Dogsledding in Jamaica

Dogsled print by Stunnerj

The Jamaican bobsledding group is most legendary. But we never approaching that a nation would have a dogsledding group too.

Im in Jamaica, my shirt glued to my back with sweat. The steam is like an unrelenting, wet down quilt warmed with a hair dryer. we cant splash H2O fast enough.

Then we find out that were going to be riding dogsleds as an afternoon activity.

It turns out that Jamaica not only has a dogsled team, yet that dogsledding is critical business too. When business owner Danny Melville was selling in Canada for a dune cart for his Jamaica-based adventure company, he happened upon a dogsled with steel wheels, built to allow teams to sight on dry ground. This discovery led to a mission that seemed all yet impossible: Create a successful dogsled group in a nation that gets no snow.

photo by JoAnna Haugen

Before long, Melville had recruited a musher as well as dog trainer, as well as he partnered with a local animal preserve to staff a group with dogs that would have differently been euthanized.

As things go in a place like Jamaica, Jimmy Buffett learned about a endeavor over drinks a single night. Soon after, Margaritaville came on house as a teams premiere sponsor.

Though many people know about Jamaicas national bobsled team, that made its entrance in a 1988 Winter Olympics (though it didnt qualify for either a 2006 or 2010 games), a countrys dogsled group has existed for years with little hoopla. Thats not to contend its just a flitting fad: a group completed a Yukon Quest in 2009. This year, Newton Marshall was a first Caribbean musher to finish a Iditarod, that he did with a Jamaican dogsled team. The group has competed in several alternative races this year as well, concealment two second as well! as two third place finishes.

Which brings me back to my sweaty t-shirt as well as dull H2O bottle. Im actually in Ocho Rios visiting a outdoor adventure association founded by Melville. The dog members of a dogsled group have been here, as well as visitors have a opportunity to association with them. Being a animal partner that we am (Im generally fond of preserve rescues), we not only pet a dogs, yet get a opportunity to strap them as well.

I fist in to a back of a sled. Im squished between another person as well as a steel bar, that binds me in to a car. The musher calls out a couple of commands, as well as a dogsled takes off down a grass. we shove opposite a sled as we strike across a belligerent at speeds impending 30 mph.

And then its over. Ive got a bruise a distance of a baseball on my hip from bumping up opposite a car during a ride, as well as my sweaty shirt is substantially rotting in my bag, still watchful to be unpacked.

So would we do it again? Yeah, mon!

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