First their tracks disappeared then the whole trail was gone. Now I was skiing by feel. The light was so flat I couldn't focus my eyes on the snow, not even looking straight down at my feet -- you don't usually get vertigo on a flat river. Later that day I heard the sound of snow machines. Snow machines meant trail so I was very excited. I turned around and saw them stop a few hundred yards behind me. They just sat there, so I went back to talk to them.

I said, 'It's nice to see you. I am tired of breaking trail and navigating." They replied, " We have been following your tracks for hours and hoping you would show us the way."

I showed them on a map where we were and where we were going. I wanted to get to the next cabin and try to wait out the storm. They took off, took the wrong route and missed the cabin I was looking for -- the Bible Camp. I think they were hesitant to go to the other side of the Yukon as it is half a mile wide in some sections and crossing it can be sketchy. There are ice chunks that are several feet high and there can be open water.

	"There is such a great feeling to have total confidence in your gear. When you are in the middle of nowhere it is all you have."

I made it to a different cabin along the trail and pulled the plywood off the door. Inside, it wasn't exactly a deluxe hunting lodge. The stovepipe was full of ice and there was no way to get on the roof to clear it. I wouldn't have any heat. There was a cot that had a couple of sleeping bags. I opened one bag and out came a mountain of mouse poop, and the bag was soaked with mouse pee. Fortunately I didn't need a sleeping bag that badly. I pulled out my down pants and Das jacket, lit my stove and started melting snow. There wasn't a single piece of food in the one room shack. I realized that with the weather conditions, this was going to take far longer than anyone had planned and that I had better start rationing my food. I had a pack of Ramen with a piece of cheese and a stick of butter for dinner.

I slept in my Patagonia jacket and was toasty warm all night long at a warm-for-Alaska 18 degrees. There is such a great feeling to have total confidence in your gear. When you are in the middle of nowhere it is all you have.

Just before dawn the weather looked much better so I packed up and hit the river. I broke trail for hours on the north side before crossing and seeing if the south side was any easier. I found a remnant of a trail that came and went for the rest of the morning. Then it started snowing and blowing again. It was a complete whiteout and the trail was gone. I navigated by map and tried to avoid the back sloughs that normally had open water. I decided to try and find the trappers' cabin 50 miles down stream from the first cabin. I pulled out my GPS to get a distance reading. It told me the cabin was 40 miles to the East--the direction that I had just came from. I figured out that the person who made the maps used the same GPS coordinates for two different cabins. This next cabin was also the hardest to find and I was told before the event, "You'll never find it without the GPS."

I had a map and compass so I thought I'd find it the old fashion way. I skied all day and by late afternoon broke trail across the river and started looking. I had to cross two sections of very thin ice and got to the point on the map where the cabin was supposed to be. Nothing there. I went up and down the bank, hiking through waist deep snow. Finally I thought I caught a glimpse of a roofline. During the whole race I kept thinking that I was seeing man-made structures along the trail only to have it be a tree or rock. This area was so desolate and I am not used to going days without seeing anything made by humans. Combined with fatigue, this created illusions. But this time it was real - it was the cabin deep in the woods.