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Annael
Immortal
Jun 6 2015, 12:14am
Post #1 of 4
(217 views)
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the new Iditarod?
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Not content with hosting a gazillion "festivals" every year, my town has started something new that could actually become very big: the Race to Alaska. It's a boat race, and anyone can enter, with a couple of caveats: the boats cannot have motors, and you can't have supply dumps along the way - you have to resupply from public sources. It's 750 miles from the start at Port Townsend, Washington to Ketchikan, Alaska, going up the Inside Passage. There are famous & dangerous tidal rapids in the narrows and bears . . . lots of bears.
Half the town turned out to see the start yesterday morning at 5 am, after a party that took over Water Street the evening before.
You can read more at http://r2ak.com/
If you're a Facebook user, there are great pictures and videos at Race To Alaska by Northwest Maritime Center.
I'm totally hooked on the tracker feature that lets you see where each team is at any time.
I am a dreamer of words, of written words. I think I am reading; a word stops me. I leave the page. The syllables of the words begin to move around … The words take on other meanings as if they had the right to be young.
-- Gaston Bachelard
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NARF and member of Deplorable Cultus since 1967
(This post was edited by Annael on Jun 6 2015, 12:15am)
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Annael
Immortal
Jun 6 2015, 4:08pm
Post #2 of 4
(191 views)
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http://www.nytimes.com/...av=top-news&_r=1
and interviews: http://www.nytimes.com/...sail-run-or-row.html
and btw the guy on a paddleboard with a cooler on it is not competing; he's a local chef and the cooler was full of bowls of hot oatmeal for the competitors on the morning of the start.
I am a dreamer of words, of written words. I think I am reading; a word stops me. I leave the page. The syllables of the words begin to move around … The words take on other meanings as if they had the right to be young.
-- Gaston Bachelard
* * * * * * * * * *
NARF and member of Deplorable Cultus since 1967
(This post was edited by Annael on Jun 6 2015, 4:13pm)
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dernwyn
Forum Admin
/ Moderator
Jun 7 2015, 1:00pm
Post #3 of 4
(173 views)
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A new kind of "Northwest Passage"!
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I like that tracking map. I think I'd rather be on a dogsled: those waters can be treacherous, especially considering the kind of crafts being used!
But if you're the seafaring type, then this would be a lot of fun - and a challenge.
The big pot of oatmeal for breakfast reminds me of a cartoon that was posted on a wall at my college in Maine, showing two Canadian trappers at a campfire, the one eating out of a bowl, the other inspecting their equipment and saying, "Don't eat all of the oatmeal, Pierre, we have to patch the canoe!" 
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"I desired dragons with a profound desire"
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swordwhale
Tol Eressea
Jun 8 2015, 6:30pm
Post #4 of 4
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Just so you have some background here....
In the winter my van carries sled dogs, in the summer, kayaks. I have no use for powered boats, unless it's was to jump off of to look at sunken ones. OK, and the time the sailboat under motor power towed my sorry arse up the creek because I couldn't find the right creek.
Sooooooooooooooooooo....
riiiiiiiiiiiiiiight.....
I paddled two days down the inside passage of Assateague Island VA/MD, dealing with tide, wind, more wind (turned out to be a great ripping headwind that had me making about a mile and hour, ugh), potential thunderstorms, god knows what swimming in from the sea (is that a fin??? is it cartiliginous???) and camping at a derelict building in the middle of nowhere that I think is the actual site of The Haunted Lagoon by those Nancy Drew writers...
Cool, probably not doing it again.
Dealing with the kind of ripping tides on the NW coast, and large hungry predators (the swordwhales are no problem as long as you don't get in the pods' way)...
nah.
I hope it's along the lines of the Iditarod, where you have to have particular gear, certain training/experience, and otherwise be prepared for the trail.
Wonder if they've got powered boats standing by for rescue.
Na 'Aear, na 'Aear! Mýl 'lain nallol, I sûl ribiel a i falf 'loss reviol...
To the sea, to the sea, the white gulls are crying, the wind is blowing and the white foam is flying...
JARVIS is my copilot, and it's bigger on the inside...
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