Regular sled dog commenter Juanita has been occupied with something else during the Quest: Puppies and More Puppies [Youtube video links].

Kryten came through the storms in Victoria a little worse for wear, and will have to move again as a result of damage to the house he was moving into, so he is still without a regular ‘Net connection, and will likely be using the $5/hour kiosk time for work rather than commentary.

Victoria remains soggy, and the rains continue, but not as bad. Some areas received their annual rainfalls in two days. The vineyards have gone from problems with drought conditions to floods in one season.

The news is much better for Rook, who has managed to find a full-time position in his field, rather than working multiple part-time jobs. It’s nice to know someone can find work in this economy.

Hugh Neff isn’t quite as far ahead as he was yesterday, but his lead is very comfortable.

The weather is a bit better today, but a lot of the trail is drifted over which has led to some cooperative efforts among the teams. The half dozen teams immediately following Hugh are taking turns breaking trail and are clumped together. The same situation applies to the last five teams, who left Dawson last night as a group. Clint Warnke (25) isn’t among them. He decided to scratch at Dawson.

You have to be confident before hitting the stretch between Dawson and Circle, because there are no roads up there. Your choices are sleds or aircraft and communications are limited. Reporting from Eagle was via a packet network on HF ham radio, as even satellite phones are spotty around the Arctic Circle.

Update at 9PM CST

Beyond Slaven’s Roadhouse

1 Hugh Neff (8)

At Slaven’s Roadhouse

2 Hans Gatt (13)
3 Sebastian Schnuelle (11)

Beyond Eagle

4 Ken Anderson (18)
5 Brent Sass (22)
6 Dallas Seavey (3)^I
7 Allen Moore (24)^I
8 Dan Kaduce (10)
9 Kelley Griffin (1)
10 Joshua Cadzow (16)

At Eagle

11 Jodi Bailey (17)^R
12 David Dalton (23)
13 Mike Ellis (5)

Beyond Dawson

14 Johannes Rygh (6)^R
15 Tamara Rose (12)^I
16 Jerry Joinson (21)^R
17 Didier Moggia (7)
18 Kyla Durham (14)^R
19 Hank DeBruin (19)^I

The Mushers in bold are former winners of the Yukon Quest, the numbers in parentheses are their Bib numbers, the small “I” indicates a Quest rookie who has competed in the Iditarod, and the small “R” indicates a total rookie.

Note: This post will be updated during the day, and the map changed on all posts to reflect the current situation.

All posts on the Yukon Quest can be seen by selecting “Yukon Quest” from the Category box on the right sidebar.