Wk 02 Behind the... Scene, screen, sled!
Location: 47º8'N 90º3'W
Expedition Basecamp, Minnesota, United States
Weather Conditions: Cloudy with flurries of snow, 10° F (-12°C)
If we can just find a way to attach this to their heads we can have a Polar Husky cam... Those were the words Paul uttered when he was standing at a tradeshow in Utah holding a "head cam" in his hands. Paul was at the tradeshow to work with our sponsor Ground on reviewing some of the gear the team uses on the trail, and to see a new jacket that the company has designed based on the needs of the team on the expedition trail. "Working with sponsors on developing and reviewing gear is a little piece of exploration and innovation in itself," says Paul. "In some ways it is much like my work with the GoNorth! Cool Scientists like James Foster out at NASA. When we sit down to figure out how to design the field research to be done during the expedition there is this sense of exploration that I get pretty excited about!"
A Polar Husky head cam is exciting alright! Like any good research project, half of the fun is figuring just how it is all going to work out. Back in the dog yard, Paul quickly decided that Beacon should be the first "cam-dog," being that Beacon is a pretty gun-ho kind of guy. And sure enough, Paul quickly concluded that it is a good thing the tiny camera sits in a thick plastic casing, since Beacon is just running as usual, completely un-fazed by the big straps wrapping his head!
Beacon is running with Ginger, and right in front of him it is Trigger and Domino. Behind him is Jupiter.
Speaking of running, we know of at least one classroom out there that has taken on this year's Polar Husky Challenge! What's the Polar Husky Challenge you might ask? Out on the expedition trail the Polar Huskies and the two-legged team members are setting out to run about 1,000 miles. So will the classrooms that take on the challenge! At Teacher Explorer Miss Gorton's class in California, the students went outside with their little "sit-n" sleds, one student being a musher and the other a Polar Husky, and then they had a relay race at the same time practicing the commands of running a dog team... and raking up the miles!
Listen to Miss Gorton's first audio update from her classroom in California!
Each one of us on the trail has to make 1,000 miles individually, but you can take the challenge as a class or in teams. Education Basecamp Manager Tiffany walks to work with her husband Jeff every day (5 miles round trip), plus they walk their three dogs (one of them being Polar Husky veteran Choko) every night (a couple of miles). Over the 14 weeks of this year's program between their 4 feet and 12 paws, they will rake up well over 1,000 miles. So, get moving and grooving and send-a-note to let us know how you are keeping up the progress!
We were sure happy to hear from all of you this week. The chat we had on Wednesday was pretty exciting to us. Paul and Aaron were on as speakers with 500-some students from every corner of the United States from coast to coast. Thank you for all the great questions! Tune in to this weeks chat to talk about Arctic Exploration with expedition team member Mille both on Monday February 18 at 6:15 PM CST and on Thursday, February 21 at 11 AM CST.
One of the questions asked and not answered on Wednesday was "when will the expedition take off?" See, we didn't know the answer then. Running an expedition is very much about "going with the flow" and staying entirely flexible in mind and schedule. "That can actually be one of the toughest challenges to deal with," says Aaron, and one that has not changed since the early explorers set out to map lands in the 1500s. Even though we have worked on the preparations for this year's journey for years, and non-stop since June of last year, there are still lots of things that need to be checked and re-checked before we can head for the trail-home-sweet-home. It is much like the teeth on the wheels in machinery that have to come together just perfectly, and obstacles can be thrown in the path of a smooth departure... like weather. But weather and all permitting, the Polar Huskies are set to depart Expedition Basecamp on Wednesday of this upcoming week!
The dog yard is already fired up. The Polar Huskies have a very fine-tuned sense of what is going on. For one it has been a week of feasts. The Polar Huskies eat well every day, being served a mixture of thawed chicken meat, chicken fat, kibble, oil and a deliciously sweet smelling mash that Paul cooks up every 3 to 4 days which contains yeast, minerals, and vitamins! This last week the portions have increased to trail-size though with about 5,000 calories a day. That is to bulk up for the trail and before the days of being on the road in trucks and airplanes where many of the dogs tend to eat a bit less. Then, the last few days before departure, the pace, if even possible, intensifies at Expedition Basecamp. In between "dog yard eruptions" the dogs are almost in a trance as their gaze on the two-legged becomes fixated on every little move with the question being not "are we there yet?"... but "Are we going yet?"
Now, it will still be a while before we are there yet. The expedition starting point in Sweden where the route has us setting out that is. First there are a couple of thousands miles of driving to be done. Once we land in Stockholm, Sweden we will have to pull out the maps to drive about 1,100 miles to the starting point, but even before then there is some road to cover here in the U.S. Loaded on the dog truck with all the gear, the Polar Huskies will travel from Expedition Basecamp north of Grand Marais, Minnesota to the International Airport in Chicago, Illinois. This first visit to the airport will be to unload the gear and hazardous equipment (such as the gas stoves, bottles, and generator) that is to travel with us. This has to arrive early to the airport to be checked over a 24-hour period and then all the gear flies to Sweden on Friday on a separate plane from the team members and Polar Huskies. Round 1! Are you mapping it by now? Round 2: all of us can not get on a plane to depart until early the following week. In the meantime, the dog truck will head for Sawyer, Michigan, still in the U.S. Sawyer is where the gang of puppies along with the rest of the Polar Huskies that are not going on the expedition will stay to be well cared for while we head out on the trail.
This weeks two Polar Husky Superstars will be in charge of the gang in Sawyer, Michigan. Two superstars that are truly some of the greatest Polar Huskies to ever set paws on the trail.
"Timber Bimber is one of my best friends," says Mille, who pretty much can't finish the sentence that Timber is not going with us this year without tearing up. "It not only means that we don't have our number-one polar bear alert with us; or one of our very best pullers of all time; or the star of the renown "Timber Tales" that has been such a beloved read on the website for years; to me it means that Timbers signature bark will be missing when the going gets tough; that his wagging tail straight in the air, head down leaning into that harness come rain or snow storm will not be cheering up the view; and that he is not there to give me kisses and small noises of encouragement assuring me that all is good when I am tired. For some-ten years on the trail we have shared so many incredible moments and he has saved our lives more than once protecting us from surprise polar bear attacks." But Timber being retired and not going on the trail doesn't mean he has not been busy or will stay busy ahead. Timber has quickly become one of the favorite uncles of the Polar Husky puppy gang - and watching Timber, he seems to be all barks and share the excitement in that job too!
Do you have a "best-friend-dog" or know of a great dog, a brave dog, a sweet dog, a funny dog, have a dog poem, a song or know of some good dog tricks? Make sure to share it in the Dog Zone - and check out all the other dog postings from your fellow GoNorth! student explorers!
Never one to stop barking either is this weeks other Polar Husky Superstar: Peto. "It is going to be quiet," says Paul. "I think the number of times I have stopped the sled and Peto has not made noise to get us moving again out on the expedition trail can be counted on two hands. And that is in 12 years of expeditions, running thousands and thousands of miles across every possible and impossible terrain." Peto was Paul's second Polar Husky and he came to be Paul's buddy as a lone puppy spending every minute with him, be it on Paul's pillow making noises in his ears or swimming next to the canoe on the lake, even then making noises as a puppy growing up his first summer. They even came up with Peto's name together. Paul read out a list of names to Peto, and Peto made his signature who-how noise at the name "Peto," so "Peto" it was. "Yeah, I also think the number of times Peto has not been in Paul's team can be pretty much counted on a couple of hands" Mille goes on, "for one, as truly incredible a puller as Peto is, it is simply a bit of a pain to run Peto without Paul being the musher - because his noise level when we would stop would be completely out of whack in his craze to make sure Paul was not to leave with another team without him!!" And rest assured, no one will be louder with excitement than Peto when the truck gets loaded to go this week!
