Word: alaskas
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...local birds, then graduates to more and more travel in search of new species. Next come vacations in the states with the most birds (California, Texas and Florida), followed by forays onto the big-time birding circuit: southeast Arizona for Mexican specialties, the Dry Tortugas for noddies and boobies, Alaska for arctic and Asian species. The final step is the long trip to see a single bird: Michigan for Kirtland's warbler, Calcasieu County in Louisiana for the black francolin, a grueling five-mile trek up the Chisos Mountains in Texas for the Colima warbler...
When the race started in 1977, celebrating the men and dogs who brought life-saving anti-toxin from Anchorage to dipheria-stricken Nome Alaska in 1925, the winner took 21 days to finish. "Everybody says, 'It will never be done in 10 days.' I have shaved off 31 hours [from the previous record]. I think I can shave off two more," Butcher says...
Butcher studied to be a veterinary technician in Denver, after which she moved to Alaska, homesteaded in the Wrangell Mountains, and started to raise and train sled dogs. She and her husband David L. Monson now own a kennel of 150 dogs in their Alaskan home. They live in a log cabin, 12 x 16 feet, without running water. Butcher melts ice in the winter, draws water from a nearby stream in the summer, and generates a limited supply of electricity. The closest neighbor is more than six miles away, mail is 25 miles away, and Fairbanks--the nearest town...
While Butcher says she recognizes about 1000 sled dogs across Alaska by sight, she confesses, "I don't remember anybody's names." It's like having acquaintances, she says. "Then I have best friends and I have my relatives...
While dog sleds are Butcher's sole from of transportation as she refuses to use snow machines "mass transport" in Alaska, she could not do without her dogs. "When your snow machine breaks down, you can't curl up with it," Butcher says...