Hi! Just finished today and have a connection, so I'm uploading photos right now:www.endurohorse.com

We had a nice day, riding from Granger, Wyoming to Fort Bridger. The finish was great, we got to trot in and finish up right in the Fort! There was even an audience. Just had dinner at the local cafe, which was nice. Karen Beason came in barefoot claiming that her shoes were muddy (Grin) (probably true).....but they served her anyway. haha.

There were only 23 riders today. I think a lot didn't want to haul an hour to the start this morning, or else they didn't want to ride in the rain, or were afraid that it would be muddy. It did rain, thunder and lightning nearly all night, and after lunch we had quite a storm. The ground was pretty slick, through most of the ride the footing was really good. We got to see an original stage/pony express station this morning in Granger, and a 200' plume thingy that shoots out a flame--oh, and an antelope ran right across the road in front of us.

I think I've got the info now on which horse has done the most days...that'd be Sunny the Mustang, Skoldjur the Icelandic and Zane Grey the Arab stallion. Lancelot, Jamie's horse is a close behind with 17 days. The others have probably around 19 or 20 days....not sure exactly (none of this is official). Terry Wooley pulled again today so now we're back to there being only a couple of riders that are only missing one AERC day and they are MJ Jackson and Kayla Ramsdell. Kayla is still the only one who has ridden every mile, just missed one AERC day. Other riders who have gone almost every day but a couple are Bonnie Way, Phyllis B...myself.....some that have done most every day but missed a handful are Dave Rabe, Terry Nance, Shawn Bowling, Jane Blair, Pat Verhuel...hmmm....there are probably a couple more but they aren't coming to mind.

The same rider who has lost her horse three or four times lost it again today and it ran and hit Pat Verhuels horse and caused her to get a broken front lip. Ouch! Trilby didn't ride today, probably a good thing due to all the lightning.

The sheriff came and warned us that this coming storm is going to have a lot of hail in it. Lots of people have thrown their horses in trailers already. We're waiting to see, right now it's just raining.

The bugle is going off at the Fort. Yesterday the juniors all did pony express re-enactments for the public every couple of hours...they'd gallop in, do a mochilla change and the other rider would gallop off.

I better get back so I don't miss the ride meeting. Day 27 tomorrow! Weaver went over 4k miles today :+).

Happy XP trails,

Karen
in Fort Bridger, Wy

We're in Utah now. It was a really nice day, we had a really enjoyable ride. The weather was nice, not quite as hot and we only got rained on for a few minutes. There were some sections of pretty deep mud but overall the footing was pretty good.

I rode with Kayla again, she rode Buzzy again. She's still doing really good. We started again at 5 a.m. and it was still very dark. We left out of Fort Bridger and rode to lunch somewhere near the Kemmerer exit :+P.....then we hauled the horses about an hour to Echo Junction in Utah and rode the last half of the ride there finishing near Park City -- not too far from the Rolls Royce building. My GPS said 49.6 miles but I didn't turn it on right away this morning since it was so dark. Yesterday my gps said we did 52.3 but that included warming the horse up -- we are sure getting a lot of long days, just how it works out I guess.

There were only 17 riders today. First and BC was Linda Tribby, Steph Teeter was 2nd then Kayla 3rd and me 4th. Don't worry we weren't going fast, we showed up at lunch in 4:10, blazing trail at a blistering 6+ miles per hour! Barney really had to convince us that we really were in the first group of four into the vet check. Pretty funny. Trilby didn't ride again today, and I found out that the horse that has now done the most days is Skoldjur, John Parke's Icelandic -- at 21 days --- 16 of those being consecutive. Next is Carol and Sunny and Kathy and Zane -- they are tied or else one apart but I don't know for sure. Zane has gotten 9 BC's.

After lunch we rode on the rail trail which was pretty neat and really pretty. A lot of it goes along where the Pony Express did, so we got to see I-80 but it wasn't so bad since everything is so green and all the wildflowers are in bloom and there is water everywhere. Kayla's horse lost a hind shoe in all the mud so we stopped and I put an easyboot on and it stayed on till we finished, then he got reshod tonight.

After finishing we went over to Louise's and checked on Cheyanne and loaded up provisions then came over to the Heber fairgrounds where we are staying the night. We have hookups and water, and there are plenty of pens for all the horses. Pole bending and barrel racing for those who want some entertainment, some of the riders are participating. I am still a little surprised that I haven't needed the third horse yet (knocking on wood). Weaver is sound and entered for tomorrow, and Rocky finished today putting his lifetime mileage also over 4,000 miles -- now he gets two days off then starts again the following week scheduled to do two days.

Today was a long day -- we started at 5 a.m., then rode 25 something miles (a little over that), then had to haul for an hour after having an hour hold and vetting, then rode another 25 miles then hauled to Louise's then to Heber and got here about last, set up in time for the 7:00 ride meeting and now here it is nearly 9 p.m. and we have to get up early tomorrow so we can go to the 5:20 a.m. ride meeting to find out where exactly it is we are hauling to in order to start tomorrows ride. The horses will have to be loaded and tacked up and ready to go by then.

The ride tomorrow is supposed to be a really nice one, it's all in the mountains on nice singletrack trail so everybody is really looking forward to it. It's all marked with trail markers, no GPS -- let's hope we don't all get lost! ha ha

Guess we better go figure out who is hauling whose horse to the start tomorrow morning.........g'nite!

Happy XP Trails,

Karen
in Heber, Utah
.......only 13 days left!

Hi! I'm actually on my day off now. I was too tired to do anything on the computer yesterday, it was a really long, hard day. We rode over the Wasatch mountains. We started by having the horses loaded into the trailers fully tacked by about 5:10 a.m. so we could go to the 5:20 ride meeting to find out what was going on and get our maps. Then we hauled to the start and hung out and let the horse eat because we didn't end up starting until 6:45 a.m. Then we rode all day, doing about 7500' in elevation gain (and about the same in loss)....though my altimeter watch might have been wrong that's what it came up with. Once we finished about 5 p.m., we hauled and got to the rodeo grounds in Springville at about 6:30 p.m......so we were up and going for quite awhile. I have blisters on my feet for the first time, because I did a lot of walking and running on all the downhill yesterday. The grass was as tall as I was in some spots.

The day started out really nice, we went up the mountain and got onto some nice singletrack trail that winded thru the trees and up and down, really pretty. We even saw a moose in a pond (got pictures!), then after being out for about 5 hours we made it into the lunch vet check. Lucky for us, Jim Mitchell was there and helped us (I sponsored Kayla again). That was nice. The horses were in heaven for sure, lots of green grass and clover and since we figured on not having any crews all day we had left prepared and brought their grain and carrots along with us and everything we needed for the entire day. I even brought my water bottle with a filter on it so I could refill from the creeks.

We went up some stuff that was pretty steep, stuff that made all our knees quiver (Grin). The kind of stuff most people would say no way could you get a horse up that! Our horses were all great though, Weaver loves mountains and is a strong hill horse and Kayla's horse Buzzy just followed right along doing a splendid job. After lunch we continued climbing and went up up up and around the mountain and around and then we started going down, but also had some more up in between. Jim Mitchell showed us the contours on the topo map and you could see that we were going to have a lot of steep downhill as well as the uphill we'd had going to lunch. I did a lot of it on foot, walking thru the really rocky sections (it was nearly all rocky), and running wherever it was level enough to do that. Kayla did the best she could, but was a little sore in the knees from all the bushwhacking we did on earlier trails. The Duck had warned everybody that this trail was every bit as tough as Tevis and not to take any questionable horses. Boy was he ever right! I felt kind of bad, because on one of the steeper rocky sections Weaver slipped and fell down completely. Luckily I was far enough ahead with a long lead line so he didn't slide into me. He got up and held his back leg up and kind of hopped for a minute and I just knew he'd be really hurt..(sigh)......so we stopped and rested a minute then took it really slow down the very steep parts.......in about a half an hour I got back on in a flat spot since he'd been walking normally and he wanted to trot and felt totally fine....but I got back off anyway and walked him all the rest of the way in to the finish because I was worried about him. Barney couldn't find anything wrong with him, he just had a small scratch on that leg but was sound on it. Looks good today so hopefully that didn't hurt him. He sure had a good day overall though, he just loves going down those kind of singletrack mountain trails.

Now this morning Dave is re-setting a lose shoe on Weaver. I took the easyboots off of the horses, they'd been on about another two weeks on both of them. This afternoon I'll glue them back on, I guess it'll be Rocky's turn to go tomorrow so I'll do his first then I can do Weav's tomorrow after I finish riding. Their feet look good.

While Dave (my crew) was waiting at the finish line to pick us up he had the dogs out in the brush playing and they ran across a great big rattlesnake! He said he was sure glad the dogs came right over to get away from it as soon as he called.

I should go work on my photos for the last two days. I still have photos of Fort Bridger to put up, and the ones of all the juniors doing their mochilla transfers. I can't believe we only have 12 more ride days on this ride, it seems to have gone by pretty fast. It'll be hard to go back to real life, we'll sure miss everybody.

Looks like breakfast is up! John is fixing pancakes for everybody, mmm mmmmmm.

Happy XP Trails,

Karen
in Springville, Utah
......only 12 days left!

It was sort of amusing to be riding thru Faust, Utah on Friday the 13th. It was another great day on the pony trail! It's hot out here, (99 degrees) feels like we're baking in an oven but there has been a breeze and some clouds so it doesn't seem too bad. Our day off yesterday went by all too fast, and a lot of us were pretty tired starting out this morning. About the time we finish it seems we are perking up, and as each day goes on in the week we feel better and better. Each week gets easier too.

We left Springville, Utah this morning and hauled to the start, it took us 62 minutes. Then I tacked up the horse and vetted then we started at 6:00 a.m. Today was especially neat because we started at the site of an actual pony express station and spent the entire day going from station to station. I took photos of all of the markers and buildings that remain. We're now camped at Simpson Springs.

The trail is rugged and beautiful, mountains and trees....we spent most of the time riding along on a singletrack trail that parallels the dirt road. Lots of crickets out here, on the road, in the bushes. Covering everything.

Oooops, John and Steph just came into camp the wrong way :+P and now have to go back out and around the right way. Awwwwwwww shuks! Their kids painted up their crew vehicle and I got pics of that today.

I sent my crew stuff with John and Dolly today, and that way Dave got a day off from crewing. Only his second day since starting the ride. The other day was when he had to go get the truck fixed in Wyoming. It worked out well since Dave got to the new camp early he got a nice big corral for my two horses and an even bigger one for the Lakso's horses. They were also crewing for Troy who rode with Dave Rabe and Sands and since they were going even slower they weren't back to camp yet (their rig) by the time Kayla and I finished. We took about 9 1/2 hours today. I don't see how we could go much faster in this heat. I rode Rocky today, I can't even recollect right now how many days he's done. So much for my math skills. ha

Dave took my camera to go take some photos of the pony express station. I'll get them downloaded and put together later, if I'm awake. I'll try to upload them at Schellbourne. I did at least take a shower just now and am sitting in the shade watching the horses in their corral. Oh goody, I can sleep tonight without them rubbing and itching and rolling while tied to the trailer.

Kayla rode Buddy today, her acrobatic horse (the one who did the flip). He did really good, seems to be recovered from his tumble. We're a little mismatched though, since before we were riding Buddy and Weaver together they go together better than when we mix our horses up the other way. Maybe next week we can get them back together again.

The desert terrain is a welcome change, though in a couple more days we'll probably be tired of the dry heat. I think that it was great for Rocky today, it's what he is used to and did excellent taking care of himself. He drank out of puddles that most horses won't look at and just inhaled all the grasses. He hasn't stopped eating since we finished an hour ago. I need to weigh him and see where he is, last night when I weighed him he was at 876. His normal weight is about 900 so he isn't doing too bad for having been traveling for 7 weeks now and gone a whole lot of miles in various conditions. Weaver is holding his weight even better and could maybe stand to lose a few more pounds (grin).

I should take a nap now..................zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

Happy XP Trails,

Karen
at Simpson Springs, Utah
....only 11 days to go!

Last night we were at Simpson Springs and today we are at.....well...somewhere in Utah :+). I could get up to go look but I'm glued to this chair, at least until it starts to rain! We had a really great day, one of the nicest rides so far. I rode Weaver today and he's doing really great, it was his 14th day. We rode on more original pony express trail, from station to station and marker to marker today. In some spots we could either ride the trail or use the dirt road since they paralleled.....there are bazillions of badger holes out there so it's safer to take the trail but funner to ride the trail even though they are right next to each other. I sponsored Kayla again and she rode Buzzy. The best part was at the end when we got to climb up a long steep canyon and then got off and led the horses down, it was rocky and steep but more like an endurance ride, we really enjoyed it.

Only 10 ride days left, or 5 per horse......hope they can keep hanging in there. I know Weaver can do it, I'm pretty confident with him. He's gotten better each week and is keeping his weight well and has a really great attitude. Rocky also has a great attitude but I feel that he's getting fragile to the point that it wouldn't take much for him to go off. I think he's totally fine metabolically and doesn't have anything wrong like any saddle or girth sores but one wrong step..........we'll see how he looks tomorrow and maybe I'm worrying over nothing. He's also done 14 days so far. I guess any horse can take a wrong step............(sigh)

It's beautiful here, the sunrises and sunsets are astonishingly beautiful.......the sky is blue, purple, pink, orange.....and the mountains are brown, green and yellow......with rock, and we have grass and sage and more rock....and badger holes (haven't seen a badger yet though!) We've even had rainbows over our camp. Everybody will go home with some incredible photos.

Steve Shaw was riding one of Louise's horses this morning when it took a dive into a badger hole. He was explaining that to us about why his horses head was covered in white dust. I wonder if the real pony express riders ever had any horses fall into badger holes?

This morning we were trotting along thru the pony express trail and zig zagging around all the badger holes, Weaver was feeling super good and it felt like I was riding a ballet. Kayla said that it wasn't as much fun in the back when she could see how close we were getting to all of those badger holes. There's no real trail, we just zag and wind around the badger holes......somewhere along the way right by a pony express marker Weaver stopped and grabbed a bite of grass to eat. At about the same moment I instantly heard a ratttttttttle........RATTLESNAKE!!!!!! It was underneath Weaver's front legs and winding and coiling up and hissing and rattling. In a blink of an eye I kicked him and pulled him up onto his hind legs and spun him around and got out of there! Kayla was scared even worse than I was because she saw the snake. I just heard it and knew that it was beneath us. Weaver has no idea how close he came to being bit, he may still be wondering why I kicked him so hard though, for no good reason (Grin). We had jello knees and heart murmurs for many more miles after that.

Lunch was great, Dave made it over the pass in time and was waiting for us along with Rocky and the two girls (Whinny & Dax, the dogs). Kayla came with us since her grandparents hadn't made it in time. Terry Wooley's motorhome broke down on the top of the pass, blocking everybody. So any rigs that hadn't made it over by about 8:00 a.m. were stuck. Ron Waltenspiel and Dennis Tribby pulled the wounded rig up over the hill. We both vetted and came over and gave the horses food and ate lunch. We really went fast :^D in the morning because of the heat. We started at 5:00 a.m. and made it to lunch by about 9:30 -- about 4 1/2 hours. Yesterday it was 99 degrees and already 75 degrees when we woke up at 4 a.m. So we were moving out pretty good so we'd make it thru lunch before the heat of the day so we'd have enough time to slow down should it get really unbearable. Luckily, we had a stronger breeze today and more clouds so it was really nice.

The horses are really perking up, they love this country and the trail. Winding thru a singletrack trail or thru sagebrush and up and down gulleys and mountain passes has given them a renewed enthusiasm. They love their work! It is such a blessing to be riding a horse that is having so much fun. We were less tired, our second day of a four day ride week.......the first day of each week always seems to be the worse. In two more days we'll get two days off in a row and then be ready to head across the Nevada desert from Fort Schellbourne.

Crews kept us watered and everytime Dave was waiting for us I'd dunk my hair in a bucket of water and we'd soak our shirts down to stay cool. They dry out in a few minutes but in the meantime the breeze really cools you down. The horses were getting sponged down too, and that helped them a lot. A couple of times we stopped to let them eat for a few minutes at the trailer and I think that was a real benefit to them. Weaver, of course....always has a mouthful of food if there is anything available. I figure that I better feed him because if I don't he'll go on strike and I'll never get him down the trail because he'll park himself in front of a grassy spot and that'll be that.

The thunder is loud and we can see lightning just a mile or two from camp. The wind is blowing and my computer is getting sprinkled on. The screen needed dusting anyhow. Now I've got mud dripping down. ha ha

Happy XP Trails,

Karen
somewhere in Utah
.....only 10 days left!

We rode into Utah yesterday. Started in Fort Bridger, Wyoming - beautiful morning ride. Moon was still up when we left at 5 AM (which is a good thing because the sun wasn't even close yet). We milled around the start for awhile until we could read the GPS maps, or at least have a good idea of where we were going for the next couple miles. I rode Santini. John took the day off, saving Sukaro (Squeak) for the Uinta Mtn ride today (there's another story). Bunchuk got his leg hung up on the portable corral a few days ago (pawing) and was a little sore so we decided to give him a few more days off. Beautiful country out of Fort Bridger - very green from the torrential summer rains we've have for the past few days (I've never seen such lightning and thunder!!), high country (close to 7000 ft) so the sagebrush was sharing the land with junipers. Looked a lot like central Oregon. Cloudy and cool, the footing was nice and soft from the rains - very nice riding. I rode with Linda Tribby, Karen Chaton and Kayla Ramsdale, and Sue H. (Henderson??) until she lost a shoe and had to stop and do an easy boot. Sue's twin sister had done the GAHR in '76 and she was thrilled to be able to do it herself this year. We rode pretty slowly, came into the vet check after 4 hours (25 miles) and discovered we were the first ones in! (I'm not very good at riding super-slow without John :)

After lunch we trailered 50 miles to the head of the Rail Trail which went up the canyon from Echo Jctn past Park City. Dave gave us an extra hour for the transport. This is the first ride I've done where I stopped for coffee and snack at a gas station halfway through the ride. Felt a little odd ordering food in a helmet and tights...

Met up with Linda and Karen at the trail head and rode the last 25 miles on the Rail Trail. Linda went on ahead (finished first and BC). It was a nice day - mostly riding alone. Joined up with Jim Baldwin and Karen Beason for a bit. The boys met me in a few places for water and grain/hay for Tini. Got rained on a little, but it felt good.

We spent the night at the fairgrounds in Heber City - pretty nice facility, pens/stalls for the horses. Unfortunately the ride that was scheduled for today - the old Wasatch trail was looking grim. The trail was supposed to be marked by some folks in the area, but they had some troubles and weren't able to do the whole thing. Dave drove what he could, trying to patch the trail waypoints from the road and topo maps. But we all went to bed wondering if the ride was going to be pulled off. Meeting was scheduled for 5:20 this morning (since Dave was still out on the mountain). John and I decided not to ride the mountain - too much uncertainty about the difficulty of the mountain pass and chances of getting lost. Decided we're rather save the horses for the next 600 miles of XP trail. Hopefully all went well (we'll hear about it tonight!).

Tomorrow is a rest day, then we trailer to Fairview, Utah the day after and start the last stretch of XP trail. I think it's going to be hot hot hot once we get down into the Salt Lake Basin - we'll get into some high country as we get closer to Ely, Nevada and Fort Schellbourne but I think it's going to be hot...

Our crew is still doing great. The boys are headed to Provo today for new skateboards and hope to spend most of tomorrow at the skate park in Orem. They've been entertaining themselves well - hacky-sack, cards, squirt guns - it doesn't take too much for these guys to stay happy. They bought cans of paint and are customizing our '84 GMC Suburban (500+ miles and still going...). Michele (my 20 yr old niece) is hanging in there as well. She's doing the cooking, and most of the horse handling. Very cheerful and patient and capable. It's really an incredible adventure. We have our routine down, everybody has their jobs, horses are happy and settled into the trailer/camp - ride/camp life. Pretty cool.

Steph