Women in the wild: 35th annual event lights up Talkeetna this weekend

TALKEETNA —Many an Alaskan guide has quipped, “What does an Alaskan man want?” followed by the punchline, “...a woman and truck that both work.”

In the spirit of The Last Frontier, downtown Talkeetna will be filled with participants and spectators this weekend for the 35th annual Talkeetna Wilderness Woman Contest and Bachelor Auction this weekend.

Events

This year’s two-day event ties in to Talkeetna’s 100th birthday with the theme “The Night of the Century...Celebrating Talkeetna’s Heritage”. Things kick off this evening at 6 p.m. with the Festival of Lights parade sponsored by the Talkeetna Chamber of Commerce. The parade begins at Swiss Alaska Inn winding through the east end of town, downtown and ending at the village park on Main Street.

The bachelor float will end at VFW Post 3836 on Veterans Way. Immediately afterward, the bachelors will host a “meet and greet”, sign Male Order Catalogs and participate in The Mating Game.

Registration for the Wilderness Woman Contest begins Saturday at 10 a.m. at Fairview Inn. At 11:30 a.m., the bachelors will welcome the train at the Village Depot behind Fairview Inn ever hopeful that a lot of single women disembark.

Wilderness Women competition begins at high noon on Main Street. Doors open at the Denali Arts Council’s Sheldon Arts Hangar at 6 p.m. for the bachelor auction. Tickets must be purchased online and the ladies-only event is open to those 21 and over. At 7 p.m., the Wilderness Woman Contest winner and runners-up will be announced with the bachelor auction to follow. Following the auction and Bachelor Ball, live music continues throughout the night at Fairview Inn with an overflow party at the Tee Pee. The Talkeetna Roadhouse opens at midnight for breakfast.

Talkeetna Taxi’s Sober Rides will avail itself from 9 p.m. Friday through 5 a.m. Saturday. The Society is sponsoring the rides to insure safe arrival to local destinations. Event organizers note many people catch a lift to the Talkeetna Roadhouse for breakfast and the many stories that are sure to result from the event.

The contest

The contest pits women against each other in a series of three events. The first is a qualifier in which three or four women at a time run 100 yards with empty buckets to a ‘creek’, and return the same distance with full buckets. The fastest five times advance and time is added for any spilled water along the way.

In the second round, women are asked to prepare a sandwich and open a beer for a lounging bachelor, and then head out into the ‘woods’. Participants don snowshoes, and move from field to stream while shooting a latex ‘ptarmigan’, sawing a small piece off of a birch round, snagging a salmon, and evading a lonely ‘moose’.

The final round measures the finalists’ snow machine skills. Each woman must fill a sled with split wood, then tow it by snow machine to a waiting bonfire. There they will feed the fire while bachelors sit around telling lousy stories. All three rounds are timed. After penalty times, if any, are added, the three times are combined, and the woman with the fastest cumulated time wins. Organizers note there are some great prizes for the top three finishers, but most women do it for the love of the game.

Past prizes have run the gamut from gold nuggets to free trips to Hawaii and London. Second and third-place finishers take home an assortment of hardware ranging from handmade fur hats and bear claw necklaces to free lodging, meals and activities provided by businesses in Talkeetna.

The Society

The Talkeetna Bachelor Society hosts the event with a mission of raising funds primarily earmarked for women and children in crisis. However, it has funded a wide range of public projects. The group is comprised of single men with an ambition of creating the best possible living conditions and opportunities with a focus on bringing awareness of, preventing and assisting individuals affected by domestic violence.

The Society was created in 1981 and hosted its first auction that year at the Fairview Inn. In 1986, Pam Rannals created the Wilderness Woman Contest with a goal of giving women an opportunity to show off their uniquely Alaskan skill sets. Several years after its inception, donations to the Valley Women’s Resource Center became part of the tradition. The Society has also made donations to local non-profits and organizations that addressed community needs.

Last year’s event allowed the Society to donate $22,000 to various organizations. Filled requests ran the gamut from healthy snacks, student and senior meals programs; school art programs, to scholarships, helping purchase sports uniforms for various youth groups, to filling local food pantries.

In 2015, the Society donated half of the proceeds to a fund with the Alaska Community Foundation and the Jessica Stevens Foundation. In doing so, it helped directly fund the Sunshine Community Health Center’s efforts to support women and children that have been victimized by domestic violence and/or sexual assault.

Organizers of the weekend’s fun note that none of it would be possible without the enormous volunteer efforts of many people. They also encourage those unable to make the trek to the north side of the Mat-Su to make a financial donation to the cause. Checks may be sent to: Talkeetna Bachelor Society, P.O. Box 1063, Talkeetna, AK, 99676.

For more information on the Society, its benefactors, or the upcoming weekend, visit www.talkeetnabachelors.com.