Cause I've got one hand in my pocket...

And the other one is driving a dogsled...
It's a beautiful day in Churchill today and I have finally conquered a fear of mine. Since we got the dogs I've gone sledding on my own quite a few times (some runs more eventful than others), but I had never been brave enough to do our "long loop"- about 35kms- by myself. Whenever I do the long loop I've had Marc-Andre drive the trail ahead of me on a skidoo. He doesn't stay close but he is atleast out on the trail and checks up on me every now and then. This morning Marc-Andre got called in to work, but it was such a gorgeous day I had to go.
I was always nervous to go by myself because I was afraid that something would go wrong, ie. dogs take off, dog gets hurt, I get hurt, moose. Haha. I trust my dogs but you never know. And at first I was always afraid of getting lost in the bush because my sense of direction sucks, but now I've realized that the dogs know the trails and have a better instinct of where home is than I do.
Lately we've had Riel and Herschel in the lead, our two young males, but the last few days Riel has been more interested in playing with his teammates than running. So today we put Ivva up front, she's usually a great runner. So we started out, sun shining, birds chirping, a measly - 38 with windchill. Made it past all the first obstacles, which are all the others teams that we have to pass to get on the trail and the sewer dump area. Both sometimes problematic depending on how focussed the dogs are off the bat, and today they were very focussed. We started off nice and strong and I had a great feeling. It was funny because sometimes Marc-Andre will follow me with the truck just until I get past the dump and I thought he was behind me for sure, as I was passing the dump I turned to give him the thumbs up and wave good bye (as he was off to work and wasn't returning for the next 3 hours), but he wasn't there! He had already left for work, so we were really on our own, me and my 7 dogs. 
So down the trail we go twisting and turning. It was quite cold despite being really sunny. So I had on my balaclava + neck warmer + toque + ski goggles + 2 hoods and then my whole long john out fit, snow pants, big coat, 2 pairs of socks and 2 pairs of gloves with big mitts on top. At the beginning of the ride I had my mitts in my pocket in case I had to jump off and  rearrange some dogs quickly.  But as things were going just swimmingly I reached for my mitts to realize that I only had one! I had dropped one on the trail, I was only about 5 minutes down the trail  so I could have gone back, but I didn't want to mess with the magic going on so I just threw a Hotpaw in my right glove kept on trucking. That's where the title for my post came from, on my my run Alanis Morrisette's song Hand in My Pocket got stuck in my head, probably because I kept my right hand in my pocket the whole time. Cheesy I know.
The dogs all did awesome down the train tracks to the hydro line. Ivva running hard, Herschel keeping her on the right trail, next Pirate totally killing it (he always gives it his all), Nuvuya was being a real princess at this point, tugline loose, just running not pulling; behind them Riel and Ula both great pullers; then alone in wheel is Chetwynd strong and steady. Things were going great, we had a few poops from Nuvuya and Riel, some chasing of birds down the trail but mostly a nice relaxed ride. Then we turn off the straight trail on to a small river. Usually we turn and go back to town on the river. Today, however, Ivva wanted to go across the river and Herschel was in complete agreement. They all of a sudden started to book it, so I stepped on the break, slow em down, throw in the snow hook and go grab the neck line on the leaders and turn them around in the right direction. They looked like they were on board, but when I got back on the sled Ivva and Herschel picked left, so back goes the snow hook and back I go to the front of the line, I drag them back and guess what, it still doesn't stick. We went back and forth like this about 6 times. I knew that Herschel knew he should be following the same trail we usually do, but Ivva was determined and apparently that meant Herschel was too. At this point I decided to move Ivva back and give Riel a chance because he knew the trail well too and he usually listens. Butt (and I do mean butt, lol) I go to unhook the tugline and see that Riel's is caked with frozen poop! Which is surprisely hard to remove, so I quickly changed my plan and grabbed Nuvuya. I made the switch and Nunu instantly took off in the right direction. I've never been to proud and relieved!
 When we first started running the dogs we were running Nuvuya in lead but she wouldn't keep a good pace, she kept her pace, which was often slower than everyone else, when we moved her back she did a lot better. So it's been a few months since she's been up and I could tell she had something to prove. Hard to believe that little 30 lb dog could pull so hard, she was just lunging in to it, it was awesome. She kept a great pace and I could tell that she knew the trail well. Herschel and Nuvuya seem to be a good pair. 
The river is where I get worried about moose popping up so I'm fairly yappy on the trail, praising the dogs mostly, but every now and then I belt out a tune, haha. Today obviously it was Hand in My Pocket. I did see a huge set of moose tracks today that looked fresh, yikes!
So about 2.5 hours later I'm about 5 minutes from the dog yard, I just happened to look up and there is my right mitt hanging from a twig at the side of the trail. I don't know if it got picked up by another musher (if so Thanks!) or if that twig just caught my mitt. Suprisingly my hand didn't really get cold, but I can tell you I can sure feel my left bicep right now! ouch!
We pulled in to our yard and my toes were started to go numb, so I basically sprinted from dog to dog to unhook and feed. Surprisingly I had a ton of energy after the run. Probably because I didn't have to run myself that much because the dogs did so well. Needless to say my confidence was way boosted today, I now feel that I can handle whatever gets thrown at me. But I do believe the more we run the dogs the smoother things will go. Luckily it's going to be beautiful all week and I happen to have a few days off so I'm pumped to go again tomorrow, and the day after and the day after!