are these men running naked down the frozen streets of Anchorage? Well, it must be Fur Rondy time!
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| Saturday, March 5, 2011 4 PM about 22 degrees out |
So, just what the heck is a Fur Rondy? That is the question that I was asking myself when I first heard about "Rondy" shortly after I started working in December. A quick search of the internet brought me to the official Fur Rondy site. For those of you with limited time, or dial-up, I'll give you a little background.
So this week's history lesson - the development of the Fur Rondy, short for Fur Rondezvous. Back in the 1930's only about 3,000 people lived in Anchorage (there are now about 270,000 people). The town needed something to help survive the brutal winters and the isolation. There was a gentleman by the name of Vern Johnson (a distant relative, perhaps?) who organized a festival in the middle of February to coincide with the time when the trappers came into town loaded with furs from their winter trapping. The original Rondy had such events such as skiing, basketball (a surprising favorite sport here in Alaska), children's sled dog race and other activities. There was also a parade and huge bonfire. The Rondy has grown from that time, but from what I can see, many of the events are the same. There is still sled dog racing and a parade, and even a fur auction. Other events include a charity ball (nope, didn't go to this one), arts and crafts shows, train shows, snow sculpture, ice sculpture, hockey, snowball fights, footraces, the official start of the Iditarod, and one very special event which is a huge draw to this weeklong outdoor festival: the Running of the Reindeer.
Everytime I heard about the Running of the Reindeer, it just made me chuckle. Something about it just appealed to me, and I really wanted to view it. Initially, I was to go see the Running of the Reindeer with some co-workers, but when they backed out my husband and son stepped up and took me to Rondy. For Alaska standards, it wasn't a bad day. It was overcast and in the mid-20's with no wind. However, even the mid-20's gets to be very chilly after a while.
The first thing we went to see was the snow sculptures. The competition was actually last weekend - and some of the sculptures had deteriorated over the week, but that didn't lessen my enjoyment. Just to be outside and doing something after being inside all these weeks felt so good. It gives me just a glimmer of understanding of how the Rondy came to be - but back to the snow sculptures
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| Jake, Shrek, and me |
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| crowning of the snow queen? |
As you can see, these are some big sculptures. And if you look at the people wandering around you can see how they are bundled up.
There were a few vendors. Here is a sign for one. He had a line at his table and the smell was tantalizing.
I haven't tasted one - yet...
Then we wandered over to the Ulu factory
If you've been to Alaska before, you know the Ulu is a special type of knife. And for those of you who plan to visit, we will go and visit the factory.
Our next stop was up the hill to the downtown streets of Anchorage. Many of the streets were blocked off for some events. There was also a carnival, complete with rides, for those really hearty souls.
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| Looking up at downtown Anchorage from the Ulu factory
Here are some pictures from the antique snowmachine parade held right in downtown Anchorage
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| I'm not really trying to take a picture of the portapotty. Look at the coat on the guy to the left of the portapotty. He is wearing the complete pelt of some type of animal. |
The next event that I really wanted to see was the dogsleds. Races had been held the previous week, but a few blocks away they were offering dogsled rides. So the guys and I hiked several blocks and found a crowd of people watching two sleds go around in a circle, giving the rider a ride that probably lasted about two minutes. 
There were two dogsleds, one was a team of 8 and the other a team of 6. The smaller team was taking kids or small adults and the team of 8 was taking double or regular adult size adults. After just a little encouraging, I bought a ticket to go on the dogsled. The guys both declined. So we stood in line and waited. And we waited. Then we waited a little bit more. It was cold and standing still was making it colder. After waiting more than 30 minutes we walked away from the dogsled rides. It looked like fun, but the time for the Running of the Reindeer was fast approaching. So, we chalked up the cost of the ticket as a donation to the kennel and walked back to downtown. Here is a video of someone getting a ride. These dogs are quick! and smaller than I expected. The dogs used for races like the Iditarod are bigger - or so I am told.
We made a pit stop at JC Pennys, and even though there was 20 minutes before the racing started, the street were brimming with people and they were standing 3-4 deep from the barricade. We wound standing by the finish line. Basically, about 3-4 blocks are barricaded off and there is a pen at each end. The reindeer are let loose at one end and run down the street with the runners. The runners stop, but the reindeer run into the barricade. Then the reindeer are led back down the street to the starting line so they can run again. There are 4 heats, but we only watched two of them. The first one was a bunch of servicemen.
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| Pre-race Reindeer Reindeer are surprisingly short |
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| Run Run Rudolph! and GI Joe! |
The soldiers were laughing so hard by the time they reached the finish line that they could barely run. The reindeer really passed the majority of them. Those little guys are fast!
Then it was time to hurry up and wait for the next heat. The other divisions were men; women; and co-ed. And for some reason, people dress up to do this. Lots of costumes out there. Or, as you can tell from the picture at the top of the post, very little costume. Again, most people don't really run with the reindeer. There were maybe 15 reindeer and lots of people. Each person pays a $25 entry fee and the money goes to different nonprofit agencies around the city. So, it's fun and for a good cause. Here are a few other pictures from the 2011 Running of the Reindeer!
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| check out the bear over the front door of the hotel |
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| see the furs hanging on a line over the reindeer? I don't know if these were coats or what. There is LOTS of fur around here. I don't think there is a PETA chapter in Alaska. |
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This Cook Inlet. I think. |
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These guys are going home too. |
There were a few other things that went on this week too. Steve and I took a walk one night after work. It was 7:30 and still rather light out. It was so nice to be out and it wasn't freezing and you could see where you were going, but it was so icy that it was treacherous. Our streets are still glazed with an inch or two of ice. Even the dogs were ice skating down the road. The other night Steve came home with those grippers you put on your shoes. They are like studded snowtires and they work great. I took the dogs out today and didn't slip once. It is much more enjoyable to go for a walk when you don't have to worry about landing on your keister with every step.
I also have a lesson in Alaskan economics. I met with a native woman this week who lives 225 miles out of Bethel. Bethel is about 400 miles northwest of Anchorage, and like most places in Alaska you can't get there from here by car. You have to fly. To continue on to this woman's village, you then fly another 225 miles. She told me that in her village a loaf of bread costs $7.99. To offset that cost, she makes her own bread. And to offset the cost of the gas, she has a woodstove that she uses. However, wood is not always readily available so sometimes they have to travel 25-35 minutes (maybe it was miles) on snowmachine to go get wood to cut. Sounds like a third world country doesn't it?
In sporting news - dogsled races are HUGE up here. The Iditarod started today. Or yesterday. Well, both days. Saturday is the official start day with ceremonies held in Anchorage. But Sunday is called the restart. It is the day the racers leave Big Lake (a town about 2 hours out of Anchorage) and actually hit the trail. It is televised on our local cable TV, and the local station has regular updates. I think I heard that the mushers are wearing GPS trackers so you can actually follow them on the internet on the Iditarod website. But when you think about it, it is really pretty amazing what these guys do. It's about 1,200 miles of rough and tough country, up and over mountains, ice and wind, just a musher (there are lots of women mushers too) and the dogs. Pretty gutsy.
So, I think that pretty much covers this past week. We are up to about 11 hours of daylight, although until today the temperatures have not been out of the 20's. I see in NYC and WI you are at 11.5 hrs of daylight, but we are still gaining daylight at a rate that doubles yours.
Until next week!
