(Wheel Dogs Spud and Scout pulling from the rear)
For sure one of the coolest experiences, and I highly recommend doing this! At 8:30am on the 13th my boyfriend Kyle and I headed from Vancouver, BC up to the Sun Peaks resort just north of Kamloops, BC to attend our 2:00pm appointment with the Mountain Man Adventure doggos. In case you don't know where Kamloops is exactly I'll explain a little. It's about four and a half hours (give or take with traffic and road conditions) north east from Vancouver up part of the most dangerous highway in BC, the BC- 5 North. Luckily for us though we only hit one patch of ice and the roads were fairly clear on the way up and back the next day.
Along the way the road speedily winded up, down and around through the snow covered mountains and untouched fields. I felt like a dog myself with my nose pressed against the passenger side window looking in awe for any signs of wildlife and at practically every single ice sickle we passed by.
On arrival to the Sun Peaks Resort there was at least four feet of snow on the side of the road, so naturally we were rather excited and acting like giddy children on a snow day. Kyle and I then headed to the Information Office to make sure we were in the right place/ ask for directions to get to the dog sledding tours. We then headed over to a smaller office up the village where the owner of the business, Chris, would pick us up and take us over to the dogs after we signed a waiver. Chris was very kind to us and explained to us about how many dogs they had, what all we'd be doing that day, how they train them, what makes a good sled dog, how he founded the business and any other questions we had for him.
(Owner Chris and our guide Jessica hooking the dogs into their position. Closest to me is Chris untangling the left Wheel dog Spud while Jessica is getting Norman into right Team.)
We were able to meet all of the dogs that'd be pulling us when we arrived, learn their names and a little about each of them. Spy and Aero were our Lead dogs, Dusty and Sonic the Point dogs, Helen and Norman were the Team dogs, and last but not least Spud and Scout pulling at the rear as the Wheel dogs. Chris explained to us how when he originally started the job he thought he'd be worked with Siberian huskies, but found out they'd be Alaskan huskies. Alaskan huskies are an unofficial dog breed that can be mixed with greyhounds and various other northern breeds that are built for running and pulling. In my opinion many of the dogs resembled longer furred coyotes.
(Taking a break to enjoy the frozen scenery and let the dogs catch their breath.)
The dogs were very well behaved while we greeted them, some were much too shy at first so we didn't bother them but many of them were over excited to meet the two of us. Before they were latched to the sled not a single dog out of the team barked and I was very impressed with how well trained they were. But as soon as one of them started getting hooked to the sled thats when every dog in the vicinity started barking away and getting excited. Jessica and Chris explained to us that they never train the dogs to heel, its always pull, pull, pull all the time. They stressed how important this was, because when mushing you don't want any of the dogs to go against the flow or try to come back to you when they're hooked in. Chris told us they only train the dogs to not bark and to be quiet when meeting the guests, but they want them to get overly excited and eager when they're being strapped in to encourage pulling.
As the dogs were being strapped in Kyle and I too were getting into the sled. They had him behind with me sitting in front between his legs. Thank goodness we sat this way because it was sooooo cold out that day, and us being ourselves had forgotten our gloves at home in Victoria. We waited for the full team to be assembled and giggled and how ecstatic the dogs appeared to be about going on the trail. The most eager of them all was hands down Helen, she kept pulling and trying to run even while we were dead stopped, and when she wasn't doing that she was barking her cute little head off or rolling around in the snow. It was so nice to see how happy the dogs were to go out for a ride. In fact they might have been more excited that we were!
(Somewhere along the 10k loop with the dogs hard at work)
When Jessica finally lifted the break we jolted forward and the dogs were off and kicking little bits of snow in our rosey faces. The best way to explain this experience is to imagine you're on a roller coaster thats dog powered and is on an icy trail instead of tracks. It was so much fun! The dogs happily ran along the 10k loop with breaks here and there, usually before a larger uphill just to make sure they never were too exhausted. At about halfway Jessica took Sonic off and let him run beside us for the remainder of the trail. With the snow so compact she said there was no need for an eighth dog, it would make the run much too fast. Then shortly after we were given the choice of steering the team ourselves. I politely declined because my hands were much too cold to stay out in the open air for more than a short amount of time. Kyle on the other hand decided to make the most out of his Christmas gift (I know right, I'm a pretty cool gf lol) and took her up on the offer. He steered the team for a solid ten minutes around the winding path through the snow covered woods, I honestly don't know how his hands didn't fall off afterwards with how cold it had been. Then Jessica took back control and lead us back to the rest of the dogs.
After getting out of the sled we petted on all the dogs and told them good job and gave them all sorts of lovies. We then gave them each a frozen raw chicken thigh as a treat before they were fed their meals. While the dogs ate Chris told us what all was in their food and explained that they had to regulate how much food the dogs ate based on the amount of sled pulling and exercise they were getting. Chris mentioned how they needed to stay lean but be very fit, so the fact that a few ribs were showing is a good thing and means the dogs are healthy.
(Kyle tossing Spud a frozen piece of chicken soon after finishing the run.)
Then we got to play with puppies! They had three younger dogs who weren't old enough to be pulling in an outdoor kennel that we were allowed to go in and get licked on by them. After asking Chris more questions and getting many puppy kisses, he then drove us back down to the Information Office near were we had parked. We said our thank yous and our goodbyes then headed back to Kamloops to stay the night.
(The dogs pulling us around one of the bends in the trail.)
I highly recommend the Mountain Man Dog Sledding Adventure tours, they treated us and even more importantly their dogs so very well. It was such a fun and unique experience that I think everyone who can should try.
here is a link to a short video I made of our experience on the Into the Wild tour! Hope you enjoyed!!
Feel free to ask any questions and I'll answer them to the best of my abilities! :)