Day 37, 2001 XP

[Karen <karen@storallnv.com>]

We had another really fabulous ride today, and finished in Cold Springs, 
Nevada at the sight of an XP station.  We hauled to the start from the 
Austin rodeo grounds for a 5 a.m. start in the dark, and began our journey 
today.  It was 96.6 degrees when I finished.  It did feel pretty toasty out 
there today.  We started with a climb over a mountain pass, then some flat 
stuff thru badger holes and then more passes to climb over.  The trail was 
absolutely gorgeous today though, we rode by another original XP station 
before lunch and then had our vet check in a beautiful green area with 
aspens and grass and a creek.

I rode with Kayla again, and Patty Danley joined us. She just got here to 
ride the last week.  She was probably laughing her head off at us planning 
on trying to get to lunch in "only" 4 1/2 hours <G>.  As if that's really 
fast or something!  Then I know we really impressed her by trying to keep 
up a 6.6 mph pace!  lol  Kayla rode Khairo (oops I spelled it wrong before) 
and he did great again.   I rode Rocky again today, and now he only has one 
more day to do on this ride......he's up to 925 XP trail miles now.  He's 
doing really well, hope he makes it okay on his last day.  Weaver goes 
tomorrow and then will also get to finish if everything works out.  The 
horses all seem to be doing so great on this ride (really, I'm not making 
it up, I have pictures and everything!).

When I got in I got to see Hugh and Gloria, who just arrived.  There aren't 
too many new people coming but they might in the last couple of 
days.  Mostly it's all the same people, some have gone and come back with 
fresh horses.  This past weekend (which was Mon-Tues for us) they posted 
the results from the entire ride so we all know who has ridden what, how 
many days, etc.  I think Jim Mitchell counted up how many horses have 17 
days or more, and there is only like 6 or 7 that have -- I figured there'd 
be more than that but then most people have used more than a couple of 
horses so it breaks it down a lot.  It'll be neat at the end to see how 
many horses that started in St. Joe made it all the way to Virginia 
City.  What a fantastic journey they have been on!

Troy (Kayla's brother) rode with Dave Rabe and Sands today.  Jamie Mitchell 
rode with her dad and Calina rode with Phyllis -- Kayla with me.  That's 
all the juniors riding.  The kids are all doing really great, Troy has 
ridden a lot of days (not sure how many), Kayla has ridden every single 
mile and missed one AERC day and Jamie's horse Lance is one of the ones 
with 17 or more days -- and Calina has probably ridden about 1,000 miles 
(not sure of that either).  See, I'm not of much use I don't really know 
anything. <g>

Early this morning we were doing some XP trail thru the brush and came 
across what looked like a grave.  It was a large oblong pile of rocks.  I 
guess I should have marked it with my gps so somebody could find it again 
though I could point it out on a map.  It just wasn't a natural pile of 
rock, but you never know.  We've wondered how many times we've gone by or 
over the graves of all the thousands of people who were buried on the trail.

Tomorrow is going to be a long, hard day.  The directions and map are three 
pages long.  The crews can get in to lunch tomorrow which is nice.  Lately 
we've been bringing everything with us when we start.  You can send a 
crewbag but sometimes it's just easier to take it all with you when you 
leave.  We're getting pretty good at that (me and Kayla).

We're kinda getting excited about finishing.  I think that everybody is 
going to try and ride the last day, so some will take days off inbetween to 
make sure their horses are ready.  We are going to have our official AERC 
finish outside of town, and then once everybody has finished (even Trilby), 
we are all going to ride together as a group into Virginia City -- that'll 
be really neat -- and then we can pony our other horses along with us if we 
want.  There are going to be a lot of people there for sure, it'll be 
exciting.  Hopefully not too exciting for Rocky <sigh>.  Good thing I'm 
riding Weaver tomorrow past the naval bombing range.

Happy XP Trails,

Karen
in Cold Springs, Nevada
.....only 3 days left :+/