Pierre Heritier is a particularly interesting component of life these days. It will be just the two of use living out at the dog farm for the next three weeks while the proprietors are in the lower forty eight. Pierre arrived from Switzerland a fortnight ago with 18 Siberian Huskies in tow and is here through February training for the Yukon Quest. The Quest is an historic 1000-mile sled dog race starting in Fairbanks Alaska and ending in Whitehorse, in the Yukon. In addition to my duties on the dog farm I have been privy to the ins and outs of the training that takes place for such a race and to know Pierre, who has been the subject of unprecedented fanfare in the Swiss media, personally. I’ve been spending a bit of time recently assisting him in getting his various medias uploaded for the viewing of his constituency back home and will be re-posting some of them on this site so that everyone may have a chance to see some of the aspects of mushing in Alaska that I get to see.
This is Pierre on the trail in Alaska. If your French is at even the very most basic level and you can even begin to fathom what it must take to bring a dog team from Switzerland to Alaska you can understand that this is quite a touching video. My new Swiss friend is one of those people in life who does more than he says. I like those types of folks.
This is a pretty standard dog sled launch. As Laurel would say “sled dogs have two speeds, anchored and go!” This is the transition between the two. The camera man is yours truly with a hand off to Pierre during the launch sequence.
And finally, you’ve got to be asking how in the world you get 18 Siberian Huskies from Switzerland to Alaska. Well, the answer is: First you fly them from Geneva to Vancouver. Then, you rent a UHaul truck and don’t tell the “rental technician” what it’s for. You fill it with dogs and drive it 2,000 miles through Canada and up the Alaska highway in the wind and snow.
And stop in Whitehorse to play.
