17 miles with 10 dogs....flying!

I have been training 10 dog teams for sled dog rides/tours all season and have had few snow runs without passengers.  Today I had the Twinkle/Bodhi team and we went all the way to the Franklin Falls Dam from Profile Falls in Bristol.  The dogs loped for about 10 miles continuously, and then finally settled into a trot for the rest of the run.  I saved side trails for the way back as a treat for the dogs, but some were not broken out right (drunk or crazy snow machiners).   In one set we ended up doubling back on ourselves and coming out the way we went in, which involved breaking trail in pretty deep snow.  Quiet a change from the hard packed and fast main trail.
The run was so perfect: exciting, relaxing, fun and even funny at times.  I love watching Bodhi learn.  And watching Twinkle get her mojo back!  She really likes running lead with Bodhi.
The whole team was:
Twinkle & Bodhi
Pema &  Bridget (eventually put Pema in wheel bcs she was ruining our perfect GEE over)
Java & Turbo
Tula & Hakka
Rainy & Smudge (Rainy went up and took Pema's place)

Tomorrow I am taking the Kubota/Nikka team out.  Not sure where I will go.  Maybe explore the Bridgewater trail conditions?

14 sled dog tours in 4 days....tails wagging and all dogs cuddled up

Starting with breaking trail on Friday with Katie, a family of four on Saturday and then busy days up at the hotel with Tom my teams did 14 tours these last 4 days.  So much fun!
Today the dogs all got massages.  Lots of lazy happy tail wags and dogs paired up cuddling in dog houses.

Website Launched

We have a website!  It's a plain website, soon to be a very exciting website.  Created by BBM Designs.
www.barking-brook.com
Full launch of the website should be mid-January!

We are in the Paper!

We are in the state section of the New Hampshire Union Leader, 1/3/11!!!
Article entitled: Kennels offering Sled Dog adventures, Call of the wild  By Roger Amsden
The article has a great photo of my new sled, me, Linda Isabelle (who was helping me out that day) and two of our first customers!  Too bad I was wearing my silly hat that day.
It was a great tour day, 8 people from the Biller family came out and rode in pairs.

Fabulous day with two Friends and 20 Dogs

Today I met my friends Scott and Linda Isabelle at the Hill trails.  Linda said she would help me anyway I needed, and I took her up on the offer!  She was a huge help, doing half the work of prepping first one team and then the other.  It was great, I was able to get both teams out today without exhausting myself.  Further joy was having an adult to talk to for HOURS!  Scott ran his team with us while we ran my A team.  We did lots of nice passing work on the way out and then we turned around at about 4 miles to head back.  We saw him again for a head on pass as we headed out with the B team.
It was a truly spectacular day, thank you Linda!

Clever Dogs doing Clever Things

Did that just happen?  How did those three dogs get out of their kennel into the play area???

Go and put them back in....
Put the little carabeener into the latch just to be safe....
And wow!  Looking over I see Java Bean on his hind legs, carefully and slowly manipulating the kennel door latch with his front paws and nose!  And I have an extra witness, KTST saw this too.

I think Java bean usually waits till I am not looking, but he must have been extra worried I was going to leave his group behind when I loaded the dog truck!

Christmas Mush - Dogs at the truck

A nice photo taken by Kelly Berg.  I love how Rainy is Howling away!