Saturday morning I headed to the Chena River in downtown Fairbanks to watch the start of the Yukon Quest - a 1000 mile race between Fairbanks, AK and Whitehorse, Yukon by dog sled. 24 teams are racing this year, and about half the town came out to see the start despite wicked cold temperatures (though at -23F it was considerably warmer than it's been all week...).
It's amazing to think of these dogs & mushers setting off from the start line, with 1000 incredibly tough and incredibly cold miles ahead of them.
the dogs are so ready to go - the teams are attached to a snow machine to rally up to the start line. once the team is the next in line the snow machine unhooks and a slew of volunteers take hold of the lines to keep the dogs from running before their turn.
lulu's was there - who knew they had their own bagel-person?? they needed a few dogs to pull their bagel-laden sled...
check out updates on the race here