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Re: [RC] Cooley Ranch ride - patriciaIf you read Sheila's story below, I was the "ride buddy who pulled". And I was shocked that she threw the saddle on in seconds and was yelling her good byes over her shoulder as she hurried to the starting line. Even though I didn't ride, I will say that my husband and I still enjoyed the heck out of the camping and the amazing care we all got from the ride management. They busted their @#*'s for all of us and I didn't see anyone who didn't appreciate it, pull or not. Un cooperative weather, but wonderful experience all the same, and I will also be back next year. Thanks to Ruthie and Ron and let's not forget Merryben who made it to the ride in spite of hardly being able to walk on an injured leg. (But would you expect anything else from Merryben???) Patricia Life isn't measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the moments that take our breath away! From: Ridecamp Guest <guest-owner@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> Date: Mon, 20 Jun 2005 06:32:34 GMT To: <ridecamp@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> Subject: [RC] Cooley Ranch ride Please Reply to: sheila kumar paintmypony@xxxxxxxxx or ridecamp@xxxxxxxxxxxxx ========================================== Here is my story about the Cooley Ranch ride this past weekend. I had been looking forward to this ride since I did it last year on my then new gelding, Neymo.I enjoyed it so much, I wanted to see if we would do any better after a year of working on the "slow down" cue! But alas it was not meant to be for him. One of his pasture mates bit a nice chunk out of his skin right under the saddle a week and a half ago. I had been dressing it and icing it and hoping he would not be ouchy by Thursday before the ride. I saddled him up on Thursay and took him out for half an hour and we came back with an ouchy back. So back to icing and lay up. My lovely (QH)mare stepped up to the plate and agreed to do the 50 mile with me. People always ask me if she is half Arab. I tell them only the mental half is, all the rest is Registered American Paint horse! She is so happy to be out there showing off her stuff and competing for that completion. In her mind the sooner she gets back to camp, the sooner she can eat! Back to the Cooley ride. I had agreed to haul a Dick Carter's horse who was going to be ridden by Barbara White. After 4 hours of stop and go traffic in the rain, I got to ride camp. I handed over the horse I was hauling to Barbara and heaved a sigh of relief because I am nervous taking someone else's horse in my trailer with my supreme driving talent! They were almost full up at camp and Ron had to haul me up through the mud with his tractor to be able to park in a decent spot. Some people had to park on the access road. The rain kept us wet on and off through the evening. I checked in and vetted my horse and looked around for a porta potty only to be told that they were delayed in arriving. By late evening there was no sign of any porta potties!! I discovered new uses for cat litter!! Thank God for those portable miniscule camp potties. After a wonderful dinner with some friends we headed off to the ride meeting. Ruthie said the trails were not terrible and told us all to be careful and have a good time. It rained all through the night. The mud turned into soup! I got up at 4:30AM and woke up my riding buddy. She was in two minds whether to ride or not. We trudged through the soup to get to the lovely 'Coffee cart' that had hot steaming coffee and got our coffee at 5AM. She then went over to Maryben and told her she was pulling. A few people had pulled already. I was still in two minds. She then asked Ron if he would help haul her out with the tractor after the riders had left at 7AM. I had still not decided and went over to the start to wave the brave souls on. I told Ruthie I may be pulling and she said that was fine. Twenty minutes of watching the riders at the start, I could not stand to just go home after what I had been through to get there. I started to talk myself into riding. What was endurance anyway if you could not stand a little mud, a little rain, a little whatever..! My horse and I were not made of powder, we would not melt. And watching poor Ruthie standing in the rain taking numbers and trying to keep her clipboard from soaking just gave me the push I needed to show (myself) that I could ride this ride in the mud and rain and come out of it with no falls or injuries. So I ran back to my trailer and grabbed my surprised horse and threw the saddle on her back put her bridle on and hopped on. My friend who was trying to move my corral panels to get her rig out was so shocked. I go back out to the start and poor Ruthie was still there with her clipboard. I called out to her and told her I just had to go and ride in the rain. She told me to be careful and waved me on. I was going out an almost an hour after start time. We walked carfully through the mud and slush and even passed a few people to my mare's utter happiness. She thought we were on the wrong trails at the get go because there was nobody to snort and pass! Then we caught up to Peggy who I had ridden with before and we got to chatting and we rode the whole wet, slushy ride together. It was one long trail ride. We must have only trotted for about 10 minutes in all. I decided to downgrade to the 25 because I was not too thrilled to be out there all that longer because I was still on Antibiotics for my sinus infection!! Since my original riding buddy pulled, I had no crew bag at the vet check. (Her husband had the crew bags in the truck).My horse was so unhappy that I would not let her attack every bucket in sight.Peggy was so nice to share her food with us and my mare was once again a happy camper. I shared my chocolate covered raisins with Peggy and we were rejuvinated for the trudge back home on the oh so soupy trails. We finished our rides without any harm to either of the horses. Her horse tried to buck a few times because he was pretty fed up with this trail ride. He was under the impression that this was an endurance ride and we were supposed to move out!! We did endure and had a whale of a time and I enjoyed every minute of it. Thank you Ruthie for everything. We will be back next year. PS. The porta potties did show up by the time we came back to camp. Sheila and the ever hungry Gambling feather(aka Cassy) =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Ridecamp is a service of Endurance Net, http://www.endurance.net. 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