The next morning I was up early (not as early as poor Josh), and headed to the checkpoint insearch of Hans Gatt to get that interview I really needed. There was a mid-race mushers meeting in the afternoon and attendance was manditory. I found Gatt before hand and got to talk to him. He gave me a great interview after having a real night's rest on a hotel bed. The meeting was pretty damn boring, but all the mushers were there. Us reporters were kind of salivating trying to plan our move once they were done. John Mitchell, the Canadian trail coordinator was just briefing them on the Canadian side of the trail, which they had hit officially awhile ago before Dawson.
Generally the U.S. trail is rougher, with former musher John Shandelmeier in charge and the Canadian side is a lot smoother. The Canadian Rangers usually take care of it, but this year just the head Ranger, Mitchell took charge. I had interview Mitchell before I left. He was a really nice guy. He gave me a ton of information and he has a slow voice that is great for note-taking.
So the meeting was let out early, the mushers retired and so did the reporters - to the bar. Josh and Sam had their laptops and were finishing stories, I was done but had nothing to do so was trying to get on the sketchy internet to no avail. Sam needed whatever signal he could get so I abliged and drank in silence.
And by silence, I mean every minute or so I'd ask Josh, "ARE YOU DONE YET?!", or I'd whimper, while keeping a sharp eye on the progress of his beer and ensuring to order him another if it got too low. Once in awhile I'd just straight-up poke him. It's a good thing Josh is an awesome writer, because that must have been one hell of a distraction.
Anyway. He finally got done, and by that time my poutine had arrived at the table. I had to get a poutine, because I had spent the last 8 days in the U.S. I needed to reclaim my Canadian heritage - in the form of fried smothered in gravy. We were sitting with a bunch of dog handlers and musher Peter Fleck's dad. When they say my poutine I was ridiculed to no end. Although Peter's dad asked me how I ate those and looked like I did. I was flattered. I let him think I live off of poutines, as all good Canadians do, right?
It was party time, and a bunch of the handlers had come ready to do the toe shot. A creepy old man that resembles a pirate brings out a wooden chest, and inside are certificates, funny hats which you must wear, and the shriveled green toe, bedded in a glass jar full of salt. You can pick whatever shot you want, but it has to be at least 40 per cent. I believe the traditional way to do it is with whiskey. The toe has to touch your lips.
The night progressed from a $70 bar tab at the Downtown Hotel (for just me), to Diamond Tooth Gertie's, the exravagant, gigantic and beautiful bar that Dawson is probably most famous for. All of the staff dress up as if it were still the gold rush, and the gambling hall sprawls over two storeys with a stage and dance floor big enough to welcome, well, I don't know...Metallica! Maybe not. But still, what I'm getting at is that it is HUGE. There was a cool band playing too.
Diamond Tooth Gertie's.The night ended with Josh and I hanging out and talking until he had to go do his radio interview at just after 6 a.m. I seriously think Josh is a robot or something, because he manages to function well on very little sleep.
Sylvie-Ann, Josh and Me at the Pit.I felt bad for him for a second and then ZZZZZZZZZZ. It was a Saturday, and my deadline wasn't until Monday at 1:30 p.m., so I had no reason to get up. I slept in until like 1.
I don't have much recollection of this day. I think I gathered a few interviews despite my deadline being two days away, and put them in the bank for Monday. Then that night I was still pretty hungover. The Olympic opening ceremonies were on, but Josh and Sam were busy working so I retired to my hotel room in my pjs, ready to hit the hay, while watching the ceremonies and Gordon Campbell drunkenly wagging his B.C. flag around.
Then as the ceremonies were coming to a close, I heard a knock on my hotel room door. I opened it to find Sylvie-Ann, and she easily convinced me that I should get drunk. So I hopped in the shower, flooded the floor to the bathroom again and made myself pretty. The two of us sat at the Downtown bar and drank on the comfy couches for awhile, until we ran into Sam and Josh at some point. I think Jason was staying in that night. The 36-hour layover was coming to an end and he had to drive the next morning. Better him than me though.
We went to the Pit, where Josh and I had an extremely ridiculous and wonderful journalism experience at the same time. In a dark corner sat Gerry Willomitzer and William Kledhein (excuse the spelling, I can't remember it exactly). Anyways, Kledhein is a mushing legend. I'm pretty sure he competed in the first ever Quest, and last year he returned for his last one before selling off all his dogs and officially retiring, but it seems you can take the dogs away from a musher, but never a musher away from the dogs....err....whatever. It makes sense. Gerry had lost his position in the race considerable since holding a strong second place into Circle. They were obviously talking strategy, and Josh and I just had to get in. We were drunk, and we imposed. They let us sit with them. They were also liquored and we had a long discussion with them about all thing Quest, that turned into us complaining about the media relations, and them telling us how they wish meida would be allowed to cover the Quest, and how much they appreciate what we already do.
Best $70 I've ever spent. Kind of.It was awesome. So again, the night ended with Josh and I hanging out and talking. This time we dipped our feet in the hot tub in the courtyard of our hotel. We immediately noticed a drunk guy passed out with a drink in hand, teetering in a lawnchair in the courtyard. Being kindred spirits, we both thought at the exact same time, "WE HAVE TO DRAW ON HIS FACE." So we discussed at length how we would do it. I left Josh in charge of the drunk guy, he was not supposed to wake him up, and I trotted off to get my precious Urban Decay teal blue eyeliner, because it was all I had.
The best piece of art ever.At $20 a stick, I am usually not willing to use it to draw on people's faces, but this was just too perfect of a situation. So I grabbed it and came back to the courtyard to find - Josh chatting it up with the drunk guy. YOU HAD ONE JOB JOSH!! So the night ended, and poor Josh once again headed off to his radio interview with like an hour of sleep at most. I wonder if the listeners of KUAC noticed. I bet they did.
Sam, Sylvie-Ann, Me and Josh at the Pit.More from Dawson later!
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