New Old Woman is a cozy and very useful shelter cabin on the Iditarod trail where I stopped during the Race in 1996. After Beth arrived ( she camped overnight with the stuck sno machine 35 miles away from us ) rescued by Keith and Sven, we took off around 5 pm towards Unalakleet, the first Eskimo village on the coast of the Bering Sea. It stopped to snow but started to rain and snow…incredible ! I loaded LEGEND in my sled because just a bit hurt in one leg and so after hours of travel in a vast, lonely tundra full of creeks and rivers with overflows, LIGHTNING in single lead drove us to the outskirts of Unalakleet where a huge water pond 8 inches deep was waiting for us. The dogs didn't want to cross it so I had to put in Lead my old leader CIORS in order to get through it. We went to the local Elementary School where we could sleep in the…library. I believe in Europe they'd be fussy with this kind of hospitality, but here it is amazing how the sense of hospitality for the "travelers" is so big, it is really extraordinaire !! A group of 6 little girls good at animals, helped me real well to put the straw to bed the dogs. Megh and Storm got a lot of attentions and licked widely these lovely teenagers. A nasty warm south east wind was blowing outside while the very gentle Family of Donna and her husband invited the seven of us..at midnight to a unbelievable good supper with clams chouder, moose stew, salad, cookies etc…all kind of goodies. In 1925 this section of the trail has been covered by the Eskimo mail carrier VICTOR ANAGICK with a big team of 11 dogs in 6 hours…against our 4 hours of travel.
Vs. ARARAD K
