Old Crow 'rolling out the red carpet' for ice cream man on a dog sled
Yukon musher Brian Wilmshurst will deliver a load of sweet treats to Old Crow this week
Call him the ice cream musher.
Brian Wilmshurst, who operates the Klondyke Cream & Candy shop in Dawson City, Yukon, is setting off this week to deliver some of his sweet treats north of the Arctic Circle — to the small fly-in community of Old Crow.
And he's making the long distance trip by dog sled.
"I have a bunch of extra ice cream on hand, so what better place to get rid of it [than] up in Old Crow? Kids up there don't get the amenities like we do down south here," Wilmshurst said.
Wilmshurst is an experienced musher, who's competed in both the Yukon Quest and the Iditarod. He didn't race this year, though, so he was looking for an excuse to get out with his dogs.
"It's always been a dream of mine to go see Old Crow. I haven't been up there before, so maybe I'll do it in style, on the back of a dog sled," he said.
"There's so much beautiful land out here in the Yukon. I try to see as much of it as I can."
Wilmshurst plans to start at Eagle Plains on the Dempster Highway, which is roughly 200 kilometres from Old Crow.
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'Follow the frozen water'
Wilmshurst has phoned around, asking people for tips to plan his route, but figures he'll mostly just "follow the frozen water."
"I guess they have GPS and all that these days, but I'm not the greatest with electronics. So I think we'll just try to figure it out."
Wilmshurst won't be travelling alone, either — other mushing friends will join him, and he said the group keeps getting bigger and bigger.
"You get a bunch of dog mushers together, it could get a little competitive," he joked.
Up in Old Crow, people are already offering them places to sleep and keep their dogs. They're "rolling out the red carpet for us," he said.
His goal is to leave Eagle Plains on Wednesday and arrive in Old Crow for Easter — with a load of frozen confections, still frozen.
"I'm hoping that the weather stays cool, so that it makes it. I am a little worried about it warming up a little too quickly."
With files from Max Leighton