During their childhood in Washington, cross country skiing was an important part of Arleigh Hitchcock’s connection to the outdoors. Their mother and grandfather taught them to ski when they were just a toddler, and they fondly remember nordic skiing near their grandparents’ home near Donner Pass, California. That experience prompted Hitchcock’s first foray into activism at a young age. The nearby Lake Van Norten wetland was slated for development, but it was a beloved landscape for their family. “I would take my cousins to the wetland, and we would document animal species and vegetation that we found. I was sending them to a professor at Berkeley that was helping the community try to fight the development plan,” Hitchcock remembers.
Hitchcock now resides in Fairbanks, Alaska, where they moved in 2019. They work as a wetlands ecologist and continue to connect with their surroundings through skiing. They learned to skijor shortly after moving to Alaska, and they channel their activism into various social and environmental movements, including founding a 100% volunteer-run cross country ski group for the queer community in Fairbanks. Pedro’s Pals, named after Hitchcock’s late sled dog, hosts queer ski and skijor lessons and meetups for all experience levels.
“I am one of the few visible queer people in the cross country ski community up here,” says Hitchcock. Their early experience with trying enter nordic ski races proved challenging, as none of the races offer a non-binary gender category. “My friend Mary did the research to figure out which races would be interested in making a non-binary category, and the Tanana River Challenge was the only ones that responded,” they say. Hitchcock went on to be the first non-binary person to race in the newly formed category.
But the experience was bittersweet for Hitchcock, who had just lost their beloved dog Pedro to a snowmachine accident. “We got hit by a snowmachine on the Tanana River,” Hitchcock shares, “during the race, we had to ski right over the spot where we were hit.” Hitchcock channeled their grief into founding Pedro’s Pals. “Pedro was the first dog I ever skijored with, and the only dog that I could hook a lot of my friends and family up to, including my sixty-year-old mother,” they say. “Part of my healing from that loss was getting other people into skijoring. That’s really what got me through the grief, teaching other people in Pedro’s honor.”
Now, Pedro’s Pals hosts regular meet-ups and free lessons in Fairbanks. Beginners arrive early for a lesson with Hitchcock before a larger group heads off on a social ski, often at Creamer’s Field. “Queer people generally have less access to outdoor spaces, which are very straight – cis- white- dominated,” Hitchcock says. “I wanted to make a lesson space that people would feel safe coming into as their authentic selves, and not even have a worry for entry.”
There is no fee for lessons or meet-ups, and the group runs entirely off of donations, which go towards purchasing gear for loan to participants. Looking ahead, Hitchcock hopes to formalize a small board or council for the organization and to host more regular pride skis, individual lessons, and re-distribute more gear. They even dream of putting participants through first aid classes for skiers and dogs, to help prepare for unpredictable situations on the trail.
Hitchcock says that getting queer folks out on the land together is about much more than just exercise. They think back to social skis with their family as a child, packing picnics and hot chocolate, and observing birds, the forest, and the wetlands. “It’s not just about going out and getting exercise,” they say. “Going outside, being part of things, and moving your body at the same time — it’s really good for our mental health, which is something that a lot of people struggle with in Fairbanks. Especially queer people. It’s important to provide more opportunities for queer people to be safe in the outdoors.”
Hitchcock also hopes that more groups akin to Pedro’s Pals will pop up around Alaska. “If there are people elsewhere in the state that want help starting their own pride skis or, or gear lessons like that, they should reach out,” they share. “I would love to support anyone trying to make this kind of group in their own community.”
Emily Sullivan is a photographer and writer focused on outdoor recreation, environmental wellness, and community empowerment. She is based on Dena’ina lands, where she can usually be found skiing, packrafting, or berry picking.
