Gone To The Dogs

Still going North, we arrived in Tromsø, where having spent the day back on the cruise of 2013, we'd booked ourselves onto a husky dog sledding excursion.  We arrived after lunch, and once docked it was a short coach ride out to the Villmarkssenter for our afternoon activities.


There were talks, tea and cake by a log fire, and of course we got to meet the dogs (and puppies).





These were Alaskan huskies (not a pure breed like the Siberian husky, but a blend of various breeds, chosen for their strengths as working sled dogs).





Housed in rows of small double kennels (to which they were loosely chained to prevent them fighting for 'top dog' position!), with the puppies in a segregated area with their mums.


 They were obviously also hugely excited at the prospect of getting out for a run, lots of howling and barking as other sleds set off into the snow, or returned from their trips:

And then it was our turn.

We were settled onto the wooden sled, Martin at the back, and joined a queue of other sleds ready for departure - which proved to be a bit chaotic, as the over-excited dogs all got tangled up in each other.

Eventually though we were off . . .


We were out for about half an hour in the end, bumping over the snow, around a lake, surrounded by mountains, and passing grazing reindeer.

Our 'musher' Hanna, told us some more about the dogs and the job as we went along - for example, they always put the girls in the lead positions, as they are more intelligent and take instruction better.  The 'boys' evidently get easily distracted - as we witnessed when one of them directly in front of us, stopped pulling, to keep looking round at the lead 'ladies' pulling the sled behind us!

All in all, a great experience . . .