[RC] Wild West I, II & III - TypeF \(Jackie Floyd\)
Had a GREAT time at Wild West. As far as I'm
concerned, it can get no better than the beautiful trail we had to ride last
weekend. I could have done without "No Stop Hill," but hey ... what's life
without challenges???
This would be my first ride where I had more than
one horse at my disposal. My daughter has decided that her little Arabian
gelding James Dean is just too much horse for her and he now lives with me. I
decided to put him to work and make an endurance horse out of him. Not having a
whole heck of a lot of time to condition for a 50, I opted to do a 30 on him on
Day 1. James has had a problem being afraid of sticks. So much so that he's
dumped me twice and run over me once (cavaletti poles that time) and
dumped my daughter enough to give her a concussion and a broken tail bone. He
spent three months at a trainer just working on sticks. And the trail course and
tarps and whatever else they could find. I'm glad to say, the three months paid
off. He actually turned on his brain and finished the 30 with only two brain
farts early on in the ride and a couple of minor spooks in the end. He even went
up No Stop Hill like it was no big deal (I was shaking inside but that's another
story). If James hadn't been cured of his stick problem, we'd have not made it
out of camp, this being The Land of Sticks. Goodness!
I met up with Sue Flagg and her mule Henry at
the beginning of the second loop and followed her for awhile, then we ended up
riding together. I discovered that she knew my Mustang MC's new owners Steve and
Angie Meroshnekoff of www.WhiteDogRanch.com and gave me glowing reports
of what fine people they are. That was a great addition to my day. Sue and I
finished with, I think, 20 or so minutes to spare and James ended up with
the Best Conditioned award, which was selected out of the bottom 10, at the
request of the sponsor Christensen's who donated a beautiful embroidered crew
bag. That made my day, and my daughter's also. My daughter knew that if James
didn't work out for me, he'd have to be sold. James now has a brand new bridle
and headstall I bought from Cool Tack while we were there, so I think he's
staying!
Day Two found me riding my
ever-faithful Tank. He was feeling awfully good and was in "race" mode the first
25 miles. I let him travel a little faster than I really should have and by the
first 15-minute stop he'd had so much fun that he thought we should be done. So
the rest of the ride was rather a shove. Tank can be rather dramatic (read:
bullshitter) and not only was he insisting that we really should NOT be doing
this (he has a habit of turning his head and eyeballing me and then heaving
this big SIGH), but he was absolutely positive we were going the wrong way.
Every time we got to a fork in the road he insisted we take the opposite way I
wanted to go. We got into several arguments over that, all of them resulting in
him turning into a complete slug and a LOT more sighs. Jeez, dude ....
Well, I felt sorry for him and let him walk most of
the way back. That found me receiving the tail-end award in 73rd place, even
though I still had 2 hours I could ride. (Trilby wasn't there ... SOMEBODY had
to try to use up all the time.) Of course, he vetted out like he hadn't been out
at all that day and then proceeded to pull me around camp for the rest of the
evening. Hmmm ... me thinks I smell a rat ....
My husband arrived mid-afternoon on Sat. and being
he never gets to ride trail with me except fire roads, I got the brilliant idea
to share with him. So we pulled ribbon on Day Three. I told the Ribleys I had
just as much fun doing that as riding Day Three 50. Not sure they believed
me, but I really did. It was great to be able to show my husband the kind of
trail we get to ride on and it was fun decorating our horses with their fancy
orange and red necklaces.
I didn't take many pictures this ride and none the
first day. I figured I'd have my hands full with James and if he didn't break
me, he'd most certainly figure out a way to break my camera. Fortunately, he
proved me wrong.
So much of it was in the dark forest or I was busy
pushing branches out of my face. The ribbon crew got a little creative with the
Subaru ribbon marker. Can't see the ribbon very well in the picture, however!
The pictures of the horse tied to the Logan trailer are because he looks a lot
like my Tank. I don't know Sally's last name but she did a double take when she
saw Tank also. Her horse is not as flea-bitten as mine but they're very similar
in body and head shape. It is of particular interest to me because we're really
not sure of Tank's breeding. We were told he was Arab/Quarter mix but most
people either seem to think he's Anglo Arab or all Arab. Sally's horse is full
Arab so now I have confirmation that he quite possibly could be. He sure THINKS
he's an Arab LOL!!!
It was great to see Nick Warhol riding Zayante all
three days. Zayante looked GREAT and the beaming smile on Nick's face said it
all. I'll be waiting for his ride report because I know he's gotta have one.
All in All, it was a wonderful weekend and I think
this ride is one I can definitely add to my ride calendar every year. I'd like
to thank the Ribleys, their volunteers and all the sponsors for a lovely ride.
It was just a blast.
:) Jackie, Tank and the new kid on the block, James
Dean.
