Day 6. Monday. I Ate It … But Survived.
This was supposed to be a hard riding day, with a little fishing mixed in. The boys had warned me to strap my helmet on tight.

We enjoyed a breakfast of sourdough pancakes at Sheep Mountain Lodge, then were entertained by the sight of lodge ownder Zach Steer training his sled dogs … how? Zach (who runs the Iditarod) hitched his team to a quad, put it in neutral, and had the dogs tow him up the trail. It dawned on me then that certain things have played a central role in opening the Alaskan frontier – first the dogsled, later the bush plane. Maybe it is not much of a stretch to imagine that the quad could play a similar role. After all, I was experiencing wild adventures the likes of which I hadn't imagined a scant few days earlier.

When we hit the trail, I realized this would be a hard-core ride – maybe not by Doogie's standards, but certainly by mine. It's important to note that we made a point to ride responsibly, on established trails, rather than plowing over the tundra. Our rides focused on hunting and mining trails.