It’s amazing the different 20 miles of driving can make. Yesterday tromp through the moraine involved rain and heavy, wet snow. Today, out the road pointed north, we skied on good smooth track. Off trail, 18 inches of snow covered the ground, forming the sides of a deep, but skiable ditch. I gripped my poles halfway down the shafts to avoid skiing with my hands high in the air. Aki dashed up and down the ditch, ears flying up and down to the rhythm of her bouncing gate. At trails end she rolled in a stain of deer’s blood on snow as she has in beaver scent, bear scat, and even dead salmon; her face a mask of ecstasy until someone shouted, “Aki EEUUU.” The little dog looked shocked, a gourmet of smells wrongly condemned by her pedestrian people.