27 DOG NIGHT! By Sue Santarcangelo
“Are you nuts? It’s winter in Alaska. Who would want to go there for a vacation to work a dog sled race?” Dr. Peggy , owner of Mesquite Veterinary Clinic, used to ask her fellow vet Tex Coady that question year after year. Tex, who has been going to Alaska to work on dog sled races for more than 30 years, would suggest that she should try it. “I couldn’t imagine going. I hate the cold. I absolutely hate the cold,” comments Dr. Peggy. But when a spot opened for a vet on the Kuskokwim 300 Sled Dog Race, her dislike of the cold was overcome by her friend’s encouragement not to miss the opportunity of a lifetime. With Tex’s assurances and sub-zero winter clothes, some loaned to her by Tex’s wife, she boarded the plane and headed to Alaska to work as a vet on her first dog sled race. “I looked on it as an adventure,” says Dr. Peggy. In her diary, she documented the way her trip began. “Up early 4:45 am, cup of coffee and a sausage patty, banana bread sandwich for the road, and uneventful check-in at Alaska Air. Boarded onto first seat in first class (a first for me).” The firsts kept coming. A once in a decade snowstorm in Seattle, more than average amounts of snow in Anchorage, and a 400 mile trip on a typical in-state Alaska airplane where first class was reserved for the most important passenger - cargo. Humans ride in the back. That ride landed her in her initial destination, Bethel, Alaska. Dr. Peggy explains that, “Bethel is a town of about 5,000, has about 26 miles of roads but you can only get to it by flying in from any distance in the winter or by snow machine for the closer villages, or by vehicle on the frozen river. In the summer, only by plane as the tundra becomes too soft and boggy to allow roads. Truly isolated.” In this isolated town on the mouth of the Kuskokwim River, Dr. Peggy met the dogs. “Tex had told me the dogs would not be what the stereotype sled dogs we imagine. These dogs are small, compact, thin and came in every coat color and hair-type, and a few with a blue eye. Almost all were very happy and some were shy with only an occasional fearful one. They ranged in size from about 40-60 pounds. All lean, mean, pulling machines.” Her next chance to meet those “lean, mean, pulling machines” would be at her checkpoint in the tiny village of Tuluksak, 50 miles up the river. Tuluksak is the first rest stop on the race out of Bethel, and the last stop on the return run. Dr. Peggy continues, “Once settled in the school…we started trying to organize getting bags of straw together and secured, along with the dog food for the mushers, when they came in for their required 4-hour stop on the way back.” It was here that Dr. Peggy learned that the mushers might leave some dogs with her on their return run. “No one told me anything. I asked what I should do with the dogs and was told ‘you’ll figure it out!’ says Dr. Peggy. By the time the race was over, she had 27 dogs tied along two chain lines. Dr. Peggy continues, “They were all “in tact” males and females. Some had injures, others were sore or tired and most of them didn’t know each other. It was quite a job keeping them from fighting or other things.”
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