Day 3, part 2

Today's itinery is Mud Lake. Because of my extremely uncooperative dogs I've forgotton my beanie (known in Canada as a 'took') and scarf, and as a result of this and a knifelike wind the only thing keeping my ears on is the fact that they are frozen to my head. The journey to Mud Lake is fairly straightforward. It abounds with gradual slopes, followed by steeper downhills, giving the dogs a chance to really stretch their legs and pound the ground like they were raised to do. The circle around Mt. 'Toblerone', as Laird calls it, is a spectacular river valley ringed by majestic, shining peaks and a beautiful, perma-rising sun which squats just above the southern horizon all day long, giving the impression of an endless dawn. My dogs run at high speeds across the plains, revelling in the simlpe joy of the marathon sprint. Claudia, however, who is right in front of me, has dogs which seem to prefer fighting and nipping at one another's heels more than they enjoy the run, and so I am constantly forced to stop and wait for her to move along. Laird pauses in the lead several times to swap dogs around, Alan, Casper, Yergen and Yasmine all have dogs removed from their teams as our guide searches for the ultimate combination. My team, however, remains the same as when it started, with only the swapping of little Ella with Mia, due to Mia's approaching Heat phase and Harry's inability to concentrate with her running beside him.
With my parka shielding my ears, my only real regret is that the batteries in my camera are constantly frozen, and I can only take a few pictures of the Mud Lake trek with my fast dying phone.
Upon reaching our destination, we stop only for a breather and a few pictures of the frozen swamp. Laird makes a few more changes in the teams and I wrestle with Mia for a moment, trying to right her twisted harness and calm her and Sage, who just want to run again. When we finally leave, the wind is at our backs and we make excellent time, the fur rimmed hood of my parka protects my ears and I don't need to draw it up and over, whcih offers me an uninterrupted view of the trail. Starving, though, I find a delicious peanut bar I had stowed in my parka's deep pockets, which gives me the energy I need to climb back up the excellent slopes that just that morning we had enjoyed going down, and fly down the other sides, twisting and turning to keep the sled away from the sharp corners and deep drifts, slamming the brake when control was being sacrificed far too much for speed. Finally, after many adrenaline pumping near crashes, we return to camp. Over the next few hours we rest and recuperate, some lumber is chopped for the fires, diaries are written in and photos examined. When the time for bed finally arrives I deign to sleep outside in my sled, to experience all that I can of a true sledder. And so wrapped in jacket, scarf, thermals, t-shirt and sleeping bag with binoculars around my neck (in case of northern lights) I rest, slowly freezing from the toes up despite three layers of thick wooly socks, and with frost gradually settling on the small circle of my face left open by the sleeping bag, I sleep the night away, to be awoken by the frenzied barking of my dogs.