Saturday morning. Round-up. Rodney the farrier came to do half a dozen horses, and Dave and I geared up to lead a ride, just a two hour on the ranch. I can see how these can get mundane, but with 3500 acres to explore and awesome views of the Sangres, I haven’t gotten sick of them yet. Plus I like having a critter between my legs and the more time I spend in the saddle the gooder I’m gonna get.

That afternoon there wasn’t anything going on, and I’ve finally gotten the itch back to play some cards so I headed to my bar in town, Poag’s. I discovered their couch in the back, plugged in and plopped down. I put in a good four plus hour session, playing a bunch of $50+5 turbo SNG’s and one table of $1-2 NLHE. I won my first 3 sngs and stacked a guy AA>JJ aipf. Mmm this poker stuff can be fun. I quit somewhere around 6:30, up about $1300, leaving myself enough time to eat some food before going to see Toy Story 3 at the Jones Theatre in town.

It was the last showing before the movie left the theatre. It was also the 2nd showing. The first was Friday night. I don’t think I’ll ever get totally used to small town living, but I do enjoy and appreciate it, possibly even prefer it. I dunno yet. Right at the climax of the movie, the audio just died. The seventy people in the audience all said awwww, and patiently waited for them to get it fixed, which they did. Good flick. I headed back to the ranch, got a good night’s sleep, and woke up Sunday morning for round-up.

Sunday looked much like Saturday with a ride in the morning and the afternoon off. The good day at the tables yesterday gave me plenty of motivation to play this afternoon too. Since I put on my last pair of socks that morning it was time for laundry. I went over to Dave and Michelle’s place, put in a load, took a shower, and was playing online by 2pm. I hadn’t played a Sunday online in over a month, so it actually kinda felt good to be playing again. That is until I started getting hands (poker, obv) shoved up my ass. I was stuck pretty good until I closed out the night winning 3 sng’s in a row making me a small winner in cash and medium loser in tourneys. I felt good with how I was playing and am slowly getting ready to get back on the grind.

When I got back to the ranch we had 5 voice mails form people who wanted to ride Monday morning. We only had one morning ride on the schedule, and since I didn’t check them until after I was done sitting around the campfire, they didn’t get called back until the morning. They all showed up, including another group in the afternoon. Barb and I took out a group of 9 in the morning, then Mike and I took out a group of 11 in the afternoon.

It was a strange day. I mean, I guess on any given day when you are woken up by horse poop being thrown at your window, it just has to be odd. Very Friday the 13th-ish or full moon-esque. More horses spooking at weird things than ever before, customers dropping water bottles like they were two year olds in high chairs playing fetch with their parents, a baby rattlesnake in a bush right after a gate that fortunately zero of the 14 horses in the vicinity stepped on (and all moved away calmly when I spotted it). When we finished the afternoon ride this lady from the Forest Service approached me saying she had a question. I told her I might have an answer. I can’t imagine that dealing with the Forest Service is ever a truly pleasant experience, since they are our regulatory authorities and all. She told me that somebody got a flat tire on the highway, quarter mile down to the left, and they don’t have a star to get the lugs off. Yeah, we got stars aka 4-ways, and I’ll be there as soon as I’m done taking care of these clients.

I pull a jack and 4-way out of one of the trucks and head to the highway. I see their vehicle parked mostly in the entire Westbound lane of a two lane highway. Makes more sense than pulling off the road into the grass obviously. Course what are you to expect from some city folk who can’t change their own tire?

Really long story short, they had all the necessary tools there themselves. The “star” that they were referring to was like a star bit, not a 4-way, to remove what they thought were the lugs. This Volkswagen had 5 individual lug nut covers, all with a star shaped hole in the middle that they assumed must be the lugs. I whip out my Leatherman, peel off the lug covers, get the tire changed, and send them to Westcliffe Petroleum to get the tire fixed. We take care of our neighbors out here in the country. Turns out that the vehicle owner just bought a cabin on another county road in the area.

Immediately after that I headed to town to eat, I didn’t have a chance to have lunch due to the big rides that day. I walked into Poag’s, and immediately felt tension in the air that lasted until I finally had enough and left a few hours later. I played 4 tables of cash for 3 hours, salvaging a big losing session in the last 15 minutes with a couple of stackings. Only lost $300. In the first hour I got stuck about that much, even with flopping a straight flush, rivering a royal that I barreled the draw twice on, and getting a stake share of the bad beat jackpot hit at another 1-2 table that I wasn’t on. Although, now that I think about it.. I might not have been playing at any jackpot tables at the time so might not have even gotten the $62. Made it back to the ranch early, finished the “Bible” of pack horses, and got another good night’s sleep.

Tuesday morning I made it awake before the barrage of horse shit, before anybody else in fact, and headed into the catch pen with two halters. I found it very strange that Rudy was in one corner and Mariah was in the opposite, closest to the trees in West. She was pacing along the fence line. She usually comes to us since she loves round-up so much. I decided to catch Rudy first since he can be a pain, and I expected her to walk to me by then anyways. She didn’t, and after Rudy let me give him some lovin’, he realized that I didn’t have apple snacks and walked away. At least he was heading for Mariah in the other corner. He stopped just short of her, let me put on the halter, and then I saw one of our big black horses walking toward me in the corner of the catch pen from the trees in West. His front left leg looked strange, like it had been wrapped in red medical bandage. I quickly realized that this wasn’t the case, the red was blood and what I thought was fabric was a big chunk of flesh hanging off the bone. Blood had soaked his entire front leg crimson. I could see it flowing copiously and reflecting in the morning light. Fortunately I had the phone in my back pocket and called Dave.

“Morning. You have a fucked up horse here, and I don’t know what to do. I think it’s Ranger but I’m not sure. Well, he’s walking along the fenceline back to the corral so I’ll pick him up there and get him somewhere safe. See you in a bit.” I haltered Mariah, led her and Rudy into the corral, and Ranger was standing in the holding pen still gushing blood. I got a halter on him, lead him into the round pen, tied him up short, and took a closer look at the wound. It looked like he ran through a fence with lots small barbed wire cuts, but nothing compared to the wound on his upper leg. It was a good six inches long, couple wide, and the entire chunk of muscle and flesh was like a flap open all the way to the bone.

Ranger, aka Lone Ranger, is new to the herd this year. He was given to a friend of the ranch Deb, who wanted to use him on the ranch, but after two rides he was deemed unusable even for a guide horse, and being 25 years old, there was no interest in our buying him. Nobody in the herd likes him, he’s quite spooky, and generally stands off on his own, hence the name. We assume that he must have been chased into a fence because he’s not aggressive or flighty. Dave showed up shortly after we got him secured, and it took the three of us to keep him held so Dave could wrap the wound. He did his best to put a clean cloth over the flap, putting it back in place as good as possible, and then wrapped it in horse medical tape. He then went about trying to get a hold of Deb and the vet figuring out what to do next, and when I left this morning it was still up in the air.

I came to town, had breakfast, talked with my manager Katie a bit about an audition for the WPT on camera role that I’ve been invited to, and I booked a flight back to Vegas for that week so I can be in LA in person for the audition. I feel like it’s something I can do well with a little coaching and help, and I intend on giving it my best shot. I hope they don’t make me shave my beard off. I’ll come back on the 20th, gear up for a 5 day pack trip leaving on the 23rd, and then think about coming back sometime in September. It’ll be good to spend a few days at home I think.

Peace and good luck,

Devo

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Wednesday morning we woke up, did round-up, and saddled horses for the two rides going out that morning, both couples, one on a 2hr and another on a ranch day ride. Rick and I were the first two up, we walked into the catch pen to catch us some horses, saddled them up, and walked into West. I asked him how much riding experience he had going fast. He said none. So, I gave him the same speech that Mike gave me, hopefully scaring the bejezus out of him too. I gave him the easy route, and according to Mike on the radio he did great. Molly almost slipped him but he cut her off and herded her in.

Then that morning Mike lead the day ride while Rick and I did the two hour. It was good and solid, a nice fun ride. I was all excited to ride for another four hours up to Grouse Peak and back, but Rick claimed that he couldn’t do more than another hour in the saddle. Thus we headed to town, ran errands, had lunch, and talked Dave into teaching me how to fly fish. We waited for Mike to return to help him finish up his trip and see if he wanted to go, which he did.

We headed to San Isabel, about twenty miles south of us in the Wet Mountains. On the way is Bishop’s Castle, a literal castle built by hand over the past thirty years by a crazy mid 50’s feller named Jim Bishop. He lets people cruise around and check things out on a true donation basis. Rick’s head exploded and it was neat to check out, especially the new things he’s built in the seven years since I’ve been there.

From there we continued to the reservoir and Dave taught me how to fly fish. First cast with a fly it hits the water with a nice presentation, a trout hits it instantly, and I set the hook like I have all my life, like I’m hookin’ a largemouth bass. I snapped the fly right off in his lips, Dave giggled a bit, and taught me how to set hooks. I did it a few times that day, landing 3 real ones and one about four inches, missing way more. I caught the fever. We had dinner in the small town, headed back to the ranch, played a little cribbage, and then hit the sack. Rick was leaving at 2am for a 6:30am flight from Denver.

The following morning we rounded up, got four horses ready for a pack-in Dave was doing to my favorite place, South Colony Basin. Sadly I couldn’t go due to a lack of horses, so instead Mike and I went to breakfast, and then I went fishing all day. First I went to Lake DeWesse, didn’t see or catch anything, and then decided to head down to the Arkansas River. When I got there it was chocolate milk (due to recent heavy rains), and I turned right around to go back to Lake Isabel. I netted 11 fish in a few hours, nobody else caught anything, and I enjoyed a day to myself that I haven’t had in a while.

Friday, same morning routine, and then Dave and I led a 2hr trail ride for 6 people. So sweet being out there on horseback. I just love it. We took care of some loose ends, played some cribbage, and then headed out to pick up the 5 day coming in. Back to the ranch, clean everything up, and now I’m sitting at the bar of Cel Dor Asado waiting for Barb and whoever else to show up. I’ve finished this blog while waiting. Kinda worried.

Peace and good luck

Devo

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Saturday morning we didn’t have anything going on except the farrier showing up at 9am. We had to round them up for that, but didn’t have any rides going out that day so I intended on sleeping in. I made it to 6:40am. I haven’t used a watch or an alarm clock in 3 weeks now and it feels great. I woke up bright eyed and bushy tailed, slightly annoyed that I couldn’t sleep in past 7am. I’m truly a different person here and way happier.

Since I was the first one up and fog was hanging over the Wets I decided to go for a drive. I needed to pick up some milk if I wanted to have breakfast, I figured I would do both in town. It was absolutely beautiful.

I pulled over to shoot this last one, sunrise on our four closest 14ers, and just as I was about to shoot those two bucks walked right in front of me. Awesome. The scraggly peaks are Crestone Needle and Peak, two thousand foot cliff faces sticking straight out of South Colony Basin, my favorite place I have ever been. I enjoyed breakfast, went to the market, went to Ace to fix my spud gun and buy a can of ether, and back to the ranch. We chilled out for a bit, taking care of loose ends here and there. We worked with Little Bit for a while on being picketed out since she was going on the 5 day this week, and we never got her to take being tied up to a long rope well. Hopefully she’s fine in the high country. After the work was done, it was time to play, and out came the spud gun. Alicia was aiming for Rudy. She missed, but we sure got a good amount of what the?!? looks out of that goofy horse.

That evening we had her going away party at Dave and Michelle’s house. It was a really nice time with some really awesome people, and I’m sad she’s headed back to school so early in the summer.

Dave and his son Wesley

Post dinner pipe. I am a fashion guru.

Sunday we had two rides going out. I was going to do one, Dave was going to do the other, and Mike had the pleasure of shoeing the two horses that the farrier wouldn’t touch. I took the morning two hour, a man named Steve and his grandson Cameron. This was the second time the kid had ridden, the first being earlier in the week, and he was a natural. I had him loping by the end of the ride. I hit a home run, showing them everything they wanted to see, teaching them much they didn’t know, and I gave the kid the first Mule Deer antler shed that I found this year, a really nice four pointer. I got stiffed.

After munching a salami sandwich I went to helping mike shoe Marguerite. The farrier won’t touch her for a good reason. We had to cross tie her to two halters on a trailer, and then had to tie up her back foot to even start to get nails driven. Man she’s a PITA. She eventually put up such a fight that she ended up laying on the ground, four legs sticking four different directions, and this was fine since she got herself to a point where she couldn’t move. Tap tap tap and the first hind shoe was done. “You sure like to do things the hard way, knot head,” said Mike as we both giggled at her solo game of Twister. On to the second shoe.

She stood there and held her leg up nice and proper. Learned a lesson eh Marge?

That afternoon Mike and I headed to town, he took a shower while I picked up some stuff that the food getter for the Ultimate forgot, and then we went to Cowboy Church. The music was many of the contemporary classics that I knew well, and it was refreshing to hear the pastor say, “Religion is crap.” Which it is, it has nothing to do with the relationship that Jesus always talked about, and it’s permiated the modern church to the point that I went from being a youth pastor to a professional gambler who holds a disdain for the church. Jesus never talked about going to church, he talked about being the church. Church isn’t a place, it isn’t a bulilding, it isn’t something you go to. It’s something you are, and it’s been a long time since I’ve found that.

Afterwards we went to R’s pizza, and our order got punted so bad that our entire meal was comped, beer included. Susan (girl I met at the dome last week) showed up, we headed back to the ranch, drank an awesome bottle of Sauvignon Blanc watching the sunset, and that turned into watching thunderstorms roll in. Mike moved into Alicia’s cabin, and then I got to move into the Penthouse. It took all of about fifteen minutes. I’ve thoroughly missed living simply and it feels sooooo good to be content with the little that I have out here. We made a campfire, Mike finished up settling in, and her sister and dude came up. We hung out around the fire until after midnight, the latest I’ve been up since I hit the road three weeks ago.

Monday morning we were up nice and early to round up the herd and get them ready to go on the 5 day Ultimate. Mike and I had a good time gettin them in, and then we went to work prepping 14 horses. Many hands make light work, Dave arrived in the van full of customers, and we were on the road around 9:30. Drove to Gibson trailhead, packed the horses, taught the custies how to ride in high country, and had them on their way shortly after noon. It’s amazing how much work goes into one of these trips. I met Susan back at the ranch for a day date that consisted of spending time in Canon City, waiting for Fuller to show up.

We had lunch at this Irish brewery on Main Street downtown, and it was pretty dang good. McClellans I believe it was called. After lunch we walked around a bit, first place we stopped was this amateur art gallery, and I found three pieces that I liked for $205 total. I paid with my platinum card, the dude wrapped up the art, and he handed me the credit card clip to sign. It didn’t have a line to sign on. Where should I sign? Wait… it says declined. Hmm. It just worked across the street. I check my bank account online, funds are sufficient, I tell him, and say I’ll call my bank while you work on that. My bank says everything is fine. He runs the card again. Declined. Thrice, declined. I politely tell him that there’s something wrong with his machine cause there’s certainly nothing wrong with my card, he gives me a look like he doesn’t believe me, and I walk out of the place.

We drive down the road to The Abbey vineyard for some wine tasting. Complimentary except for their reserves, which are $1 each. $4 for fourteen wines. We enjoyed the afternoon watching the thunderstorms roll in, I bought a case of mixed wines, and was very much impressed.

Since the art gallery didn’t want my business, I decided to stop into the fly shop in town. I’ve always wanted to learn how to fly fish, and since I’m around these awesome trout fisheries so often and am working for an expert fly fisherman, I figured I would buy me a set-up. $500 later on my platinum card that worked just fine, we went to dinner. We ended up at some Mexican joint off Main that had a full parking lot, always a good sign in a small town, and then we ended up at my favorite bar I’ve ever been in, My Brother’s Place. Three quarters rafters and the rest bikers during the summer, I love this bar and we posted up there for less than an hour before Fuller showed up. Good to see the guy, we have another beer, and then I lead him back to the ranch. I offer him the loft in my Penthouse, the Hobbit Hole, and my vacant tent, and he takes one of the bunks in the Bunkhouse. He wakes up to a similar greeting that I experienced my first morning.

“Who the hell are you?” Mike asked him. LOL at least he’s consistent.

After round-up and saddling, Susan showed up and we were ready for an adventure. We intended on doing a day ride in the Sangre’s, but we didn’t have proper horses and didn’t want to do a ranch ride. Rick wanted to get up into the high country, so up we went, and I chose Hermit Basin to head into due to the 4WD road that gets up to treeline. I’ve heard it goes higher but haven’t tried it late enough in the season to find out, every time I’ve been up it’s been blocked by snow. It wasn’t the case today. We drove all the way too the upper lake, parked the truck somewhere around 12,000 feet, and went for a hike.

Finally put some faces to the Marmots that I heard in the high country. They’re my favorite critters out here, not as curious here as I’ve experienced them elsewhere, but still cute as hell.

After walking around the lake we continued up the road, hoping to make it to the ridge separating Hermit basin that we were in and North Taylor basin. I’ve always heard about the wreckage from a B-25 bomber that crashed there shortly after WWII, and I was hoping we could glass down and see some of it. We did. Lots of melted alumninum, and were far enough away that we couldn’t see much, but it was neat to see and being that high up is always awesome.

The silver spot in the bottom is part of the wreckage. From there we continued on up to the backbone of the range, had a picnic, and called it an awesome day.

Peace and good luck,

Devo

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Wednesday morning was the girl scouts’ last day on the ranch.  Mark and I started round-up at 7:30am.  Rudy’s become a staple for round-up while the rest of the herd (and most of our stronger horses) are in the Sangre’s on a 5 day Ultimate Pack Trip.  Blaze, and old boy who was born and raised on this ranch, was awesome for a number of years but has been a PITA to catch lately.  He was fine on Monday and Tuesday, but today he decided he didn’t want to be caught.  Mark, a guy who’s been around this ranch since 1986 after establishing a partnership between them and his whitewater outfitting company in the northeast, has been here with his wife Barbara all week.  They show up for 1-3 weeks every summer and hang out, helping out where needed, and with Dave, Mike, and Alicia in the high country their help was much needed.  Mark decided that he’d take Blaze, so I got Rudy.  Nice choice kid.  I put my halter on Rudy no problem, Blaze decided he wasn’t going to get caught.  It took him until I saddled Rudy and mounted him in the catch pen for Blaze to let Mark catch him.  Round-up was smooth, Mark got most of them as I went into the far woods and only found a useless Paint and colt.

The ride that morning was a girl scouts trail ride, and since my search for socks that morning failed and I was wearing the ones I wore yesterday I decided to sit that one out.  I went over to Dave and Michelle’s house, spent some time with Michelle’s Dad who was in town, very Alabama, and cracked his first beer at 10am.  I did my laundry, took a shower, and was back at the ranch at 12:45 in time for the afternoon ride.  It was a family from the Springs, mom, dad, sister, college aged son and daughter.  They were a good group and Mark and I instantly were excited to take them out.  It’s awesome having groups of competent adults that you can move fast with, it really feels zero like work.  Mark’s horse, who happened to be Gary the ranch owner’s horse, came up lame for the 2nd day in a row and I took the group by myself for more than the 2nd half of the trip.  I learned some things about gate locations (ie the absence of them) as I took them for quite a detour along a fence line, but the group was awesome and I didn’t have shit to do so we enjoyed a longer ride.

That night I went to town for dinner and some relaxing.  I ate at the Feed Store, which used to be a feed store but is now a restaurant, and enjoyed a delicious Oriental chicken salad.  From there I went to Poag’s, and it was invaded in no time by the jazz camp.  30-40 kids, aged 13-19, and half a dozen instructors set up shop there.  They played and played and I was so impressed that I made a donation to their scholarship fund.  After a while I decided to stop into the Dome and sniff around a bit.  There were less than ten people there, but that’s okay because one of my favorite things about these trips is meeting locals in local’s bars.

I sat next to a man named Jim who’s a rancher here in the (Wet) Valley.  We talked about hay and I thoroughly enjoyed the conversation (seriously) and then he got up to go talk to his wife.  There was a young good lookin woman sitting next to him that I couldn’t help myself but ask her name.  We spent the next two hours chattin and I was glad that I decidced to take a detour to the Dome.

Thursday morning round-up was early since Barb and I was leading a trip up to the Lakes of the Clouds.  On the way she listened to a voice mail that said happy birthday, and bwahahahaha her secret was blown and I was going to do my best to keep it blown.  We met the clients in town, drove to the Gibson trailhead, unloaded horses, and since it was just a day ride we didn’t have to do much but saddle-up and ride.  There are three lakes, and we tied up at the lower lake, set up lunch, and then the two married couples were ready to fish.  I wanted to hike up to the middle and upper lakes, the dudes decided to join me, and I’ll let the pictures tell the rest.

<a href=”http://smg.photobucket.com/albums/v229/maverickusc/?action=view&current=PlayingCowboyLakesoftheClouds0541600×1200.jpg” target=”_blank”><img src=”http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v229/maverickusc/PlayingCowboyLakesoftheClouds0541600×1200.jpg” border=”0″ alt=”Photobucket”></a>

It was an amazing day.  We were late coming back, but that was okay since we were loving it just as much as our custies were.  We made it back to the ranch somewhere around 7:45pm, unloaded, put the horses to pastures, and then we high tailed it down to town for a birthday dinner at Sangrita.  It was delish, we had awesome conversation, Barb took off early before she turned into a pumpkin, I headed to Poag’s for a beer, and made it to bed before 11pm, which has turned into pretty late these days .

Friday morning I sat out round-up and didn’t mind so I could enjoy a cup of coffee, I drove my truck around the ranch squawkin on the radio tellin Mark and Barb where horses were.  We had a 10am trail ride, three girls from New Orleans, they started prissy and turned into troopers, and it was also an enjoyable ride.  That afternoon we herded some horses from North ranch to the corral, pulled four of them some reason that I still don’t get, and then herded them back.  Three riders drove them and three of us in three vehicles drove on the road and were supposed to keep them from going down the wrong roads.  It was a ton of fun turning my truck into a cutting horse, but quite intense and scary thinking that the pair that slipped the gate might run onto the highway.  They didn’t, turned into the ranch instead of heading straight, and by that time we were ready to go pick up the group coming out from a five day Ultimate.
We hung at the Commanche/Venable trailhead for about half an hour in the rain waiting for them, and then when they (14 horses and nine people) showed it turned into controlled rainy chaos for a while.  It didn’t take us long to get rolling, back across the valley to the Ranch, unload quickly, shower, and down the hill to where I’m writing now.  Mike, Alicia, Mark, Barbara, Barb, and I are just finishing up dinner at Sangrita, and life is quite awesome.

Peace and good luck,

Devo

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Saturday, my birthday, we somehow didn’t have any rides going out at all. The break was welcome to everybody on staff however, and gave us an opportunity to catch up on some things and take it easy all day. We did some trailer repair fixing a broken leaf spring, which consisted of us blasting country music out of the ranch truck while the rest of us watched one person work. I cracked my first beer sometime around 11am. We played a game of Skip-Bo and I shellacked ‘em. After the work was done, Alisha (correction: ah-LISH-ah), Mike, and myself headed to A Painted View for some big cutting competion.

The job of a cutting horse is to cut cows from a herd and keep them away. Cows have a strong herd instinct, so when you separate one form the herd they work hard to get back to it. The rider gets 2:30 to work, rides into the herd, cuts one out, and then keeps out as long as possible. The harder the cow works the horse the more opportunity the horse has to perform and thus higher scores are possible. It was impressive watching these big dollar horses work. Very strong, quick, and agile. After a bit we headed back to the ranch to clean up.

After some showers we headed to town. Mike bought me dinner at this restaurant owned by a Uruguayan family called Cel Dor Asado. It was the size of a standard old town downtown bar, but behind the bar was the grill, and it was a wood grill. Two side by side grills fed by a stack of buring wood above it. The wood would turn into coal, then be spread under the grills, and the food was amazing. I ordered a 12oz ribeye and whatever they seasoned it was uniquely delicious and the meat was incredibly tender. Gotta love Colorado beef prepared and cooked awesomely.

Then to next door, Poag Mahone’s, the Irish (nice) bar in town. They let us play poker for money in the back, and after I punted my $1 SNG stack I hopped on the karaoke list. The party fizzled shortly after 10pm. Ranch time is way different than Vegas time. Makes sense though when round-up is at 6am the next day. That didn’t keep Mike and I from continuing though, and with Alicia driving we were free to booze it up. A little while longer we went up to The Dome, the not nice cowboy bar up the road that you’ll never catch a tourist in. I like it there. I finally talked them into leaving shortly after midnight, and we hit the sack hard.

Ugh that morning sucked. Mike hollered at me that it was round-up time, and I refused to exit my tent. I needed another 45 minutes. I came out just as they started saddling horses, helped them finish, and then Dave and I hit the road early to pack out the group that we packed into the Horn Basin last Sunday. Six horses; 3 riders and 3 packers. Therefore on the way up Dave and I ponied two each, shortly before the top we found the group headed down, said hello, and then rode to their camp where the fourth guy with knee problems was waiting. We packed the packers, gave Tom a riding lesson, and then headed back down the hill. We had a couple of almost hairy situations. Dave’s string tried to take different paths around a tree, but Little Bit, a young but very intelligent and talented horse stopped just in time and waited. Good girl for her first week doing pack trips. Banjo who I was ponying was a pain in the ass, kept stopping to eat sometimes and trying to pass me on others. I told him that I was going to pull his rope so short that his nose gets pooped on (by my horse), he tried to eat again, which rips the rope out of my hand and is a general bad horse habit, and he got put on the short rope, and his nose got pooped on. Then when we stopped by some hikers, he squeezed himself next to my horse between two trees, and being a loaded packer he was a double wide. It was almost quite a wreck. Could have been yard sale, but after some ass kicking he finally backed up out of the gnarly situation. We made it down the hill, received a $50 tip each for our two days of work, and went back to the ranch.

When we got there, the girl scouts from Iowa had arrived. 9 of them and one leader here to do a modified version of Cowboy Camp. Cowgirl Camp I guess. I was going to be involved with this trip rather than the 5 day ultimate trip going out in the morning. It’s Alicia’s last week on the ranch and she hasn’t been on one of the long trips yet, so I gave up my spot for her figuring that I’ll catch one later in August.

Monday morning we did round-up, saddled 13 horses for the 5 day, and I went with them to the trailhead to help with logistics and drive a vehicle back. I returned and headed to the arena to work with the girls on team swording. That’s where you have two riders and a herd of cows and/or calves. The object is to cut the cows from the herd in a specific order, get them to the other half of the pen without the others coming, and do this for all the cows as fast as possible. One rider goes in to cut then drive to the other side while the other rider keeps the herd from coming with or escaping across. Then they switch. It was a blast. Cooked em dinner, had a short campfire, and then I hit the sack around 9:30 and read The Fountainhead for about an hour. I’ve been reading that thing for a couple of months, love it, and am barely half way through.

Tuesday morning Barb and I did round-up and I kicked all kinds of ass. Before we put them to pasture the night before I put the bell of shame on Ashley, the horse that likes to play hide and go seek. OMG that thing is awesome. It’s a halter with a cowbell instead of a lead rope. Apparently this pattern has been going on for years, she hides a bunch, they get sick of it and strap on the cowbell, and eventually she gets sick of that so comes in for round-up nice and easy like most of the rest of them. It seems to have worked today as I found the entire herd in South, and although Ashley was the last one to come in, she didn’t dart off into the trees once we hit West like she usually does. She thought about it, but I was on her ass and she had a bell cowbellin’ loudly with every step she took dangling under her chin. As I headed into South, Barb cut through the trees to check that side, and by the time she came out of the trees I had every single horse in the back corral and was tying up my pony. It was fun to teasingly ask if she enjoyed her trail ride.

We then headed to Cowgirl Camp for breakfast, drove them back to the ranch, and they saddled up preparing for a day ride up to Grouse Peak, several miles and a few thousand feet above the ranch. It was a very cool ride.

Barb is awesome, a very sweet woman, and we led the ride together to the summit. Where we stopped the horses and had lunch wasn’t quite the summit, so we led a hike the rest of the way with the girls that wanted to, and the views were incredibly panoramic.

Before we called it a day we taught the girls how to barrel race in the arena. Little Bit is turning into a helluva horse quickly and put in the best time hands down, and it was amazing watching her learn quickly in the several runs she did. I had a great time today and since I won’t be playing Legends, who knows how long I’ll be here.

Peace and good luck,

Devo

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I’m sitting here on a Friday afternoon at the ranch trying to come up with what I did on Tuesday and can’t for the life of me.  It feels like aeons ago.  Every day here is so exciting, and the excitement comes not from artifical things that we generally consider entertainment, but it comes from the everyday mundane that is life on a ranch.  That’s just it, this is living life to the ranchers out here.

Tuesday afternoon Mike and I headed into town for dinner.  I wanted to buy as an apology for the day before and to get to know the guy a bit.  He’s quite an amazing dude, having lived much life in his 49 years.  He’s been a cowboy all his life, rode bulls in rodeos all over the western US from 15 to 23, and I feel like I’ve just started to scratch the surface on the stories he holds.  We ate at this place in town called Sangria or Sangrita or something like that and it was delicious.  Walked across the street to the nice bar in town, had a couple of beers, and then stopped by the Mining Company on the way out.  It was music night there.  The place is gas station, restaurant, bar, and that night it felt like the AARP open mic music night.  Mike was the 2nd youngest person in the place.  Hung out there for a bit, headed back to the ranch, sat around a campfire, and then hit the hay early.

My body’s adjusted quickly to this sleep schedule, but not so much to the lifestyle.  I’m out of shape.  And since I’m learning a lot of things quickly, I’m not very good at what I’m doing and making mistakes, and mistakes on the ranch usually involve injuries.  Wednesday morning we headed out to do round-up and missed some horses.  We had to go back out and Mariah wasn’t too happy about this.  I think she woke up on the wrong side of the pasture that morning.  Mike found them and hollered at me on radio to head back.  I was in the trees and turned around, breaking into a gallop.  She started running really fast and I was cool with this since it was fun and we were on a trail.  Then she decided to leave the trail and run under some Ponderosas.  The branches were tall enough to let a horse under just fine, but not so much with a rider on top.  I took a thick one off the top of my head that damn near knocked me out of my saddle.  The world was spinning as I fought to keep my balance and slow a fast moving horse down in trees.  I dismounted, recovered my hat with a sweet bash where I blocked the tree with the top of my head, and made it back to the ranch with a splitting headache.

We did two hour long rides in the morning.  They came from a new Christian conference center across the valley called Hermit Basin.  They showed up insanely late, both groups, and neither tipped.  I don’t get it.  They were like that in my experience on the river too.  So frustrating.  After lunch Dave and I headed over to Cowboy Camp to get it ready for our surf and turf group that was coming out of the high country and into camp that afternoon.  Mike went to pick em up at Gibson trailhead while Dave and I got the kitchen in the yurt ready, tightened ropes on the canvas tents, and put bottom sheets and pillows on the foam mattresses.

They returned with their two trucks and trailers loaded with 13 horses, we put everything away and the horses to pasture, and it took no time because the group was intensely helpful.  They were two groups of three, one couple with their college aged son, and one couple in thier twenties with her mother.  We headed to Cowboy Camp, cooked up some dinner, and enjoyed life for the afternoon.  I enjoyed some Bud Light and Cornhole.  Started a fire, I jammed the guitar a bit, and I was in bed by 10:30.

Thursday I received a much needed day off from kicking my body’s ass.  I drove the van taking the group down to the river.  Being at a rafting base camp made me a bit nostalgic, and definitely sad that my knee wasn’t better.  I love paddling.  After they started floating down the Arkansas river, I headed into Canon City for breakfast and an electrical outlet.  I sat in this cafe for a couple of hours, played a dozen sit-n-go’s on Ultimate Bet, and then headed across the street to a Western Wear place, buying 4 long sleeved shirts and a hat to replace the one I left at home.  I then went back into Bighorn Canyon to sit by the river and wait for them to float by, eventually picking them up at Parkdale just above the mouth of the Royal Gorge.  Since our shower was broken at Cowboy Camp we stopped by a campground to shower on the way back, and I got clean for the first time since Saturday.  It felt great.

Back in Cowboy camp we did some more hanging out, ate more of Alicia’s awesome food, and then started a fire.  Barb brought two guitars, her freind Roy brought a guitar and a fiddle, I had my guitar, mandolin, and djembe, and we used them all.  It was the awesomest campfire jam session I’ve ever been a part of.  We emptied a couple bottles of whiskey and boxed wine, drank the rest of the beer, and realized we should probably get to bed when it was after 11pm.  Most excellent time.

Friday morning on round-up I discovered Ashley’s hide and go seek tendencies.  She’s a horse who thinks it’s a game.  She knows that it’s round-up time, and she goes when you get to her, but she makes that a challenge.  Dave used to hang a bell around her neck she was so notorious about hiding in the woods but she hasn’t been doing it lately.  She did today.  I saw her with a few others in the woods, cut up hill to drive them to the corral, and she darted off the other direction into the thickest woods in the West pen.  Took me a while to get to her, and when I did she jogged off to the corral like this was standard.  Mike told me a story about a time she layed down to hide behind a log in the woods once.  Dang horse.

We did two trail rides today, one young married couple from Texas in the morning and a group of six in the afternoon.  Two kids, one with Terret’s Syndrome, and four adults.  Both groups were great and both rides were enjoyable.  Barb took a group on a pack-in on the high country.  We’re all back and the horses are out to pasture and we’re headed to town for dinner.

Birthday tomorrow.  My first 29th birthday.  Nothing planned, probably will end up at the Dome or something.  I don’t want to go anywhere else besides here anyways.

Peace and good luck,

Devo

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My first morning started out early, 7am, and I felt great.  Woke up to a dude hackin in the outhouse.  I was out of my tent by the time he finished and he looks like he belongs here, kinda resembling the jibberish dude in Blazing Saddles just without the beard.  Who are you?  I tell him how I know Dave.  Oh you’re the gamblin’ man!  Yeah that’s me.  Nice to meet you Mike.  I brew some coffee and watch him walk into a smaller pen than the main pasture where the herd is.  He’s carrying two bridles, and I can’t figure out for the life of me where he’s goin, cause I can’t see a single horse in the hundred yard square field.  Check out my video blog touring where I’m staying and you’ll know where I’m sitting, drinking my coffee wondering what’s going to happen next.

Mike goes behind an old land dam retaining wall make a pond thing and comes out two minutes later with two horses.  He walks them to the (pen where we get the horses ready) by the barn and saddles both of them.  By then Alicia (ah-LEE-shuh) was up and at the barn.  They mounted and walked out into the West pen, the big field where the herd was out to pasture for the night.  About 15 minutes later the herd is galloping over the hill followed by Mike and Alicia, and they lead them all to the holding pen on the other side of the barn.  Turns out this is called a round-up and was cool as hell to watch.

The energy of the place just kept building.  I picked the weekend of the annual rodeo to show up on, so they were sending a couple horses and riders for the parade as well as a horse-drawn buggy, plus we had to get horses ready for a 10am trail ride.  We did all these things and then Dave and I took a father/daughter pair on a 2 hour ride on the ranch.  This place is 3500 acres so there’s plenty of room to explore, and the views are just amazing.

Came back, greeted another group at 12:45, one family of three and one grandpa/grandson pair.  Barb and I took this group out, came back in pouring rain from our standard afternoon thundershower, put all the saddles and pads back into the barn, and let the herd back into West pen.

Dave, Mike, Alicia, Barb, and I were standing around chattin about the day and upcoming schedule when Dave mentioned to Barb that I brought my guitar, mandolin, and djembe.  She loves music and wanted to see them, and a jam session broke out.  We spent an hour hanging on the porch and I fell more in love with life on the ranch.  I took a shower in the solar shower house, and we headed off to the rodeo.

I’ll admit I ain’t never been to a rodeo.  I’ll be going back though.  Ton of fun, neat to watch, and the beer was cheap.  They had a dance afterwards, $7 admission, $10 for couples.  It was amazing.  The floor was consistently packed with amazing country dancers putting on a show to compliment the band.  I finally talked everybody into leaving sometime after midnight, because 7:30 was going to come quick the next day.

It did, and I woke up to Mike yellin, “Wake up sleeping beauty!”  I had to take Adam, his nephew and dude I found sleeping in the bunkhouse the day before, back to his truck left at the rodeo.  Adam was super cool and drove around this ginormous F450 rig doing welding.  Dave hired him to fix a trailer and he did it faster and at about 20% of the cost that it would have been in town.  I came back and helped Dave prep for a pack-in trip that we were doing that day.  We trailered 5 horses and headed to Horn Creek Trailhead.  The custies had left all their gear in the back of their truck and started hiking up, our job was to put their gear on our three pack horses and get it the several miles and 3000 feet of elevation up the trail.

We loaded the pack horses and started up trail.  The memories flooded back, this being right smack dab in the middle of where I worked in 2003.  I was ponying Soapstone, which meant that one hand was on the reigns of my horse Mariah and the other was on the lead rope of the pack horse.  I learned a lesson that when the horse you’re ponying decides to back up, you let go of the rope.  I didn’t until I burnt myself good enough to get 5 blisters and one burn way through the skin.  O U C H.  We made it up to treeline into the basin and met the party.  We dropped off all their gear and I snapped a couple pics.

I turned around to take this one.

Back down the hill, horses in the trailer, and back to the ranch.  They have a fire pit there but it hasn’t been used in a while and was overgrown.  I want fire.  Search the tool shed for a gas powered weed whacker and settle for a machette.  After my gardening project I had most of the Lupine and grass hacked down enough for a fire, which I started as the sun was setting.  This place is covered with good sittin’ spots.

The next day, Monday, I was the first dude up.  I decided that I was going to do what Mike did on Saturday.  I grapped a couple of halters and headed into the catch pen.  In January, catching horses was a challenge.  I couldn’t see Mariah or JD out there, so I checked in the old pond.  Sans horse.  I spot them up the hill to the left standing side by side and looking at me.  They know what’s going on.  Now to catch them.  I start walking towards them, and they start walking toward me, still side by side.  I walk up right between their noses, laugh a little, give Mariah, who’s quickly becoming my favorite some lovin’, and put both halters on with ease.  I walk them out of the catch pen, Mike’s up by the time I’m back, he smiles and and we saddle up.  I’m going to do the round-up.

We walk out into West pen and he tells me all the things I need to know.  I was pretty dang overwhelmed.  My total galloping on a horse time is less than five minutes ever.  He’s telling me about how to cut and herd horses, all the while watching out for holes from the prairie dogs and ground squirrels and snakes, because if they hit one we’ll both crash and they might break a leg, then I’ll have to shoot a horse and might break my own leg.  You gotta be kidding me.  In way over my head we head find the main herd in the far pen, he tells me to go along this fence line and I should find them in the trees, he heads left for that half of the herd.

Turns out that Mariah is the queen of round-ups.  She knew what was up.  She breaks into a gallop without me asking along the fence line, headed for a copse of Aspens where I can see some horses hanging.  She tears through the trees, responding to my commands to turn and avoid low hanging branches, but otherwise she did the rest.  We came up behind the small herd flying through the trees, I started whoopin and yah-in and the horses take off toward the barn.  We wrap around the rest, and Mariah is tearing after them.  I work with her to keep any of them from slipping off, and she’s intent on driving them home.  I see about half a dozen others way off in the corner by a few houses, I think they might be ours but Mariah is on a mission, and Mike says that they’re not ours.

When we crossed back through the fence the herd broke left into the trees, and the barn was straight ahead.  I tried to get above them in the trees, and we were flying.  It was so intense zipping through those trees on a fast horse in a fast gallop.  The herd broke out of the trees and headed straight for the holding pen, Mike behind me chasing his herd, and I got my group into the pen except for two.  A quick cut and a burst and we’re in front of them, finishing the job.  Mike and I got the rest in, and with a big grin I dismounted.

We start pulling out horses for the pack trip and 2 hour ride going out that morning, and we quickly realize that we’re missing several horses.  I know where they are.  And I have no problem going to get them :).  Mike drove them out and I went down to a lower grove of trees by the highway where apparently they like to hide too.  No horse, and I see that his herd slipped him and broke right heading for a water trough.  I think Mariah knew this too, and without too much askin we were flying along the highway just inside the fence line.  Chase them off the trough and we repeat the chase through the trees.  If I get to do this every day I’m gonna be a happy (and sore) boy.

I headed up to the trailhead with everybody to help however needed, and the amount of work and precision that goes into pack trips is amazing.  Seven custies.  Two staff.  9 riders and 4 packers.  One dog.  It took us about 90 minutes at the trailhead, and then disaster happened.  I am with the 15 passenger van and am waiting for Dave to finish parking one of the truck and trailers and hear him yell, “Oh shit!”  I see the truck and trailer rolling downhill.  Oh shit.  By the time I get there I hear many more oh shits until the front of the truck slammed into the rear of another horse trailer, jackknifing the truck and trailer a bit and our truck comes to a rest against the trailer.  I was thrilled about this.  From where the truck started rolling, straight downhill involved a steep drop down the hill, one small tree, one big tree, and one in betweeen area that would have resulted in a much longer roll.  But the tires were turned to the left just a little, and the driver’s side hit the driver’s side, and the trailer being bent absorbed much of the energy.  Oh, and the truck and trailer belongs to the Colorado Division of Wildlife.  But it saved out asses there, if it wasn’t there, and we didn’t hit the left side of the trailer, things would have been much worse.  Seriously of all the possible outcomes of a runaway ranch truck and trailer at a the trailhead, this was the best possible result.  We bent the bumper back out with the van and a chain, the trailer was fine just a little stiff on the hinge and a few dents.  We still left a note and filed a report, and headed back down the hill.

No afternoon ride so I finally had the opportunity to run some errands that needed runnin.  The first stop was the auto shop to look at my frame.  It’s been damaged for years since I spun out in the Raton Pass, but I realized it was an issue when I asked Adam if he could fix my hitch and stuff.  I hadn’t looked under there in a while, and thank God I did cause one of my leaf spring shackles was almost completely torn off.  When I pulled into the service station, it was.  Literally hanging on a frame bolt.  Errands cancelled, I call Mike at the ranch at 2:15 asking for a ride.  He said yeah, be there in a bit.  An hour later I call him again, no response.  20 minutes later I get sick of sittin and walk to the street to try and hitchhike home.  I stand in front of the place for another 20 minutes, finally get a lift, and see Mike driving into town just as Myron and I were headed out.  I wave and he don’t see me, Myron offers to turn around, and I decline saying he’ll figure it out and that’s what he gets for waiting forever and not answering the phone.

Around 5pm I call Dave’s house to see about finding a vehicle to get to town.  I get Michelle and she tells me that there’s people looking for me in town.  Apparently Mike and Dave were driving around looking for me, because the service station guys told him that I “walked off”, and Dave doesn’t check messages (who doesn’t read text messages?!?), so didn’t see me tell him that I was startin to hitch and needed a ride. I laughed but feel a little bad now, sitting at the bar they looked for me at three hours ago writing this blog.

Peace and good luck,

Devo

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