Into the Wild: Week 16 (winter is coming).

As I write this post it is snowing, there is already a good few inches of snow on the ground, its -3'C and there's a lot more snow on the way. On sunday they predict it's going to get to -13.5'C at night. Winter really is catching up with us pretty quickly - and I am so excited. I love seeing the dogs play in the snow, I love how beautiful it is here in the snow, and I love that being on a sled gets closer and closer!
It's been a good month - lots of exciting things to do and to look forward to.

I may as well start with some extremely exciting news - here are the two puppies we are going to be getting from Alaska in under 2 weeks! Phoenix, one of our dogs here, had some frozen sperm flown up to another Hedlund Husky in alaska and bish-bash-bosh now there is a Phoenix litter up there! We are getting two of the litter, a boy and a girl. Linda has named the girl Terra and the boy Griffin.

Terra - the girl pup.

Griffin, the boy pup

And, if two pups weren't exciting enough, our very own Rayna is pregnant with our very own Arrows pups! Arrow and Rayna are both such gorgeous dogs, I cant wait to see what beauties their pups look like. The vet thinks Rayna has a big litter brewing too - at least 8 pups! They are due around thanksgiving (27th November)! The welping box has gone up in a spare room today so now we have a 'puppy room'. Sooooo exciting.

Rayna. She's usually so lean so you can see her bump!

We have been doing a lot of work with the dogs recently too. We had a guest who wanted to learn how to run a team and apply the knowledge to her own dogs. Also, I got to run my own team which was awesome, such a cool feeling.

Me driving my team!

We also went to walk some of the dogs to a big old waterfall to teach our guest how to Canicross with her dogs.

We are always looking for new dog sled trails so we go out and cut through the forest, cutting new trails to get further and to new places. Come sun or snow!

Also, the group of mushers up here form a group called The Cook County Mushers, and they do many different things together, in the mushing and non mushing communities. Here we are preparing to go clean up a couple of miles of highway! (I'm in the back right of Linda in the orange jacket). It was a beautiful sunset during and then a great pot-luck at our friends house after wards, not bad for community service!

Ilo and I love to go on walks, we are going to a waterfall tomorrow with a little picnic, and a few weeks back we walked up Pincushion Mountain, just outside of Grand Marais. Although it was rainy and cloudy it was beautiful up there with the 'fall colours'. You had to scale a sheet of rock to get to a tabletop summit where Ilo and I had a picnic and admired the views.

The view of Grand Marais from half way up

The sheet rock we had to climb

Our friends at a local restaurant and hotel on the lake close down for Christmas around this time and Rachel and I were invited to their traditional "hot tub party on the beach". It sounded glamorous! Rachel and I took a few beers, and walked the beach looking for this 'hot tub'. It was soon dark and there was no sign of it...

Turns out it is a paddling pool, with a hose that is hooked up to the hot plumbing!

Rachel and Paul test out the water. We had about 10 people in there in the end!

And when you get too hot you go and jump in icy lake superior! I jumped in twice! Safe to say it was pretty cold...

Our emergency vet is about 1 and a half hours away in Canada, but our regular vet is over 3 hours away in a town called Ely. The first day Linda and I went there, with 8 dogs! 4 in the back of the cab and 4 in crates in the boot, it was bit of a squish.

But there was a beautiful sunrise and sunset (yes, we were on the road for both).

The next day I went with another two dogs by myself. Ely is such a strangely stereotypically American town, it is fun to look around.

There is also the International Wolf Center there which is amazing. There is exhibits about wolves, their history etc and a bit open area for the wolves.

an example of a wolf pup litter.

I stood by the enclosure for about 20 minutes, not seeing anything. The man who worked there and I got talking as he worked in the Wolf Center in Reading, England for a while. He said they normally would wait until there was other people were there (it was super early in the morning) but he would ring the 'feeding chime' and hopefully the wolves would run right up to the window to get fed.

And along they came, 150lb wolves! It was amazing. The camera doesn't do justice to how massive they were.

Rachel hadn't been to Canada since she was wee so we all went up for dinner in Canada to an all you can eat Sushi place (amazing, I know!)

Linda and I have been there many times and always get served by this guy, Kenny, and Linda decided she wanted to hunt him down for a picture together. I don't think he quite got why this was happening...

In the front garden we have built a fire pit, and some benches from tree trunks. It is awesome to sit out there and relax under the stars or watch the sunset.