I had Friday off and used that day to run errands in preparation for our weekend up at Harry O out of Sedro Woolley. This was the weekend of the fundraiser ride that I made all those bulls for. It was so hot on Friday, I had to work in phases... Me n Russ went grocery shopping early to beat the heat, picked up the horses on our way home and then I had to get the trailer organized and cleaned out, make and pack up the food, finish the laundry, pack the camper.. Derek got off work early thank goodness so he was able to help me because I was not functioning very quickly that day.
We finally made it to the campground around 6:30pm, had some dinner and decided it was a great night to get in a quick ride. So we saddled up and were on the horses at 9pm! Rode down the road to the Cowboy Campsites to check it out. We had never been to their facility, it is basically a big area where you can purchase camping lots, you get a lifetime ownership of that lot. They are not huge, but big enough for your truck/trailer, maybe a small cabin, 1 or 2 corrals, firepit.. Some people have put a lot of time and money into their sites and they are so cool! Cowboy Campsites does not own the land, it is leased land, so you dont technically own anything other than rights to your spot for as long as the land is leased to CC. I like the idea of having a place to go and you can set it up real nice, but 2 minutes down the road you can camp for free and access the same trails.. soooo... why buy what you can get for free! :) But it was fun to ride through the area and wave at the campers.. the very last couple we came to were sitting and watching their 2 pups run around. The guys says to Derek "I really like that roan horse you got, is he for sale?" of course Derek says no, we wouldnt sell him for anything at this point! I asked if his dogs were Toy Aussies and he said no, they were mini aussies but only 3 and 4 months old.. OMG, it made me sooo excited to get our dog when I saw how flippin cute those little buggers were running all over the place!! It was dark when we unsaddled, sat with some Horse Club friends for a bit then headed to bed, it was an early to rise Saturday!
Saturday morning, we saddled up and rode out to our station on the trail. We left about 45 minutes before the official ride started so we would have time to get to our station and set up the bulls and the tarp. At our station, we met all the riders, they drew poker chips from us and then most of them participated in the ride challenge of attempting our obstacle type course. We were at our station for about 4 hours, until the last rider had come through.
Here's a couple pics of our bulls and some horses crossing the "tarp water" and then they had to navigate through balloon hanging cows. It was a great setup and fun for the riders. A few horses wiped out our bulls here/there and we had to mend broken legs, horns, replace the stakes into the ground.. some horses had no respect for them bulls! :)
Here's Josh riding HotRod and then a pic below of Adam on Princess.
After we finished with our station, we then were able to saddle up and finish the rest of the ride, behind the last riders. We attempted to do the other obstacles at the 4 other stations, a bridge crossing, shooting a toy gun, opening/closing a rope gate and then riding across a wood teeter totter... that was interesting. We were pretty tired that night, the weather was fantastic on Saturday, I think it reached about 80.
Here's a pic of Derek in the woods on our ride Saturday.As we rode that day on the rest of the ride, Edgar and Red were walking out a lot faster than normal and were pretty tired from the ride and heat. When we got back into camp, I realized that Edgar was not feeling well, he was acting colicky! :( He drank plenty of water on the trail, he was happy to eat grass, so we think maybe he got overheated. He thought real hard about laying down, so I grabbed the banamine paste and gave him a dose. He also had no gut sounds. We then led them down to the creek, Edgar drank a little, stood there for about 15 minutes while he ate some grass then led him to the water again where he drank some more and by the time we led him back up to the trailer, he had some gut sounds and he had quit looking at his belly. So phew!! He seemed all good...
Sunday morning Edgar was still fine, he had pooped, peed, ate, drank and had gut sounds.... We took our time that morning, no need to rush. We then saddled up for an almost 2 hour easy going ride with Barb S and Renee. We explored, had no idea where we were going, but we did a really nice low key loop and it was a great ride to end the weekend. I have not ridden much up at Harry O, but the riding is great! You can do easy and you can also do pretty tough hard riding. Derek & I both are looking forward to going back, it was his first time there and we had a great time.
We got home in the early afternoon on Sunday and as we were taking the camper off.. there was a MOUSE under the camper in the bed of our truck! We noticed it when we lifted the camper up out of the truck, I have NO idea where the bugger came from, there were no holes in our camper, so I dont think he came from inside.. I HOPE NOT anyways!! Maybe he jumped in the bed of the truck while we were camping and then went for a very long ride.. unfortunately we didnt get a chance to kill him, I had wanted to but Derek never had the shot to take with the 2x4. :) I dont know where else he would have come from.. It really bugs me though that he was there, I HATE rodents!!
We both crashed in our chairs that afternoon and got in a little nap with Russell who was very upset with us for leaving him behind, but it was just too hot to take him and leave him in the camper all day w/o us able to stay there with him. It's a bummer to be back to work, I think we both would have enjoyed another few days up there camping with the horses.
I have always been an over-packer when I go anywhere, camping too. So I've been trying to be normal I guess you could say and pack smaller bags but I have realized I am going back to my old ways.. I took 1 pair of jeans that I wore all day Saturday and they were so dirty and gross, there was NO way I was going to put them back on Sunday! So I had to ride in shorts, which was OK, except there were a few spots on our trail that had stinging nettles hanging into the trail and they were brushing up against the horses. A couple times I had to swing my legs out of the stirrups and up onto the front of the saddle, which normally is fine, but Red was being "jumpy" so a couple times when I did that, as my feet are out of the stirrups, he jumps/lunges a little forward and spooks at my legs! So here I am trying to now avoid nettles, avoid falling off my horse who is spooked by me and keep him walking forward while I have no legs on him to do so! :) I did not get one nettle sting, so I did good...
Red is doing much better as a trail horse, he is figuring it all out slowly. He still needs to get used to saddle bags, those still make him jump at times and I realized too he doesnt like it when I break off huckleberry bushes and hold them up to my face to munch the berries off.. oh that spooks him if the branch is big enough for him to see so as I'm trying to ride with no hands on the reins so I can hold berry bush in one and pick berries off the bush with the other, my horse is trotting rapidly down the trail spooked at the bush! I kept grabbing the rein and asking him to walk but eventually had to throw the bush full of BIG plump delicious berries because he just would NOT walk and he was getting out of control with his spookiness.. oh well, things to work on! lol
So only 5 more days til we pick up Ellie!! I am excited, I think a lot of my excitement and anticipation is for Russell's sake, I just cant wait for him to realize he has a new girlfriend to love with and play with. And the breeder of our Boykin Spaniel pup, he went down and met Earl, the boy dog he's breeding to his female. Earl apparently is the 3rd highest ranked Boykin Spaniel dog in the US with the 1 and 2 dogs coming from the same lines as Earl who are older. So that is GREAT news! We really lucked out on this deal.. We are getting a champion pup for probably 1/2 the cost and it's a local breeding and we get pick of the litter... A lot of the big top breeders of the Boykins have waiting lists up to a year for a puppy.. I still am unsure of how we will handle having 3 dogs, but it will all work out, that I am confident of. :)
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