The Paddlewheel Discovery was a fun trip and the 2 for 1 coupon in our Coupon Book made it more so. The regular fee for it is $59 each. The boat was certified for 900 passengers and had 4 viewing decks. There were only 370 on board with us. Almost as soon as we cast off we had a demonstration from a float plane. He took off and landed on each side of the boat so everyone had a great view. The pilot had a microphone and could communicate with the boat narrator, giving facts and answering questions from the boat. This was on the Chena River.
Following is a capsulized excerpt from our handout: The Binkley family’s tradition (the owner) goes back over 100 years and 5 generations to the Klondike Gold Rush. In 1898 when Charles M. Binkley hiked over the Chilkoot Pass with other stampeders, he was not so much in search of gold as he was the chance to chart and navigate the Yukon River and its tributaries. He became a respected pilot and boat-builder. His son followed in his father’s footsteps and piloted freight vessels on he Yukon and Tanana Rivers in the 1940s. The seasons were about 120 days from breakup until freeze-up and he could make about 10 trips (2000 miles each). Noting the coming changes in the freighting business, Captain Jim began a river excursion business in Fairbanks in 1950, purchasing a 25 passenger boat. In 1955 he build (in his backyard) the company’s first sternwheeler, the 150 passenger Discovery I. In 1971 the 300 passenger Discovery II was put into service and in 1986 Discovery III was build near Seattle, WA and shipped to Alaska in 1987. Jim’s wife Mary remains active in the business but the 3rd and 4th generation Binkleys are now at the helm.
Notice the photo of the guy who owns a riverside home with the dock for his Ski-Doo, airplane and boat.
As we progressed downstream we stopped for a visit at the Susan Butcher Kennel. You may know she was the famous winner of the Iditarod Dog Sled Race 4 times! Susan led the only climbing party to conquer the highest point on the North American continent by dog team when she mushed to the top of 20,320 ft Mt McKinley. She died of leukemia in 2006. Susan’s husband Dave was co-owner with Susan and now runs the kennel. He was a delightful presenter hooked up to a wireless mike, and told us lots of trivia, most of which I’ve forgotten by now. He has also written a book and was available at the Village to autograph copies for those interested. We saw the new puppies and they seem to be treated like any puppies, played with, petted, etc. As soon as they started back to the building with the puppies the dogs got very excited, barking and pulling on their leashes. It seemed to be a signal to them that it was now their turn and they were ready to go. In the summer they use an ATV which has the motor removed. The dogs are hitched to it and away they go. From the boat you could see them going out the drive and up the local road, occasionally disappearing for a short while and then reappearing, going like crazy. When they returned they came flying through the gate and we all thought for a while they were going right into the river.
We went to the mouth of the river where the Chena empties into the Tanana River. At that point you could see the silt bubbling through the water. We turned around and on the return trip we stopped at the Chena Village (an Athabascan Indian Village). The first demonstrator there was Dixie Alexander who cleaned and filleted a salmon in seconds. She showed a parka she had made. She has one on display at the Smithsonian; value is estimated at $16,000. The inner ruff of the parka is made of wolverine; the outer ruff is made of timber wolf. The main body of the parka is made of muskrat, a small animal with very warm fur, and is trimmed with calf skin and river otter. An average parka uses 45 – 50 muskrat hides. The beading consists of glass beads brought to the Native villages from the Western culture. Before contact with Western culture, Athabascans used shells and porcupine quills for decoration on their clothing. One of Dixie’s family trademarks is the sewing of dyed caribou hair onto moose hides. The parka is very warm and similar ones are used to help people survive the harshness of Alaskan winters.
In the Village they also had another sled dog visit where you could get up close and personal with the dogs. They had reindeer, cache storage buildings, cabins, hides from many different animals, the smoke house, garden, birch bark canoe, trapper’s cabin, etc.
After our visit at the village we got back aboard the sternwheeler and returned to our starting point, viewing some really beautiful homes along the Chena river. Many are small but many are very very large.
On board there was coffee, ice water, doughnuts compliments of the Captain. Beer/wine was also available. Late in the return trip all passengers were provided samples of smoked salmon on crackers. The salmon was mixed with cream cheese. Yum!
2 comments:
The Iditarod is terribly cruel to dogs. For the facts, please visit the Sled Dog Action Coalition website, http://www.helpsleddogs.org.
Several of Susan Butcher's dogs died in the Iditarod in her effort to gain fame and fortune. One of the dogs used by Butcher in the 1994 Iditarod died from exertional myopathy, otherwise known as "sudden death syndrome." Another dog used by her dropped dead in 1987 from internal hemorrhaging. Several were injured and killed by moose. People who love their dogs don't make them run in the Iditarod.
Here's a short list of what happens to the dogs during the race: death, paralysis, frostbite of the penis and scrotum, bleeding ulcers, bloody diarrhea, lung damage, pneumonia, ruptured discs, viral diseases, broken bones, torn muscles and tendons, vomiting, hypothermia, sprains, fur loss, broken teeth, torn footpads and anemia.
At least 136 dogs have died in the Iditarod. There is no official count of dog deaths available for the race's early years. In "WinterDance: the Fine Madness of Running the Iditarod," a nonfiction book, Gary Paulsen describes witnessing an Iditarod musher brutally kicking a dog to death during the race. He wrote, "All the time he was kicking the dog. Not with the imprecision of anger, the kicks, not kicks to match his rage but aimed, clinical vicious kicks. Kicks meant to hurt deeply, to cause serious injury. Kicks meant to kill."
Causes of death have also included strangulation in towlines, internal hemorrhaging after being gouged by a sled, liver injury, heart failure, and pneumonia. "Sudden death" and "external myopathy," a fatal condition in which a dog's muscles and organs deteriorate during extreme or prolonged exercise, have also occurred. The 1976 Iditarod winner, Jerry Riley, was accused of striking his dog with a snow hook (a large, sharp and heavy metal claw). In 1996, one of Rick Swenson's dogs died while he mushed his team through waist-deep water and ice. The Iditarod Trail Committee banned both mushers from the race but later reinstated them. In many states these incidents would be considered animal cruelty. Swenson is now on the Iditarod Board of Directors.
In the 2001 Iditarod, a sick dog was sent to a prison to be cared for by inmates and received no veterinary care. He was chained up in the cold and died. Another dog died by suffocating on his own vomit.
No one knows how many dogs die in training or after the race each year.
On average, 53 percent of the dogs who start the race do not make it across the finish line. According to a report published in the American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine, of those who do cross, 81 percent have lung damage. A report published in the Journal of Veterinary Internal Medicine said that 61 percent of the dogs who finish the Iditarod have ulcers versus zero percent pre-race.
Tom Classen, retired Air Force colonel and Alaskan resident for over 40 years, tells us that the dogs are beaten into submission:
"They've had the hell beaten out of them." "You don't just whisper into their ears, ‘OK, stand there until I tell you to run like the devil.' They understand one thing: a beating. These dogs are beaten into submission the same way elephants are trained for a circus. The mushers will deny it. And you know what? They are all lying." -USA Today, March 3, 2000 in Jon Saraceno's column
Beatings and whippings are common. Jim Welch says in his book Speed Mushing Manual, "I heard one highly respected [sled dog] driver once state that "‘Alaskans like the kind of dog they can beat on.'" "Nagging a dog team is cruel and ineffective...A training device such as a whip is not cruel at all but is effective." "It is a common training device in use among dog mushers...A whip is a very humane training tool."
During the 2007 Iditarod, eyewitnesses reported that musher Ramy Brooks kicked, punched and beat his dogs with a ski pole and a chain. Brooks admitted to hitting his dogs with a wooden trail marker when they refused to run. The Iditarod Trail Committee suspended Brooks for two years, but only for the actions he admitted. By ignoring eyewitness accounts, the Iditarod encouraged animal abuse. When mushers know that eyewitness accounts will be disregarded, they are more likely to hurt their dogs and lie about it later.
Mushers believe in "culling" or killing unwanted dogs, including puppies. Many dogs who are permanently disabled in the Iditarod, or who are unwanted for any reason, are killed with a shot to the head, dragged or clubbed to death. "On-going cruelty is the law of many dog lots. Dogs are clubbed with baseball bats and if they don't pull are dragged to death in harnesses....." wrote Alaskan Mike Cranford in an article for Alaska's Bush Blade Newspaper (March, 2000).
Jon Saraceno wrote in his March 3, 2000 column in USA Today, "He [Colonel Tom Classen] confirmed dog beatings and far worse. Like starving dogs to maintain their most advantageous racing weight. Skinning them to make mittens. Or dragging them to their death."
The Iditarod, with its history of abuse, could not be legally held in many states, because doing so would violate animal cruelty laws.
Iditarod administrators promote the race as a commemoration of sled dogs saving the children of Nome by bringing diphtheria serum from Anchorage in 1925. However, the co-founder of the Iditarod, Dorothy Page, said the race was not established to honor the sled drivers and dogs who carried the serum. In fact, 600 miles of this serum delivery was done by train and the other half was done by dogs running in relays, with no dog running over 100 miles. This isn't anything like the Iditarod.
The race has led to the proliferation of horrific dog kennels in which the dogs are treated very cruelly. Many kennels have over 100 dogs and some have as many as 200. It is standard for the dogs to spend their entire lives outside tethered to metal chains that can be as short as four feet long. In 1997 the United States Department of Agriculture determined that the tethering of dogs was inhumane and not in the animals' best interests. The chaining of dogs as a primary means of enclosure is prohibited in all cases where federal law applies. A dog who is permanently tethered is forced to urinate and defecate where he sleeps, which conflicts with his natural instinct to eliminate away from his living area.
Iditarod dogs are prisoners of abuse.
Sincerely,
Margery Glickman
Sled Dog Action Coalition, http://www.helpsleddogs.org
Thank you MS Glickman for your comments about the sled dogs. You have given some information to consider, and neither E nor I want any animal to be hurt intentionally. But all the while, it is evident that the dogs we saw love to be in harness tugging the sled anywhere. We have recently seen the US Ranger dog team in Delali. A long time tradition of patrol, impossible to be conducted by any other means and still comply with the park's intention to keep the wild, 'wild'. For certain, THOSE dogs are not mistreated, and in fact don't go out in weather below a certain degree (can't remember the exact temperature).
Thank you again for your comments.
Gary
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