We call them rock skis here! 😂Typically theyre just your oldest cruddiest pair, yes. These are ‘new’ rock skis (recently downgraded) because I got a nice new pair that replaces them for ITI 2026. So now I have both classic rock skis (my oldest pair) and backcountry rock skis (these)

These bad boys are waxless fishscale in the kick zone, which is the only reason I’ll attempt things like this. Just don’t ask to see the status of the tips and tails—nordic skis shouldn’t require epoxy filler to seal up gouges to their base 😂

Sunny Stroeer said the exact same thing 😂

Big-time Tongue 😂 (this pic is from the day we got Wolfy, just an hour or two before I picked her up at the airport cargo facility!)

😘

A little more footage and explanation: I have an old sled dog and a fake sled dog, so much of what we do is not typical mushing/skijor “best practice”. We’re just out to have fun together and enable the dogs to train with me for ITI (though they stay home for the actual race itself!)

It was not skiiable by any normal standards, but we made it work!

Sorry videos on this platform are approx. 12 pixels! 😂
A couple more from this morning here.

Thank you, AT, just for being. You’ve done more than you’ll ever know.

I apologize for the new post I just shared 😂😭

If the three of us never make it up Glastenbury together again…we’ll always have had this 🤍
#GlastenburyResidency25

Time keeps moving, dogs get old. Wolfy is slowing down and Wylie’s arthritis is both progressing and spreading. They love being out there so much, but it won’t be fair for me to ask too much of them, for too long.

It also means I’m running out of time to visit these special places with Wy&Wo. Glastenbury is one of my favorites. I call it ‘the Mountain that made me love Mountains.”

Short term, it means I am slowly running out of time to train for ITIAlaska. Thats both scary and exciting, but I know it’s not the real reason that I hung on.

The impetus of this whole project was to hike until there was enough snow to ski. I hung on for probably one weekend too long, not wanting to face the fact of transition to the next phase of training.

I already cried leaving camp LAST Sunday; I am going to be a mess this weekend!

Right this moment, warm at home, my nearly 11 y.o. girl is asleep with her head on my hip. I know that if I hike Glastenbury after this year, I am likely hiking solo.

Anticipatory nostalgia is a real bitch.
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#dogsthathike #GlastenburyResidency25

Wylie is super in-tune with me and my movements; I almost never catch him asleep because he wakes up to me tiptoeing down the corridor! About the second I snapped this, his eyes opened 😂