Up the Mountain and to my Cabin & TP Life

I awaken on Monday morning to find Sharon in the front field running some horses from the pasture back towards the barns in the rear. I was offered no explanation for why this was happening.  What I do see is several of these horses she is running with 'off', as in lame.  I spend some time talking with their daughter, JD, and find her to be a wonderful lady.  She has just recently graduated from nursing school and she has a job that ends soon and she will be moving east to spend the rest of the year with her boyfriend in New Jersey.

No idea what the purpose of this is, if this is getting the horses to come in, I figure there are easier ways 

I am being told by both Mike and Sharon that it's my day off and that they will take me up the mountain, that I don't have to do anything, but I say I will join in with whatever chores need to be done.  They seems surprised with this.  Mike loads up some horses from his back pasture to take to the area where the horses have been gathered at the foot of the mountain, where the blacksmith will trim and shoe them. 

Where the horses have been sitting, waiting

Another view of where the horses have been waiting

I am kind of surprised to see the condition of the horses in his back yard.  Their feet are hugely overgrown, and two of them are obviously very lame, clearly from the lack of attention to the feet.  One seriously lame horse has one very long hoof, maybe a good 4 inches too long, and the other one has obviously broken off.  These are the same horses that Sharon just ran in from the front pasture. I am somewhat confused over this.

In conversation with Mike, he tells me that he pays between $1.50 to $2.00 a bale for hay!  And the weight of them is probably about 75 pounds.  He says it is about $70 a ton.  Isn't that 5200 pounds? And way you look at it, that's CHEAP!  I wonder if I can bring home a couple ton of hay with me??


We drop the first load of horses off where there are two farriers working on them, and one elderly gentleman who is a wealth of knowledge.  They point out one chestnut mare, called Red Star who has foundered on all four legs.  Mike seems to think it is from the spring green grass.  We go back to his place to pick up a second load of horses for the farrier, and he tells me to follow him up the mountain with my truck and stuff and that he will show me to my cabin. 

This is the injured horse and the old farrier

That's Mike on the left.  Ah, Sharon thinks he looks like Franklyn?  The woman needs glasses!

The farrier at work.  Only 35 more to go!

At the bottom of the hill, we drop off the second load of horses and Mike picks up the foundered mare.  The old man, Jack, tells Mike that there are 48 different types of founder and he feels this mare's is due to her feet being so long.  Mike says it is not.  While there, one of the horses that was brought over from Mike's place in the first load is with the female farrier, and she points out a nasty wire cut on his front right coronet band.  It is weeping, infected and dirty.  Mike says he will bring the horse up after this one, and will treat him on the mountain.  Again, I am surprised that an injury to a horse that has been in his back yard all winter was never found, diagnosed or treated before this.  That is on top of the horses whose feet were neglected.  Mike tells me to follow him up the mountain, he is towing a six horse stock trailer with the red mare in it.

Yep, the same mountain I have been seeing all along, and it's getting closer!

First off:  let me tell you where I am.  I am technically in the town of Big Horn, Wyoming.  Basically, I do not think the camp where I am going is in a town as we think it, because it is surrounded on all sides by National Forest.  So, are National Forests in any towns?  I guess that is up for debate.  Anyway, the road we are taking is called Red Grade Road.  It really is an extension of a numbered road, but, it you try to follow it on Google Earth, you will get so lost!  Driving it, it is really a straight shot, such as it is, but on a map it does 90 degree turns and will mess you up!  And Red Grade is one of those roads that gets closed when it snows.  There is no plowing of this road, and snow just builds up, to many feet, and you have to wait until it thaws to get through this road.  There are several roads like this in Wyoming, that get closed in bad weather, and that includes the highways at times too!  In other words, bad weather can set in pretty quickly, and nothing can be done to keep the road open until it is open and gets evaluated.  If you listen to weather reports during winter, you will often hear that major highways are shut down in certain sections.  In fact, I know last winter Route 90, a MAJOR highway, was closed several times through Wyoming and into Montana, and this spring it was closed down because of flooding.

I was told before we started out that we would be climbing something like 3000 feet in 6 miles.  I was kind of surprised at that, and was soon to find out how shocked I would be.  I was told that the place was on a mountain, but I was not told any details.  You could feel the climb, the truck downshifting.  I put my truck into second.  The first thing I see is a sign that warns me to put your vehicle in 4 wheel to save 'it and the road.'  I do not understand.  I will.  We start to climb.  First through the burnt trees from a wildfire of three years ago: I swear we are going straight up. 

Ah - ha moment

Yep, we are going up there

There is cliff and rock on your right, there is nothing on your left, the road ends at some rocks that were plowed over, maybe a few inches of a burm,  after that, is just steep slope.  And it keeps getting worse as you climb.  Heck, at one place, I am looking up the road and there is no road!  Just blue sky! Then we hit a switchback, and now the rock is on your left and the drop on your right.  And the drops just keep getting steeper and more and more nothing.  It is impressive, if you like that thing.  Personally, do not.  I admit to a bit of fear of heights.   I wonder what the heck I have gotten myself in for. The road is very rocky, dirt, and tough to navigate.  Your truck bounces over the rocks, and you wonder if your vehicle will bounce right off the 'road.' And even in the sunny sun, it is slippery.

Road?  What road?

A hairpin curve later and some more corners and drop offs, we level out to where we see the sign that says we are entering the Big Horn National Forest.  From there is a sign that announces the Cloud Peak Wilderness, the highest point in a LOT of territory, and Black Tooth Mountain, at 13,000 feet!

Pretty self explanatory

Then the signs for Little Goose Mountain, which is what I have been seeing for some time, and we drop into a small valley where the gate to TP is off to our left.  If we go straight, we go to The Big Goose and the Ranger Station.  I find out later that this road is only open to the Ranger Station, that there is still too much snow after that to continue, even though this is considered a 'legitimate road' over and through the Big Horn Mountains!  Ah, yeah!

Big Goose is the Ranger Station

When we enter in TP, we still travel washed out dirt roads, switchbacks and some semi steep dirt road till we enter the main part of the camp.  I must admit it is a pretty sight.

The gate you see in the center is the entrance to TP

This gate

And the road in

Mike pulls over and points to my cabin, sitting up on the right under the pines, tells me it's open, and to settle myself in.

My 'cabin'

I must admit my cabin is surely nice quarters.  Two bedrooms, a sleeping loft, and a big living/dining/kitchen combination with a soaring ceiling.  A stone fireplace, one bath, and all brand new.  The water has been turned on, but the cabin has not been used since last year, and so I make busy moving the porch furniture out of the living room, sweeping the dead flies and moths out, and then bringing in my things. 

Decent view of woods and some meadows

By mid afternoon, I am somewhat settled, but lamenting the lack of water pressure, and since I am on my own for meals, I decide to take a trip into Sheridan to get groceries.

So here is the story I am told about TP.  Seems this place was one of the oldest dude ranches in the area, and in Wyoming.  I want to say close to 80 years?  It operated until the 1980's when it went bankrupt.  It seems that a businessman from Sheridan wanted to make sure it was preserved, and so he had the brilliant idea to buy it and parcel it out to various owners as a type of camp condo complex.  I guess he got something like 12 or so people together and they drew up some rules, and then came up with a way to figure out who got what cabin.  maybe it had to do with the amount of money, or maybe it was straws, I don't know.  But the only way you can own something there now is to buy it from a current owner.  I am told that the last cabin that changed hands went for around $250 K.  I guess the rules say that no one can tell you want to do it you want to enlarge or renovate your cabin, but if you wish to do other things the group must approve.  As an example, I guess one person wanted to get a bigger cabin, and asked to build in another location, which was along the road as we came in, before you get to my cabin.  That area has only a few cabins in it, as most are centered around in a group in the center of the camp.  I guess the owners that be said no, you can't build some place else, so they went and redid the cabin they had, and built an entire, huge cabin right over the old one.  The original cabin became a 'guest' room.  This huge behemoth would look great in any other setting up looming over the two cabins on either side of it.  It is said that the powers that be are now regretting being such pains and trying to not change the camp as they originally thought, since it sure did change things in a very negative way by this construction. 

I was also told that the management gave Mike a 1/15th share of a lot for each year he worked for them.  So he ended up with a lot to build his own cabin, but since he has one that they 'give' him to live in while he's there, he felt that no one would ever think of him as other than the employee and his own ownership of one would never  be as anything but an employee, even if he retired, people would still be asking him to do stuff, so he sold it to the couple from  Billings, MT.  They built a cabin that is actually the same foot print of the one I was staying in, just a different layout.

So this is the story of TP, formerly a public, come bring your money and stay here camp, to a now privately owned camp.

I am told just follow the road straight, and I will run right into the main drag of Sheridan.  It really is only about a 15 minute ride, ONCE you get down the mountain.  And that took me a good 20 minutes or so to do that.  When you are driving forward and all you can see is sky, because the road dips away, it is hardly pleasing.  I recall wondering again what I got myself into when I come to another place that just shows sky and no road.  My heart was in my throat when I went down this hill.  And, I know that no one prepared me for this fact.  You would have thought that someone would have told me about the road, after all, it is a major part of the job, being able to go up and down that mountains for supplies and anything, really.  I am upset that no one warned me.

Yep, that's next to the road

As is this

In fact, I find out later that just last year some guy went over the cliff!  Seriously.  My question was if he lived.  Mike and Sharon told me this story, and Sharon was laughing, saying he jumped prior to the truck and trailer going over.  Mike said it was no big deal, that he pulled him out and the trailer 'wasn't that bad.'  I wonder what bad is.  I am seriously wondering about my brakes.  And my tires, because I have this dread that a set of tires (big ass tires) on this big ass truck of mine will get eaten up this summer.

This is the snow on a portion of Black Tooth Mountain.  Yep, it's June

It wasn't any better when I came back up, and I totally understood the 4 wheel drive all the time now.  I vow, I will never go up or down that road in 1. rain, 2. dark, 3. any questionable weather 4. anything but a serious reason.

This is the Main Street of the booming town of Big Horn, Wyoming.  Post Office, and, of course, the bar.

Some neighbors on the road down below

One of the interesting things Ted the maintenance guy tells me about the pine trees here, which are called 'lodgepole' pines, is that, due to the height they grow at on the mountains and the conditions, are very slow growing.  He points to some of the trees around us and says that they are probably 100 to 150 years old!  I look at these trees to be similar to ones we might have in our area that grow maybe 10-25 years old.  Definitely they are smaller around than ones I KNOW to be about 50 years old.  They are like baby trees compared to our pines.  Another thing I am told is that due to the conditions here in camp, you will destroy a pair of boots during one summer.  HUH?  The rocks you need to navigate over will eat up a pair of leather soles on your boots, and I am told 'not to wear good ones.'  Ok, another thing I am told since I own two pairs, one my new Lucchese's, and the other 'pink' pair that I wear for regular stuff because they are comfy.  Since I am slipping and sliding already in those, I am now thinking, shouldn't I have been told to bring extra boots?  My brain is thinking:  tires, brakes, now boots.  Hmmmmm.

View of the center of camp TP

I am told that there is going to be a delay in bringing the horses up the mountain.  There is not enough grass for them yet, as the late thaw of the snow pack has the season far behind.    Mike takes me on a tour of the camp on a 4 wheeler and shows me the three lakes, the roads to the pastures where they run the horses at night, and around the cabin area.

One of the lakes

Since there is nothing to do with the horses, on Tuesday, even though it is still supposed to me my day off, I clean out the two tack sheds, straightening out saddles, and making sure the leather is good on each one, and that they all have proper girths.  I sort bridles by quality and type, and make sure each one has two good, matching reins.  I sort out the junk and put it off to the side.  I put extra reins in one place, and give a good sweep to all of it.  Most of these saddles are in good shape, but they have been sort of just thrown around, and I make sure everything is very neat.  I find that just about every bridle has the same bit, a standard curb.  There was maybe two hackamores, and one snaffle, and a couple with very high ports, but all in all, they run every horse on the same bit here.  I note that in my head, since I know that horses run better on all different types of bits, I wonder if there will be problems with horses throwing their heads, popping up, not stopping, etc.

The only horse corral

Later that day, I assist Ted, the maintenance guy with building some new fence along one of the pathways up around the mountain.    That evening, Mike and Sharon have me over to their cabin for a steak dinner. 

It's been miserable up here, it rains every day.  Whether that is morning or late afternoon, or overnight, it is wet, damp and chilly!  I find myself wearing my winter vest and flannel shirts and it is almost the end of JUNE!  No one told me this is pretty much what you get here.  Ted tells me this is how it is just about all summer.  It is cold in the morning and it will warm up during the day.  Again, I was not told.  It is pretty up here, but freezing.  Not my idea of summer.  This is one thing that will take a lot of getting used to: using heat all summer and COLD! 

It's funny how you look back on stuff and never even think about it when it is happening, but puzzle over it later.  Even though Mike runs this place, he is fairly quiet, Sharon does all the talking, and make no mistake, I think she runs the show.  One of the things she has a tendency to do is talk about people.  Good and bad, she likes to talk about people behind their back.  She has already given me all sorts of information about Ted, how he is a good maintenance man, but how he is a complete waste with the horses, and how he butts in when either Mike or she is talking to one of the owners.  I am not a person who likes to listen to rumours or talk about others behind their back.  I find Sharon's sniping about people to be a turn off.  I am not so happy with how they talk about Ted, and figure that somewhere down the line, they will probably do the same about me.   

We have no cell service on the mountain, but if you go part way down the road to the start of the nasty road down,  you can get some service, but they set up a wireless network in the camp.  I get Internet service here in my cabin, but at times it filters out and others it's almost decent.  What it is, is S-L-O-W. 

Another thing is that is is freaking COLD up here!  Since I came out to Wyoming in shorts and tank tops, and the weather down below is summer, I find this to be weird to need a coat! I turned the heat on the first night and have kept it on all the time.  I made the mistake of sleeping that first night with a window open, since I was airing out the place and it had been nice and warm in the sun, and I like fresh air, but I froze my took us off and had to get up and pull more covers on me and close the windows!  It is pretty here, but there is still snow all over the place, some stacked against a cabin here and there, in the fields as you come up the mountain, and definitely on the peaks.  I thought it kind of funny to be bringing the jacket and vest I wore all winter here, but now I am grateful that I did!

Yep, snow

Wednesday is very cold in the AM, and I again help Ted with fence.  The weatherman says it snowed about a foot overnight.  Luckily we only got rain, but we still have no grass for horses.  Later Sharon and I take oars and life jackets out the boats at all three lakes.  At the third one, Roscoe, her pup, falls in and has this look of panic on his face when he finds he is having trouble fighting the current out of the lake.  I run to where he can turn around and call him in.  You can tell he sure is happy that he was out!  Sharon is one of those people who has a small dog that she likes to carry around a fair  amount and always talks to it in baby talk.  I think of Caesar the Dog Whisperer on TV who yells at pet owners to let their dogs walk on their own legs and to stop the baby talk!  I have always thought it annoying, and my thoughts have not changed.  Put the dog down and talk to him like you would a human!  Heck, she is one of those who also lets the dog sit on her lap when driving and lets him hang out her driver's side window!  That I find REALLY annoying and dangerous!

I have a bird's nest and a momma bird on one of the posts of my porch.  There are gorgeous black and white magpies flying around.  Big birds.  One morning I look out my kitchen window to see a mule deer almost looking in.  As I reach for my camera, the water pump turns on and scares her away, and then I see 6 more go bounding off down my driveway towards the center fields of camp.  When I say driveway, I use the term loosely, since I need to have 4 wheel drive to get up it.  In fact, you need 4 wheel everywhere here.  Seriously, to get up my driveway, I need 4 wheel drive low, and need to avoid the trees.  when I go down, I have to navigate around some more trees, stop, back up, maneuver again, before I can get out.  I think about backing up, but that is even harder to do.

If you look closely, there is a little head on the left side of the nest

I am very concerned about the black and white we brought up on Monday with the sliced foot.  Twice I asked Mike if he needed help changing the bandage.  Both times he said he was going to take care of it later.  I heard him tell Ted he would take care of it later.  As of a week later, the bandage has never been changed.   I know he gave him penicillin once, but now the bandage is falling off in shreds and still it sits, unchanged.  I see blood and some discharge from the foot.   It's a five minute job.  And could have been cured by now if it had been taken care of properly.  Sharon certainly does not seem to have any knowledge of horses, since she is feeding treats to the horse that is foundered.  I had told her that the horse should not get any treats.  She ignores me. In fact, Mike sees this and tells  her not to do that, and her response is "it's only a hand full."  Mike just walks away and says nothing.  This foundered horse is still, a full week later, only walking a very minimal amount, and laying down a lot.  But Mike is saying that she can get shod and can be ridden soon.  I dont' see that at all.  this horse is down for the season.  And the black and white will be too if they do not address that cut seriously.

My other concerns are about the level of training ANY of these horses have ever had.  When we went to catch horses in the pasture to take them to get shod, every single one of them ran away from you.  Several we had to corner to get caught.  And every single horse I have approached, be it in pasture, corral or trailer, has shied away from you in one way or another, especially if you approach them from the off side.  Some will kind of stand there if you approach from the left, almost looking at you with a leery look,  but not the right.  In fact, I was brushing the two injured ones, and they BOTH tried to get away when I went to brush the off side!  I don't know if that means they are very one sided, or if they have just never been handled much.   OK< I know they spend more than half the year running out on the pastures somewhere, but we don't mess with ours much, and all of ours want to come join with you.  I only saw ONE horse of all the ones I have seen that actually came to you!   And that one, Mike told to get away, as he claimed she was too pushy!  (She wasn't pushing, she just wanted attention.  I gave her a little, she was happy.) This is disconcerting.  I wonder if that means they are just so untouched, or if it means that they have had no formal training of any type.  The first is not good, but the second is telling.

There are few owners up here yet.  All are waiting for the horses.  One couple from Billings is here almost all the time, and one for Sheridan.  They are complaining that their horses have not come up.  I can understand that, but the horses need to eat something.  I wonder if the owners would be willing to buy hay for them.  But that subject did not come up, Mike had said once he had no intention of buying hay to feed the herd.

View of Black Tooth from camp

One of the things that I find weird up here are the bugs.  Well, actually Moths.  They are everywhere.  I figured that they were there due to the fact that the cabin was closed up, and that when I cleaned it, they would be gone.  NOPE!  They just keep materializing out of nowhere!  Sharon says this is common, and that they have them all summer long!  In fact, a bird kept trying to catch one that was fluttering in the window!  Now that's when you know it's bad when the birds want IN to get them!  I was trying to figure out how to help the bird!  Remember Mothra, the bad movie?  (We are talking 50's here)  I think they filmed it here!  I keep as many lights off as I can, since that only attracts the buggers, and I try to make sure that I have a cover over my beverages since I do not want them in anything I drink either!

Thursday is my official day off, and I decide to ride into Sheridan and look around.  I take the scary ride down the mountain and go explore Main Street. 

View of the Black Tooth range of the Big Horn's from below

This is a great mix of old and new, tradition and art.  There are sculptures on every street corner and in front of many businesses. I go into the famous Mint Bar, an institution in Sheridan since the days when it was a cowboy town.  It's supposed to be haunted.  Again, I am disappointed, the only spirits I see are in bottles and the only figures walking around are the owner and a bartender.  But I buy myself a baseball cap, that does not disappoint.  It's a great cap.  Out here, they already have them perfectly bent.  Really, it is a GREAT cap.

The famous Mint Bar - an institution for over 100 years

Decor

This place has brands from all over the area burnt into the walls

Street art - this one is called "Riding Out A Bad Investment"  Get it?  It was in front of the Wells Fargo Bank.

I go into gift stores, a consignment mall, the western stores, the King Saddlery and Ropes store, even a pawn shop.  I am so disappointed in the pawn shop.  I find a great pair of chinks for $30.00!  Really!  But they are too small and I am so bummed, since the used ones can sometimes go $200 bucks!  I should have bought them anyway and resold them!  I explore the streets for most of the day, try on boots at the local shoe store.  Yep, they have a shoe store that sells tons of boots, wander into a consignment shop where I see some great stuff, and explore until I find out that they are having their "Third Thursday Street Fair" so I decide it is time to go back to my cabin.  Besides, I need to get a few items at the store and get up that mountain before it even starts to get dark.

Another famous bar.  Yep, another bar!

From the King's Rope's collection of antiques

Store sign - I like it!

Mural on a building wall

And the description

Bigger than life size sculpture of a mountain man on the street

Look at the detail!

On Friday, Mike finally decides that we are going to bring some horses up.  He has been saying for most of the week that he was going to bring 6, then three, and now we will end up only riding two up.  Which happens to be his own two horses. They load the tow into the trailer and take them tot he parking lot at the bottom of the hill, where Sharon and I ride up Bailey, a black and white and Prize, a sorrel walking horse.  Ted is also bringing up his black and white walking horse.  A couple things I find out is that none of these horses actually has a pedigree.  I doubt any of them are registered.  I am told that they have paid something like $5000 for each horse.  I am shocked that anyone buys a grade horse for that amount of money.  I am told that is a basic price for a walking horse, still, I am shocked.  Walking or not, that's a chunk of change for a grade horse.  And, with the little I have seen of the horses here, that is way too much for a grade horse with questionable talents and knowledge and training.

All this week I am being told horror stores by Sharon about running horses up the mountain, about galloping them up the mountain face, about galloping them from the pastures to the corral every day.  I am also being retold the story of a few weeks back when Mike and JD went up the mountain in the snow to check it out on horseback, riding the same two horses we were riding.  In fact, the one I ride is the one that bucked Mike off and cracked his ribs.  It sure is tough to crawl up on a horse after so long not being on one. Both Sharon and Mike scowl at me as I scramble up.  Remember, I usually get on from the right since that is the stronger knee, but I 'can't do that here', so it is difficult for me.  

Sharon wants to go full tilt boogie up the hill and race.  Within a few minutes of riding I find that my horse just doesn't have it in him, and not 15-20 minutes into the ride, both horses are lathered.  She wants to run them.  I go to move my horse into a lope, and he takes a few steps, and he is laboring.  Mike had worked them a few minutes each in the small round pen at his house, and both horses did a few bucking moves, and they were breathing hard after that little work out.  I keep telling her that my horse wants to quit, and that he is too out of shape to push. 

When saddling, Mike handed me a bridle to put on my horse, and I look at a piece of tack that I would have thrown out.  It is dry, there are pieces of it that are no longer properly stitched, and furthermore, it does not fit the horse.  Mike comes over and brings a different bridle.  His comment to me is to ask if I can ride with "Rommel" reins.  I look at the bridle he has given me, and it is a pair of split reins with a keeper.  I tell him I can ride rommels, but these are not rommels.  Mike does not understand that Rommel reins are a continuous rein, like a roping rein, with one single popper hanging off the center, not split reins with a keeper.  I do not think he liked me telling him that. 
 
It takes us about 1 1/2 hours to get up the mountain.  Sharon keeps getting worried that Mike is going to come up and find us still on the trail.  In fact, he gets up only about 5 minutes after we get to the corral.  I know that we have two VERY tired horses.  Sharon keeps saying we should have run them up.  I keep saying that the horses quit on us!  You can't push two horses that are severely out of shape and can't do it without problems.  She does not seem to understand.  All the time while we are riding up she continues to tell stories of how they race the horses up the mountain, how they run over the sides and along the ridges and you have to go after them, and how out of control they are and if you don't keep in front of them they will scatter.  I do not understand the logic of this, and I tell her so, and that I find that most horses will follow the leader and you don't have to run them to do it.  If you keep control, the entire herd will be in control.  I tell Sharon that I do not understand the logic of why they do this. 

Snow on the mountain

Corrals

Sharon tells me a story of when the fire went through a few years back and they had to evacuate and how Mike refused to get out when the Forest guys came, refusing to leave the horses.  That is commendable.  She said that they rounded up something like 17 guys to help get the horses to higher ground at the Ranger Station.  She said that they took the herd out at a run and ran them up towards the Ranger Station, but that the horses scattered.  That out of the 50 or so horses, only the 17 they rode got there.  I questioned why they just hadn't each take two or so horses apiece and ponied them out?  Instead Mike had to stay at camp and wait for them to come back down, and then do it again.  It seemed to me to be a complete waste of time, effort and an exercise in futility.  And frankly, stupid.

I question the horse sense of these people, as these stories Sharon tells seems to be about people trying to act like cowboys but with no practical horse knowledge or training in how horses think and act.

 Bailey, the horse I am riding, and owned by Mike and Sharon and is the one that Mike was thrown off of a few weeks back.  While riding this horse I find out that he does NOT know leg signals.  I tried all the ones I know and even worked on changing them up a bit, and he knew none of them.  He would not travel in a straight line and wanted to keep crowding the horse Sharon rode.  The only way to get him to go straight was that I had to keep one rein taught and the other loose to keep him over.  He did not seem to really understand neck reining, I am times used a single reing to push him over, and he responded to that, but not to a real, low on the neck, neck rein.  This is not a trained horse.  The one time we did try to lope them, he wanted to race Sharon's horse.  Again, the sign of a poorly trained horse.  I was able to keep him from doing it, he clearly could understand that he had a rider on his back that knew a few things, but it is also clear that he has been used to getting his own way for a long time.  I know that I can fix this horse quite easily, the problem is that if I did, the first time someone else got on him, he would be allowed to go right back to being a disobedient horse and it would be all for naught.  Frankly, Bailey is a very lazy horse.  I see nothing in him that would make him want to buck or rear.  The only reason I can see that he might have, is the possibility of the wolf as they said, however, since they said they only saw tracks, and there was no real wolf, only a scent, the only reason he went up was because he was given poor or conflicting signals.  And frankly, since he does not know leg or neck signals, I can easily see a inexperinced rider pulling him up.  Heck, it's easy to pull any horse up if you give them enough conflicting signals.  

I am getting more and more leery about this 'race 50 horses up the mountain' they are planning to do next week.  I express my concerns.  Although I like this place and the people have been nice to me, I question the safety at this place.  I thought I was hired to make sure the people were safe.  What message would it give if the person who is supposed to be knowledgeable and in charge is not practicing safety?

I am invited to dinner with the couple from Billings, the couple from Sheridan and Mike and Sharon. 
The dinner conversation is about problem horses, horror stories of getting bucked off, and stories about broken bones, and 'rushing down the mountain' to get to the hospital.  This seems to be a really big joke with everyone.  I just sit there and my mind is churning.  What??  Why would any REAL horse person think this is great, funny, or something to brag about???  OK, we all have horror stories, but heck, I don't tell them and think they are funny!  I tell them as a warning or a teaching tool.

On Friday, Ted and I finish the fence.  Then I go to talk to Mike and Sharon and they say they do not feel I will be able to do the job.  Although I do like the place and people and I am invited back to come anytime for a vacation, they state they ride 'hell bent for leather' as the saying goes, and I just don't do that.   I agree, I have had several warning signs that this will be a potentially dangerous job.   Later on, talking to Ted, he tells me that every year they have numerous injuries, several serious, from riding like crazy people.  They have said that when they have something they can't ride, they sell it to Eaton's.  Just in case you want to pay them thousands to stay there for a week!  And I wonder jsut how bad those horses are that they can't ride, since the ones theydo ride seem to have some problems too!

Sharon does make a comment that she thought Mike felt like time was wasted and that I had not represented myself as I was, and I explained that could work both ways.  I was never told about the sheer cliffs and drops and that Mike felt that all the horses should be run at full speed and uses a bull whip to make them go faster down the mountain.  I was not told that the horses have questionable ability and training, and that there are no precautions taken to keep anyone safe on them.  I had been very clear that Simon (my mentor) was a fanatic about safety, reading the horse, and not riding any horse that is not safe to ride or is acting improperly.  I also was clear that the CHA program also taught safety first and that I expected that to be adhered to.  I said I thought that the reason I was being hired was to teach proper lessons to people, and to do so, so that they would be kept safe, and to have a positive experience.  I also thought that I was being hired to do some training on some of the horses, so that they could be better mounts for some of the older people.  I did not think that I was being hired to be an idiot on horseback.  One of my favorite sayings is:  "I may be crazy, but I'm not nuts!"

I am disappointed.  I felt the main job was an easy situation, and that it was going to be a fun job, however, I was never told that they intended to  make it a dangerous job.  Horses are dangerous enough without expecting any person to ride a horse that has been running wild all winter, then sitting on green grass, jump on, and then race them up a bunch of sheer cliffs.  That is just crazy.  There is NO contingency for working horses prior to riding, for sacking them out, for preparing them to ride. And my momma didn't raise no fool. Been there, done that, have a tee shirt, and a titanium rod with pins to prove it.

I am told I was perfect for the job in every way, except for my 'riding skills.'  Personally, I think that is just bullshit, as I will stack my SKILLS up to anyone there.  I have real skills, and I  don't feel it takes any 'skills' to jump on a horse and act like an idiot, all it take is big kahonas, or the lack of brains.  I tell them that it is not about skills, but knowledge, and I thought I was being hired to keep people safe, that riding in unsafe manners seemed against that.  Riding skills?  Heck, I don't think they wanted anyone with skills, they wanted a body to throw at the cannon fire!  Of course, it might take 'special skills' that I, in all my horse courses do NOT know about, to ride a 10 year old horse that has never had any training and has learned all the wrong ways to be a horse.  But I don't think so.  They keep saying that 'they ride differently in the west than we do in the east."  I bet that THEY do, even though I know that is bullshit also.  Correct riding is correct riding.  And from what I have seen, I do not see anything that was being done correctly.

We part with no hard feelings, however, I am quite sure that Sharon will be talking about me behind my back, and it won't be nice.  After all, she wasn't nice about anyone else.

I have a conversation with Ted's wife Darlene, who tells me all the dirt that others won't.  She got injured herself two years ago on one of the 'nice' horses.  And the interesting thing was that Mike was going to take her to the hospital and wanted her son NOT TO TELL TED!  And when the son did go get Ted, and Ted left whatever he was doing to take care of his wife, Mike yelled at him for 'blowing' it all out of proportion!  Mike said he 'had it under control' and there was no need for Ted to get involved.  EXCUSE ME?  She broke her collarbone and screwed up her shoulder and rotator cuff! She was out of commission for many months.  Makes me wonder what they would have done it I had gotten hurt? Not call the emergency squad?  She also told me that Mike gets hurt 'all the time' falling off the horses, and that she did not feel he was a knowledgeable horseman or competent rider.  Which I had already figured out, I just did not know that his current injury was not a first, but actually the norm.  She said he has had three major injuries in the few years they have been there, not to mention the minor ones. 

The entire time I was there, Mike was taking pain killers for the broken ribs he got when Bailey dumped him.  Not my glorified Tylenol, but heavy dope, Vicodins.  Every night I saw both him and Sharon drinking a fair amount of alcohol.  Mike seems to like straight whiskey on the rocks.  They pull out wine with every meal.  Everyone there is always carrying a drink.  So now we have inexperienced people with untrained horses mixing alcohol and drugs, and all that around the horses.  This is SOOOOOO not right! 

I am feeling much better about leaving before anything serious happens.  And I know in my gut it will.  And it 'ain't gonna be me!" 

So, I will do some more sightseeing, I have reservations for this Friday.  Remember I said in a post a while back that there would be more about something later?  I have reservations at the Virginian Hotel, in Medicine Bow, Wyoming for the dinner with James Drury, (The Virginian from TV) and I plan to be there Friday. 

One last thing about this subject: (even though I am getting ahead of myself a little here)  I figure since I am 'in the West" and there is supposedly a 'Western way' and an 'East Coast' way of riding, (or so Sharon says) I will tell my story to people, and see what they think.  Well, I told my story to cowboys involved in the Cody Rodeo, I told my story to ranchers across Wyoming.  I told me story to men and women who are natives from Wyoming, including two women I struck up a conversationwith on a bench in from of the Irma.  I even told my story to James Drury (The Virginian) and his buddy, John Lindquist, who rode horses for a living in everything from thoroughbred racing to the movies.  And NOBODY backed up Sharon's claims that 'their style of riding in the West' was true!  (As I figured)  In fact, most people laughed, and made a few choice comments about what idiots they were.  John Lindquist was the best, when I was telling about the horses, he started laughing and wanting to know if they billed the horses as 'bombproof!"  We both broke down laughing.  Several people offered me names of other places if I wanted to stay and work a guest ranch, all offered me support, and all welcomed me and said that they were behind me 100%.  And all said that I was smart to no longer be there. 

So my humble opinion?  Sharon runs the show, and Sharon knows nothing about horses or riding.  God save us from ignorant people.  God save these people who think that they have someone who knows something in charge of the horses.

Only thing I need to figure out, do I go home or do I try to get another job out here?