Ridin', Reinin' and Writin'

    

     I wish I could have blogged my trail riding vacation in Utah every day (so much I could have written) but time did not allow and, to be honest, my priority was not sitting at a computer at the end of the day. For a time when I got home I thought of writing the details up day by day while they were fresh in my mind but scrapped that too. As the days went by, other thoughts, insights and revelations surfaced and it is those I am putting on paper now.

 

    Trading off my trailer for a newer one with larger living quarters just before I departed increased my anxiety about the cost of the vacation but I stayed on course, loaded Sapphire and Cameo in the trailer and Mischa in the truck and got on the road for what would be a three day haul to Paria. As it turned out, it was four. I drove right into a Montana snowstorm and spent much of one day parked. Better to lose a day than to be in a wreck though. Horses, dog and I were safe.

Sapphire and Cameo take in the sights on my first ride in Utah.

My ride to Resurrection and Buckskin Gulch. Note side door.

Cameo and I Buckskin Gulch Ride

   Of course I met people at the ranch, some of whom I will keep in touch with. A couple from Las Vegas are planning a trip to Alberta next year. As occasionally happens to me, she and I had an almost instant rapport and I gave her a copy of my book because, as I told her, "You will get it."

      On a final note, kudos to my mares, who accepted, with grace, everything I asked. Neither one had been on any kind of extended trail ride like this before. They were sure footed, trustworthy and trusting. They did buddy up of course but that could be expected.

     Did I make any mistakes, do anything stupid, on my trip? Yes. I'm still a country girl at heart and I tend to trust too easily. Or is it that I just don't think that there are people I shouldn't trust? On the way home, when I was looking for a place for my horses to overnight, I stopped in a little town thinking there would be a rodeo grounds there. Not much was open but I asked a couple of fellows chatting on the street. The one in the truck said he lived there but the rodeo grounds was privately owned and he knew of no other.

     "I have a little patch of ground you can use," he said. "Jump in and I'll show you." So I did! What was I thinking? In today's age, one should not ever do that. He truly was a nice man, showed me the little pasture but I chose not to use it as it seemed unsafe to turn them in at night. Only later did I think how stupid that was to get in the truck with a strange man...

 

Revelation #6: I underestimated myself. A lifetime of always trying to do better, to be better had allowed doubts to creep in (sometimes by others but mostly by myself for allowing it to happen) that I still did not do things as well as I should. But a ton of experience behind the wheel and on the back of a horse had prepared me for this trip as it has done in the past. I don't scare easily and I don't stress and that has saved many a potential dangerous situation. My horses will do anything for me if I ask nicely and I can still hold my own physically on a long day in the saddle. I cannot ask for more.

 

And I did gain insight into myself and others and what makes us all tick. I now have a better understanding of that part of the country, too, and its people. I always learn when I visit some place new but there's questions unanswered too, like "What makes those rocks that colour?" and "Why are the lines in the rock" and "How did the early settlers survive?" I'll be looking for answers.

And my new motto (borrowed from Nike on the advice of a friend): "Just do it!"