Remembering

Helen, our fearless leader, on the float trip

We are on our way west again. Yesterday morning I drove into Jackson and picked up Breezy and Ransom from Happy Trails Pet Resort. They tackled me in the lobby hopping and wagging and talking to me. I hopped and cooed and hugged them. I'm not sure who was happier, me or them!

Jimmy, our resident comedian, on our float trip

It was raining yesterday morning. John, Jimmy and Helen decided to take one more ride so off to the hills they went with rain slickers in hand. I don't think they got a drop of rain while they were out. I took the dogs and returned to Mary where I unpacked the Camry and warmed Mary up. It felt good to be back with her and readying for our trip to Oregon. As I sorted laundry I thought about what a special week we spent with our friends at the ranch.

We stayed in "1st Cabin" named because it was the first cabin built on the ranch for guests. Jimmy, Helen and Corky stayed in a double cabin on the far end of our row. The ranch itself has been in the same family for 80 years. Between Helen and our wranglers and guides we were informed of the history of the ranch and how it became part of Grand Teton National Park. Anyway, 1st Cabin was the first in a row of cabins, made of logs and furnished with a double bed, a twin bed, a table and chair and a chest of drawers in a large dressing room. We left the windows open most of the time for fresh air but the logs were so insulating that we stayed warm every night. The lodge/dining room where we ate was about ten steps from our cabin. It was all log with picture windows lining the front to give us a perfect view of the Tetons. I took a hundred pictures of those mountains and no two really look the same due to the changes in the light and the weather. From the lodge you head downhill to the corral where they bring the horses in to saddle for rides.

1st Cabin

The horses are turned out every night to graze and rest and then the wranglers go out in the morning, gather them and bring them in for their day of work. They normally do two 2 hour rides per day. They break them up according to how well you ride and how much ground you want to cover. They have lesson rides for people who don't have a lot of experience. They have slow rides where you just walk and those mostly go up in the hills behind the ranch. There are medium rides where you walk, trot and lope some and they have fast rides where you walk trot and lope a lot so that you can see more country. Mostly those go down by the Snake River. Those were our favorites.

We had a guide, Randy who was really fun to go with. I rode with him for the first time on Thursday when we went to the river for our dash and splash ride. What a great time! He is from Mississippi and obviously loves the outdoors. When we would get ready to move from a walk to a trot or to a lope he would put his hand up and holler, "REGULATORS! Proceed at the (trot or lope)!" The second he put his hand up the horses all popped their heads up and readied themselves to pick up the pace. It made me laugh every time. He was full of funny stories and interesting information and I think he appreciated that we could all ride well. During the entire ride we were cutting up and laughing and he kept saying, "You people really need to cheer up!". He was my favorite guide. We had Stephanie and Ashely who were both good and T.J. who is the head wrangler there took us on our all day ride. He has been with Triangle X for ten years, is just 33 years old and had never had much of an interest in horses before he arrived at the ranch from Nebraska. Now he manages the entire herd and all of the wranglers. He also goes out to find new trails for all day rides and he and Ashely are engaged to be married some time next year. It feels like a family when you are there probably because a lot of the people who work there (between 60 and 70 during the season) have been there for years. We also met some people who took sabbaticals from their life long jobs to come out and work for the summer. There is no television or radio so you are liberated from all of the garbage going on in the world. I found out about the financial crisis on the Internet which I have found is a much less emotional way to get the news. Many, many of the guests had been there many times before. We actually met several people from Kentucky and some people who have Saddlebreds in Missouri. It is a small world. And Triangle X is quite a place.

Randy, our guide telling us a story

Carter Ragsdale sent John a song via his cell phone. He has had this song on his phone for some time. The song is a spoof on the Brokeback Mountain movie. It is set to a catchy country tune and the chorus goes, "I aint goin' down on Brokeback Mountain. I aint goin' down on Brokeback Mountain. That shit aint right, that shit aint right." John played that song for nearly everyone on the ranch. So by the middle of the week people were walking around smiling and saying "That shit aint right...". It was pretty funny. I heard it so many times during the week that I went to sleep with the tune playing in my head. If you see him at a horse show ask him to play it. He will do it happily!

You will never be hungry at Triangle X either. They serve three huge meals a day, mostly beef based. We had fillet, sirloin, prime rib, hamburgers, corned beef sandwiches and hot dogs (probably all beef!). On Friday we had salmon and it was delicious! In the morning they had all kinds of cereal, yogurt, eggs, waffles, pancakes, bacon, sausage, biscuits and gravy...hearty breakfasts every morning. On our all day ride they packed us a lunch of turkey and cheese croissant sandwiches, potato chips, a Hershey bar and an apple...for our horses. The night of our hike/float day we went into Jackson and ate at the Cadillac Cafe (next to the Million Dollar Cowboy Bar) and had the best ever hamburgers and fries. As much as I rode and walked on this trip I know I didn't lose an ounce but I'm certainly more fit than when I showed up!

As I was groaning from sore muscles and as I was hauling my ass out of bed every morning John was jumping around the cabin and saying things like, "I'm not sore at all!" and "I think I'm losing weight!" I listened to this several mornings in a row and finally on Saturday morning, after our all day ride when I was getting up with my bones creaking and my muscles binding into knots he jumps up and says, "I feel pretty good this morning, how about you?" I looked at him and said, "Go to hell," fell back in bed and pulled the covers over my head. He howled with laughter and he bounced into the shower.

It wasn't that he didn't whine at all. He did his fair share of that. For our hike we bought a little nap sack to carry our lunches in and some extra water. He is fond of telling me that he is the pack mule and to let him carry things. I really appreciate that about him. He is always looking out for my well being. He is a wonderful person. So when we took off on our hike he probably had ten pounds or so of food and water in his nap sack (worn like a back pack). Helen was carrying 15 to 20 pounds in her back pack. To be fair she works out with a trainer who makes her run two miles and walk two miles in intervals with 20 pounds on her back so she was fit as an antelope for the mountain hike and the rest of us were...pretty pathetic in comparison! So half way through the day John started telling Helen, "I'm going to tell everyone that you made me walk 25 miles with fifty pounds on my back." I think he repeated that at least 20 times and each time the distance and weight got larger. She retaliated by repeating his complaint about buying a walking stick, "Stiiiiickkkk! Why do we need a stiiiiccckkkkk???" Needless to say we laughed a lot on this trip.

His other complaint was one that I knew he would have because everyone who rides a horse all day going up and especially down hills has it. You have to keep lots of weight in your stirrups going down hill not only for your balance and your horse's but to keep from rubbing sores on your horse's withers. After all of the uphill your legs get a little tired. The wranglers are great about stopping and letting us stretch our legs, find a private spot in the woods to relieve ourselves if necessary and to loosen the horse's cinches so they can breath, relax and get a few bites of grass. Then they tighten us all up and we all meander off to find a stump on which to launch ourselves back onto our horses (they call the mounting block in the corral "the dude launcher") and away we went again. By the time we were getting ready to stop for lunch John was starting to make noise about his knees aching. I smiled just a little. I wasn't being evil but after listening to him tell me that nothing had bothered him all week it was just a little heartening to hear him complain about aching knees. And I thought to myself, "Just wait until we start going down." As promised our guide took us up to around 9,000 feet on the ridge above a very deep canyon and we rode nearly the entire way back on the edge of this ridge. I thought my height issues might kick in but I actually didn't have any problems with it while I was sitting on Thunder. My left knee was singing to me pretty good but all I could hear behind me was moaning and groaning about knees from John and a bunch of other riders. Even T.J. who is only 33 was talking about his knees burning and aching. By the time we got to our next rest area we weren't sure that we would be able to get off of our horses much less get back on again. But five minutes walking eased the pain and we launched and went on down. It was a spectacular ride, the prettiest I've ever been on in my life and I've ridden quite a bit on the trail in different parts of the country. That night we all sat on our porch on first cabin enjoying a glass of wine with Jimmy, Helen and Corky and watching the sun set on the Grand Tetons. We were at peace with the world and our knees were serene.

Serious drinkers...John, Corky and Helen on the porch before dinner (I was behind the camera with a glass in my hand!)

Actually once I got up and rolling every day I was pretty sound except for the abrasions on the inside of my knees, the bruises on my contact points (butt and knees and one big weird one on my calf...clueless as to how I got that one). And the other strange thing that happened after my first day of riding was swelling on the inside of my thighs. I got up on Tuesday and they were swollen to where they actually touched when I stood with my feet a normal distance apart. I guess there is a first time for everything. I hiked the mountains like that. Jimmy was walking behind me and could see all of the colorful marks on my legs. He asked John if he had a good farrier. John said yes, that he did. Jimmy replied, "Well you need to get him to shoe her off of her knees!" and broke into his signature laugh. We love Jimmy and Helen. Great people and more fun than a barrel of monkeys to travel with.

Today we are traveling through Idaho. We will stop close to Boise in Mountain Home for the night. We left Jackson at 9:00 and headed up to Teton Pass. I'm still not sure what the elevation was up there but it was a 10% incline on the way up and on the way down. Mary handled it like a champ. Once I realized how high we were I made the dash to let the air out of the bed again. This time I caught it before it got to 100! It has been a beautiful drive today. Idaho is a pretty state. We are only one state away from my home state now. Tomorrow we will pass through Boise and into Ontario, Oregon on Highway 20 which will take us across the state. I don't get homesick at all but I always get excited when I know I'm going to visit. It is a spectacular state and there is still a lot of it that John hasn't seen.

That is it for me today. I'm ready to put my laptop down and cruise the rest of the way into Mountain Home. I hope you have had a great Sunday! My next post will probably be once we get settled in Springfield at the Arcuri's place...our Oregon retreat! They are some of our favorite people in the world and we can't wait to get there!

Here is the address for our last web album on Triangle X: http://picasaweb.google.com/tagfish1/MemoriesOfTriangleX?authkey=6UI4q1AUB7w#

Bald Eagle on our float trip

PS. I haven't found the Yellowstone BUG yet but I know he managed to stow away in my luggage and is probably taken up residence in Mary somewhere. Stay tuned...