Gazing wistfully at Fairbanks

This winter has been an odd one in Mat-Su and across much of Alaska and the Lower 48.

The lack of snow has caused everything from slushy ski trails to a huge savings on snowplowing costs to protests from snowmachiners who were not allowed to ride in Hatcher Pass.

It’s kind of a mixed bag, though. We hate to keep our sleds in the garage and slushy roads are never fun, but far be it from us to turn up our noses at extra sunshine.

This weekend was a particularly wistful one for us as this was the culmination of one of the biggest fallouts of this warm winter: the Iditarod restart’s move from Willow to Fairbanks.

For the first time any of us can remember we had to leave Mat-Su to cover the start of this race, sending managing editor Heather Resz with her camera into downtown Anchorage for the ceremonial start.

And then, yesterday, we refreshed the Iditarod’s website more times than we care to mention hoping to get some sense that this race we’ve grown so accustomed to cheering live from the starting line had actually started.

Fairbanks never seemed so far away.

Sure, the Iditarod isn’t perfect. Even in our newsroom we have our gripes. Is it really necessary for us to send a staff member all the way to Anchorage to pick up media passes and sit through an annual orientation event when we have covered this event every year of its existence, and your headquarters is right here in Wasilla?

Then once we get that press pass where can we go? You might be surprised out how little access we have to cover the annual Willow restart: Once the race begins, our media credentials give us the same access to cover the race as every other race fan on the ice.

Parking at the airport across from the Willow Community Center can be kind of a hassle and is literally the only time we pay to park our car in Mat-Su each year. The crowds on the lake can be hard to push through, especially when you’re after photos.

But really, when we got home from the restart, a little rosy-cheeked and usually pretty exhausted, it was always a satisfying feeling. Good to see old friends and familiar faces from across the state. And to spend the afternoon as part of a premier international sporting event, rubbing elbows with the closest thing Alaska has to a celebrity class.

And that’s why watching that race start from Fairbanks, to us anyway, felt like our first Thanksgiving away from home. Sure, we can still celebrate and we tried to make do with what little we had, but it’s really not the same.

Warming temperatures and trail encroachments conspired years ago to move the restart out of Wasilla, following the snow up to Willow.

This move to Fairbanks has never been described as anything but temporary. We hope that the weather doesn’t conspire to force race officials to revisit the decision to make this Fairbanks restart a one-off.

Musher safety is paramount and if Willow is just too dangerous next year we’ll respect their decision.

But that doesn’t mean we’ll be happy about it. Just like we prefer spending holidays with family, we prefer covering the Iditarod at home in the Mat-Su Valley.