Musk Ox and NASCAR?

Our first full day in Alaska had a little bit of a late start. Here’s L.J. to tell you more about it.

So our stop at the Noisy Goose was short-lived, it was very crowded and we decided not to even find out what the wait time was because we had things to do, musk ox to visit and racing to see! So we headed on to the Musk Ox Farm in Palmer, this is only about 25 minutes from our VRBO to the farm. They have walking tours every half an hour and while we made it in time for the 1:30 PM tour, we decided to wait for the 2:00 PM so we could look around the museum and LJ could get his cameras ready.

Felix was our tour gride and grew up about two miles away from the Musk Ox farm. His twin sister also works there! His love for the animals shines through and we had nine people in our tour group. Two were younger boys who had lots of great questions that he handled in stride. There was a couple from New Jersey, a lady from near Orlando, Florida, the family of four that were from Anchorage and then L.J. and I so the east coast of the US was well represented!

They have around 80 musk ox on the farm and their mission is to promote gentle musk ox husbandry, qiviut production and education to the public. They have some great videos about their entire farm and about the combing of the qiviut if you’re interested in learning more about it.

We also each were able to hold a musk ox skull, which weighed about 20 pounds

Near the end of the tour, we circled back around the field holding the moms and babies. They have about another week or so together before they’ll be separated into two fields, still beside each other but nursing will be over.

Now on to racin’

Alaska Raceway Park is celebrating its tenth season as an 1/3 mile oval track, they’ve had their Drag Strip for 60 years and are steeped in history. I first met the Track Manager, AKA “Lady Boss” Michelle at a Track Operators event in Daytona several years ago, just a quick encounter and an excitement on my side to see Alaska + NASCAR intersect.

I was excited to find that their final NASCAR events for the season would be today while we were in the area and we made plans to attend.

We arrived as they were finishing practice to find a great facility with several food trucks and offerings as well as souvenirs and fans that were excited to be there.

A few photos of the track and one of the Technical Inspectors I met, Jack. Our 5.11 uniforms are a consistent design from the NASCAR Local Racing Series tracks like Alaska Raceway Park, to our NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour and NASCAR Canada Series to our three NASCAR National Series. Very cool to see how that all ties together. Our NASCAR Local Racing Series group is supported by a great team in Daytona, Kevin, Brett, Jen and Emma (some of my favorite peeps!)

We had some weather come through during qualifying so everyone sprung into action. There was a quick call out over the loudspeaker to the pit area to anyone with any type of vehicle, personal or otherwise, to please come out on the track to help assist with track drying. Immediately over 30 vehicles, including a convertible and a motorcycle (not in this clip) were on track helping with track drying. It was an absolutely incredible thing to see the teamwork and the way the whole racing community came together so they didn’t lose the track to weather!

A quick video showing the green flag action later in the evening, as well as the breathtaking beauty around the track. If you live near a track, no matter what type of racing and you’ve never been, give it a try! We enjoyed the evening so very much!

We left the track and decided to grab something to eat, we ended up choosing the Palmer Ale House which was packed! After a short wait, we got a table and met Hayden our server who had lived in New Bern, North Carolina for a bit of time which was a nice connection to home. L.J. got pizza, I got calzone and both were delicious!