Dog Sledding
It's word association time. Quick, what do the following phrases bring to mind: Alaskan husky? Mush?
If images of a body builder living in Anchorage and a bowl of hot cereal spring to mind, I suggest you stop reading now. But if snippets of Robert Service poetry or a passage from "White Fang" sprang to mind, you ought to know about Washakie Outfitting.
The ingredients that make up this family-owned business are simple: snow -- copious amounts of it for months at a time --and lots of wide-open country. But the finished product is extraordinary.
Based in northwest Wyoming, in the Jackson Hole/Grand Teton/Yellowstone region, Washakie Outfitting is the result of a labor of love. Owner/operator Jacki Snodgrass has a simple answer when asked why she's in the business.
"I was always fascinated by dog-sledding," Jacki tells a visitor. "And the first winter we moved here I realized it was a place where I can finally experience it."
The "here" Jacki refers to is her family's ranch a dozen miles outside Dubois, 90 miles northeast of Jackson Hole. Since the ranch is snowed in every year, sometimes for upwards of six months, calling it a place to "experience" dog-sledding borders on extreme understatement.
To tell the truth, dog-sledding is a fact of life for Jacki, her husband, Billy, and their children. According to Jacki, both her girls grew up with dogs and dog-sledding. In fact, she says, her second daughter was nearly born in a dog sled.
"Both girls are really into dog-sledding. They've known it their whole lives."
Compared to her daughters, Jacki came late to her vocation, but she says she always preferred dog-sledding to the more common snowmobile.
"I didn't personally like snowmobiles," Jacki explains. "I'm not mechanical, so I couldn't do anything about breakdowns, plus I'm a small person and it was hard for me to handle them."
When Jacki finally saw the chance to try dog-sledding she was so eager to get started that she ordered her first sled sight unseen and, when it arrived, hitched it to the only dogs she had at the time, a pair of Great Danes.
Robert Service and Jack London may have shuddered, but according to Jacki the Danes did fine.
"Any dog will pull," she explains. "It's just a matter of how you train them. For awhile, I'd put any dog in the harness if it would let me."
And for awhile, Jacki's dog-sledding was strictly utilitarian. She would mush the four miles of unplowed road from her ranch home, jump into her truck and head the remaining eight miles to Dubois as casually as most folks hop into the family sedan for a trip to the corner grocery.
In 1990, Jacki and her husband, Billy, discovered Alaskan Huskies, dogs bred for centuries specifically to pull sleds across snow and ice. That's when Billy fell in love with long-distance dog sled racing and Jacki decided to try to make a living as a dog musher.
Jacki and Billy have a strong case for calling Washakie Outfitting "Wyoming's premier sled dog touring company."
Washakie Outfitting employs nearly 100 dogs, as well as four full-time mushers. Tours range from a two-hour jaunt at the Snodgrass family ranch to full-day and overnight trips. You can even combine dog-sledding and snowmobiling into a single all-day outing.
The destinations are just as varied. Some trips strike out across the broad powder basins at the summit of Togwotee Pass. Others take you to the popular Brooks Lake Lodge, nestled at the base of the spectacular Pinnacle Buttes.
On many of these trips you may see other dog sleds. You'll almost certainly encounter snowmobilers. But if you select a trip departing from the Snodgrass ranch, you'll have the backcountry virtually to yourself.
"The trips we offer from our own ranch are the ones that really make our operation unique," Jacki says. "There's not much snowmobile traffic, it's beautiful country, and there are a lot more chances to see wildlife."
The only drawback to the ranch-based trips is the 90-mile drive from Jackson Hole, where Washakie Outfitting finds most of its customers.
But, as Jacki points out, the long drive from Jackson contributes significantly to the solitude her ranch-tour clients seem to appreciate.
Come for the dogs, remember the people. As alluring as a dog-sled adventure on a private Wyoming ranch may be, what makes these trips truly one-of-a-kind is the glimpse they afford into the life of a Wyoming family.
Jacki says she's proud that her guests can experience, "...our home, our way of life, the kind of people we are."
Although most of the people who take a trip with Washakie Outfitters come equipped with a justifiably romantic image of dog-sledding, Jacki says most of them "don't have the slightest idea what to expect," of the real thing.
"They don't know what kind of dogs will pull the sled, they don't know if they sit or stand, or if they have to drive their own sled," Jacki explains.
You'll have to take a trip with Washakie Outfitters if you want the answers to those questions, or to any of your own. Jacki isn't giving anything away in cyberspace.
She does promise one thing. "We don't let anyone go away disappointed."
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