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- Breaking trail for the sleds along the mountain creeks.
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- Loaded down with gear…
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- Dog Sledding in the mountains.
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- Capturing the moment…
Many of our alumni and staff will remember dog sledding, and will be able to identify with this portion of a Robert Service poem:
“On a Christmas day we were mushing our way
Over the Dawson Trail.
Talk of your cold–through the parka’s fold
It stabbed like a driven nail.
If our eyes we’d close, then the lashes froze
‘Till sometimes we couldn’t see.
It wasn’t much fun, but the only one
To whimper was Sam McGee.”
The Christmas dog run was a tradition for many years at both the Manitoba and Alberta schools. The grade twelve class would give up part of their holiday to head out with staff into the cold, and wintery conditions. Share your dog sledding memories with us.
December 26, 2016 at 9:36 am
My first Christmas dog run wasn’t.
I had started grad school in a strange city. In December I was tired of school. 8 years of grade school, 4 years of high school, 4 years of college. I wanted a break.
I knew of St. John’s. The Knights of Columbus magazine (KoC is a Catholic men’s charity organization — much like Kiwanis) had reprinted Parade Magazine’s “Toughest School In North America. I written for and collected all the news letters and recruiting info.
After my last exam, around the 18th or so, I phoned Keith Bennett and asked, “I hear you need staff.” We chatted for a few minutes. He said to come on up. I’d be sent with the grade 12’s on the Christmas Dog run. And we’d see after that.
Went home for Christmas and flew to Edmonton on Boxing Day.
Arrived, and found that that year’s 12’s were wimps. No one wanted to go. No dog run. So, along with Pierre Rondeau our Christmas Dog Run consisted of shoveling dog crap every day, and feeding the beasts.
A week passed. Got a phone call from mom. Papa had taken a turn for the worse. Quick trip home for a few days. Say goodbye to Papa. Sort out more of my outdoor stuff I wanted at SJ.
I arrived back in Edmonton at 7:30 in the morning. Mike Maunder met me at the airport. “Have you read “The Lord of the Rings” “Yes, several times” “Good. You’re teaching it at 9:00”
December 27, 2016 at 1:38 am
I was thinking about this a couple of months ago and realized that it is exactly 40 years since our grade twelve dog run.
We were starting at Wallace Lake and heading north. It was the last major outdoor activity we were going to take part in as students.
When I look back, it strikes me how much we had matured, perhaps without quite noticing it, since we had started the Newboy canoe trip four years earlier. Back then, we were in a state of shock and just did what the masters told us. By the time we did the grade twelve dog run, although we were accompanied by masters, we were almost equal partners in the endeavor. We took the lead in preparing the equipment and the food and when decisions had to be made while on the dog run, although the masters had the last word, our views were canvassed and considered – we were part of the decision making process.
We were delayed a couple of days in departing because something broke on the dog trailer somewhere around Selkirk airport and whatever the issue was (some serious welding was required to fix it), it needed to be repaired in a garage in Selkirk. The garage couldn’t do it until late the next day and so we only set out the day after that. I recall as well that some of us were delayed getting back to Winnipeg – maybe bad weather caused flight cancellations or there was a pilot’s strike or something.
I remember sitting around the fire on New Year’s Eve. It was a sheltered spot surrounded by some big fir trees. We ate pork chops and bannock. Everyone had a bottle. I remember Peter Rushforth, who was sitting beside me, had something that had an orange tint to it, maybe Southern Comfort. I think Ian Lommerse had Bushmills Irish whiskey because I seem to recall him extolling its virtues. I had less refined tastes I suppose because I’m pretty sure a picture of a pirate captain featured on the label of mine. The evening was very enjoyable, and certainly unlike any New Year’s Eve I had experienced before or have experienced since.
We were still using spruce boughs to sleep on, arranged like spokes on a wheel in a circle around the fire in the middle, with our heads towards the fire. The danger inherent in this was brought to our attention early in the trip when the spruce boughs next to Martin Denny’s head caught fire and the flames spread to his hood. With all his drawstrings done up on his sleeping bag, he couldn’t immediately get his hands free (nor could anyone else) and he started rolling around and everyone was trying to react and it took a few seconds – which must have seemed very long ones to Martin – before the fire was out and he got his hood off. Luckily, he was okay. I still have a sweater I took on the trip and you can still see scorch marks here and there – sparks and embers are no respecters of clothing.
For breakfast, there was porridge and Cream of Wheat. Porridge in the morning was never a delight. Mr Voss created an alternative based on a school dessert called, for some reason, “Square Roots” which was a bit like a granola bar. For his version he melted lard in the frying pan, mixed in dry oatmeal and brown sugar, got it to set quickly by putting the pan in the snow to cool and then cut it into squares. Much superior to normal porridge we thought. Mr Noll created a variation the next day using Cream of Wheat. The result, dubbed “Cube Roots” by Mr Noll (which we thought was very witty – Mr Noll taught us Physics and Mr Voss taught us Chemistry) was very tasty as well.
I remember at the northernmost point of the trip, we were searching for a portage out of the lake we were on and Peter and I found a trail marked with old blazes on trees that went a few hundred yards into the bush and then ended – at least as far as we could see. Maybe it was made by someone like us, searching for a way out. I remember it was starting to snow heavily and we returned to the campsite. Try as we might, no one could find a portage out of the lake. In Bugs Bunny terms, we must have,” taken the wrong turn at Albuquerque” off an earlier lake and now had hit a dead end. We were nearing the end of our food and we decided that the next day we would turn around and follow our tracks back to Wallace Lake.
We had started a couple of days late so we finished a couple of days late and got back to the school about halfway through the first week of classes. A bit of frostbite here and a bit there.
The last day was cold and sunny and there was no wind. It was just so beautiful and the wilderness so pristine, that despite the rigors of the trip, and notwithstanding the many other memories I still have of the dog run, it is usually that final stretch down Obukowin Lake that I think of first when my mind goes back to those days in January 40 years ago.
December 28, 2016 at 10:15 am
I’m one of a small number of people who have done Christmas Runs at both schools. (Peter Jackson, Keith McKay, possibly Rod Voss and Frank Felitti)
In Manitoba, you use lakes when you can. Navigation is mostly trying to find the next portage trail.
These are hard to find in the summer. A foot of snow does not make them easier. Further, sometimes summer trails and winter trails aren’t the same. Winter travel over a bog or fen is easy.
Trails on the east shore of Lake Winnipeg various user groups:
* Near the trail head, or lake head (Wallace Lake) you will get weekend snowmobilers.
* In November you will get hunters, if the lakes are frozen hard enough.
* In mid-winter there may be some interest from fishermen who want to get one lake off the beaten track for ice fishing. I don’t think this one is very big. I don’t remember seeing ice huts on Siderock (next big lake after Wallace)
* Trappers. This group is, I think, responsible for any winter trails once you get more than a couple lakes away from the road.
They too want the easy route, but sometimes they are looking for a particular kind of cover — if they are looking for Martin, say, they may want heavy spruce near a muskrat swamp. (I’ve no ideas about the preferences of Martin) So a trapper may well have a spur trail off a lake, with each trail having a few sets.
We’ve spotted these sometimes — sledding along the shore, and a chunk of flagging tape, or a bottle hung from a tree on the shore.
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In Alberta the terrain was radically different. We sometimes could use the same trails in winter that were carved out by hunters and hikers in fall and summer. Horse trails were awful, if they were worn into the soil. Trenches just wide enough to jam a sled. The ones used by quads were great — easy to follow.
Made for a difference in operation. In Selkirk the trail breakers left as soon as they could, becuse the sleds would skim over the snow. Portages were hard, but short, and the sleds usually left to their own devices.
In Alberta, you needed the walkers more often near the sled. Trail breakers might lead off, but when they got to some obstacle that was going to give the sleds grief, they would drop one or two off to wait.
One time we came to a hill. Roughly equivalent to the hill behind the grade 8 dorm — about as steep as stairs but half again higher.
“They won’t get up this on their own.” So we broke the trail up, came back down, and worked 3 per sled getting them up the hill. After the first batch 2 guys started breaking trail again, while the rest moved sleds. I ended up climbing that hill 4 times I think.
Another time I was with Simon Jeynes. He had the trail breakers, I was with the sleds. We got into problems with slush. And he wasn’t around to help.
January 2, 2017 at 9:04 am
Fabulous! Nicely portrayed. Felt like I was almost along for the trip.
December 30, 2016 at 7:12 am
Richard! Thanks so much for the memories! I can remember Martin and the flaming sleeping bag as well. In those days we used the army surplus bags which weren’t the warmest. You have to admit- those breakfasts with lard, porridge and brown sugar were creative and rich in calories; not so great for the good cholestrol though.