Further north
Feb 26th, 2008 by Chris
Our second day on the trail dawned bright and cold. The dogs were fed their hydrating soup, we ate a full breakfast and after shovelling up the poo and harnessing the huskies we set off north. Once again, the contrast between the cacophony of howling, excited dogs as we prepared and the total silence as we moved off was striking.
My dogs started out fast and much of the morning I was having to brake to avoid overtaking Raikka. But by the afternoon they were starting to slack and I was finding I was having to do a lot of scooting or even running up the hills. Running up hill in six layers of thermal clothing is not the easiest thing! After lunch Raikka decided to swap Desperado for one of the dogs from his team, but this didn’t seem to make a lot of difference.
Our destination for the day was Saukko-Oja, the most northerly point on our trip at about 68°12½′N. Another cabin on the edge of a frozen lake this place had a real sense of isolation, with the tree-less fells of the Pallas-Ylläs National Park towering behind.
Arrival here wasn’t straight forward though. We had to go around the cabin and sauna building to get the dogs facing the right direction for the tomorrow’s start, and this was far from an easy manoeuvre. Raikka’s sled tipped against one corner of the cabin and got stuck, and when he did manage to get it free he hit the side of the sauna and took a piece out of it. Several others hit things on the tight corners on the way round, so the day was slightly marred by Raikka being quite stressed by the time we’d got all dogs unharnessed and chained up. But the setting was beautiful and the day was going to be saved by one of the great treats of the trip…