David and one of the huskies

Imagine sitting on the comfortable seat of a fairy-tale Christmas sleigh. The nodding reindeer glide across the gentle hills, only the quiet swish of the parting snow disturbing the winter calm. A red-and-white fur coat keeps out the chill.

No. It’s not like that.

Imagine, instead, a top of the range Harley Davidson motorbike. Imagine also – I know that this is will be difficult – that this machine, for which you have paid thousands of pounds, has two major faults. The throttle is permanently stuck down; and the handlebars won’t turn. Oh, and there is no seat either.

When I arrive at the Plateau de Beille, south of Carcassonne in the French Pyrenees, it is surprisingly quiet: no wind, no cars, and almost no people. It is just a few degrees above zero. The road has been cleared since the last snowfall two weeks ago and the pine trees have lost their covering, but everywhere else is blindingly white.

David, one of the two mushers at the Base Angaka, opens the gate to the compound where the dogs are kept. They are individually attached to metal stakes by heavy chains, just long enough to allow them to rub noses and just short enough to prevent them from fighting. There are twenty-seven of them altogether; cross-bred huskies from Siberian and Greenland stock.

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