all the footage I did take in the first couple of hours.

On December 12th, Bill, Rachel, Kate, Danielle and I headed up to Willow to ski the same loop that, coincidentally, we skied exactly a year ago.  I say that it was a coincidence, but the Su Valley rivers usually don’t start freezing up safe for travel until early December, and we’re always itching to get out ther as soon as we can.  So it’s no surprise that it was December 12th two years in a row.

It was a chilly day, with a high of -10 F in Willow, and definitely colder on the river, so the glide was very slow.  But the trails were in great shape.  It was a great ski with great people, marred only by the fact that I bonked hard 3.5 hours into a 6 hour ski. It really took me by surprise.  I’m definintely not in shape right now, but usually on these long workouts I can survive on base endurance alone.  But not this day.  Those women (and Bill) put the hurt on me.  Thank god for Kate, who saw what was happening and quickly went to the front of the group to adjust (read: slow) the pace so they could drag me home.

Here are a the only photos taken during the whole ski (by Kate) on account of the cold weather.

I love this picture of me.  Usually when I get really tired, the camera goes away.   I stop taking pictures.   So this might be the only picture of me in full-on bonk mode.  This was after crossing the Big Swamp, which was my low point.  I am utterly exhausted, dazed and glazed, and ready to just curl up in a ball.  But this was also the point where I knew I could make it home.  The worst was over.  Only another hour or so of suffering and I’d be done.

My first bright idea was that I would do the Susitna 100. Not race it, just ski easy, enjoy the hospitality at the checkpoints, and treat it like a tour. A nice weekend vacation. But when I went to sign up, I realized that the entry fee was $350! Holy crap! That’s an expensive ski tour. Unless they are serving lobster and caviar at Flathorn, no thanks.

So I decided I would watch the race instead, and get in some skiing and camping along the way. I recruited my friend Bill and we headed to Point MacKenzie early Saturday morning.

We started at 9:00 AM, same time as the racers, but we gave ourselves a two mile head-start by parking at the snowmobile lot up the road from the race start. We were able to ski the course, and watch the lead racers go by us along the way. We hung pretty close to the leaders until we got to Flathorn Lake, then stopped for a bite to eat. Our goal was to make it to Luce’s Lodge on the Yentna River (about 40 miles into the race) for a burger, then decide where to camp.

I felt surprisingly good while skiing. Sure, we were just cruising and I was pretty tired by the time I got to Luce’s at 3:00 PM. But I was psyched to see that we were only 30 minutes behind the race leaders at that point.

Bill and I hung out at Luce’s for a couple of hours, enjoying delicious burgers and chatting with many of the racers. Around 5:00 PM we packed up and decided to head back down the Yentna for an hour or so before camping. That would give us a shorter ski back to the car on Sunday.

As we crawled into our sleeping bags at 7:30 PM, Chet Fehrmann, the race leader, skied by in the darkness. We cheered for him, and then cheered for bikers Pete Basinger and Lance Andre when they went by five minutes later. The cool thing about this year’s race was that the conditions were good for both skiers and bikers, making for an even and exciting race. I have a feeling Pete was just using this race for training for the Iditarod Trail Invitational, but it was exciting anyway.

Most of the other racers passed us by during the twelve wonderful hours that we slept. We relished the luxury of sleep that the racers did not have. By 9:00 AM we were packed up and back on the Yentna. A slight tailwind made the return trip a little easier. We passed a few runners, bikers and skiers on our way to the finish. At the finish we learned that Chet held off the bikers to win the race for the third year in a row. Congratulations Chet!

It was a great weekend. Beautiful weather, great ski conditions, and lots of fun hanging out with other people who enjoy recreating in semi-remote Alaska. Oh, how I’ve missed this.

We decided to head to Willow. There isn’t a lot of snow for cross country skiing anywhere in South-central Alaska right now. But I figured if anyone could create good skate ski conditions with the snow we have, it would be the good folks of the Willow Trails Committee. WTC did not disappoint, and the groomed trails impressed our whole crew.

We started at the Crystal Lake trailhead and headed down the Corral Hill trail to the Susitna River. Our goal was to complete some sort of loop, but not all the trails were in yet. So we headed south on the river to see what trails we could find. We had almost reached the Yentna River (and were thinking about turning around) when we found a trail headed east. That trail was narrow, rocky, and dirty, but after a few nervous minutes headed south, it swung back to the east and intersected with the Big Swamp trail as we hoped. Being back on the WTC-groomed trails, we had a sweet trail back up through the Big Swamp to Willow Swamp and back to the car.

It was a 36 mile loop that took us 5.5 hours, including a bunch of stops. Temps were -5 F at the trail head most of the day, and probably a fair bit cooler on the river in the morning. The glide was surprisingly good, in spite of the cold snow. It was a great day to be out in the sunny Su Valley, escaping the ice fog in Anchorage.

Photos and maps in the gallery:

April 1: After a few days of crust, the overnight temperatures this weekend warmed up and the skies threatened rain and snow. So instead of crust skiing, I headed north to the Willow multi-use trails.

On February 19th, I tackled the Susitna 100, a 100 mile race through the frozen Alaskan wilderness. When I first heard about this race, shortly after moving to Alaska, I knew I had to do it. I love races like this.

My write-up of the Susitna 100 on FasterSkier.com

2005 Su 100 Results

ADN article on the Su 100

ADN Interview With Tim Kelley (not about the race)

More photos from the race

By Thanksgiving time, the rain in Anchorage was really starting to get me down. I started dreaming of going to a lodge in the middle of the woods where I could ski all day and relax by the fire at night. After some research, I found exactly what I was looking for at The Point Lodge on Lake Louise.

On July 17, we headed north to the Little Susitna River and the Nancy Lakes Recreation Area for a weekend of canoeing.

The Little Su 50K is the shorter version of the Susitna 100 race through frozen Alaska.

A four-day bike trip along the 140 mile (or so) Denali Highway from July 31 to August 3, 2003 with our friends Scott and Jessica. Scott and Jess planned this trip and were nice enough to invite us along.