My Sister, Jan Steves, the Arctic Dog Musher: Living Her Dream

All her life, my little sister Jan has been into dogs, hiking, and skiing ‘ rather than (like her big brother) Botticelli, Berlin, and Belgian beers. Now, in her mid-fifties like me, she’s living her dream of being an arctic dog musher with an inspirational gusto that makes me feel like a couch potato.

With amazing personal (and financial) grit and determination, she’s one step away from actually racing in the Iditarod. For several years, she’s been wintering not (like so many Seattleites) in the sunny Southwest, but in Alaska…camping in a leaky trailer while training the dogs of a crusty, old, retired musher.

And as I write, she’s four days into a 20-day, 800-mile trip, retracing the historic “Serum Run” that brought diphtheria medicine to save a remote Eskimo community in 1925 and became the inspiration for the ultimate dog race, the Iditarod. In two weeks, God willing, she and the 10 other dog teams also doing the Serum Run should reach Nome.

At Jan’s website, you can follow her odyssey by clicking on “Jan Steves’ Blog.” Her recent adventures include how her team got away from her and she had to hire a helicopter to find them, how she nearly cut off her finger hacking through frozen meat to prepare food for her dogs, how she’s raising money by letting friends sponsor her lovable dogs, and what it’s like to be pulsing through the Alaskan wilderness at midnight under a full moon with icicles hanging from your eyebrows. I’ve never seen Jan happier. Here’s an email she sent me this morning:

Dear Rick,

I was chosen to be “Wild Bill Shannon” (who did the first leg of the original 1925 “Great Race of Mercy”), and I got to receive the serum from the train in Nenana and be the first musher on the trail and carry the serum from Nenana to Minto. That was exciting! It was quite the event, with spectators watching…and me hoping that I would go the right way! I led the 11 dog teams out onto the Tanana River and then onto the overland trail to Minto.

Arriving in the Indian village of Minto, we were greeted by its 250 residents…and shown great hospitality, as they had made fry bread and a big pot of moose stew for us. In the morning, they cooked us all breakfast of eggs, pancakes, and sausage.

Then we took off for Tolovana Road House. We had blizzard conditions both days, and the trails were often windblown and hard to find.

Arriving at Tolovana was awesome, and again, we were shown great hospitality. They had hot water ready for the dog teams. We set up our cots inside the Road House and slept well, got up and hit the trail to Manley with the crack of dawn.

Our journey to Manley was slow but we had beautiful weather. Below-zero temps but no winds or blizzards.

We are staying in the school house and have the use of their computers and showers!

Love you all!

“Wild Jan” and her dogs

P.S. The dogs are fabulous and doing great!!!!