Rocky’s Web

Wild West Church Ride (Ride for Life)

Sep 19th, 2007

I guess it’s time for another update. In further preparation for my Confinental Divide Ride, I participated in a 200 mile ride from Westcliff, Colorado to Taos, New Mexico. It isn’t actually 200 miles between the two (by road), but the route we took riding horses was equivilant to about 200 miles.

We left on Saturday, September 1st from Westcliff after participating in their parade. I brought 2 horses. One was my black quarterhorse mare (Zena) and the other was a black grade gelding that I borrowed from my son-in-law (Mark Reust). I was going to ride one and “pack” the other one. For a pack, I had purchased a saddle pack and 2 paniers. The pack works good because you can use your saddle to tie and sturdy the pack and the paniers (plastic inserts) are added protection against anything you might put in them. Along with the saddle packs, I added an “H” pack that also fits on top of the saddle and atop the paniers/bags on each side of the saddle. It adds additional storage and can easily be attached to the packs and the saddle. Since the “H” pack was on top, I put my immediate use items in it. That included my tent, bedroll, clothes, shaving kit, light jacket, and mattress. They all fit fairly well. In the paniers, I put my other supplies that were: MREs (food), ropes, first-aid kit, horse medical, additional horse halter, butane lighter, propane stove and 2 propane bottles, flashlight, axe, knife, eating utensils, extra towels, etc. I had saved room for water storage and (if needed) any food for my dogs (which I didn’t take). On the horse I was riding, I had a Pommel bag that included 2 bottles of water on one side and on the other side had some snacks, hand towel, flashlight, knife, camera, and gps. I had saddle bags and cantel bag behind the saddle. In one saddle bag, I carried a collapsible water bucket for the horses, and some small tack items for the horse. On the other saddle bag, I carred a few more snacks, an additional bottle of water and some other misc items. In my cantel bag, I carried my raincoat, towel, and radios.

Well, the first day (after the parade), I rode my gelding and packed my mare. I spent most of the day trying to hold my mare back from outwalking my gelding and in the meantime, trying to have my gelding speed up. We ended up at one of the rancher’s houses, but still have to put up our tents to spend the night in. The horses were all put in a large corral that had water and plenty of grass for them to feed on that night. We were threatened by rain, but didn’t receive any.

The next day (and all following) we were all up at about 6:00 at which time we stowed our sleeping/tent items, rounded up the horses, saddled and packed them. Then, we ate breakfast and was ready to go at about 8:30-9:00. That day, I, again, rode my gelding and packed my mare, but at about halfway through the ride, I could see I was still having problems with each of their paces, so I switched and rode the mare and packed the gelding. This was when I found the mare didn’t act very well with the bit I had in the bridle. She kept trying to throw it and would react too quickly to any type of pressure put on it. This combination on the horses seemed to work a little better and the mare ended up “pulling” my gelding the rest of the day.

On the 3rd day, I found out we had a chase truck that was going to be with us most of the way, so I put my paniers and “H” pack in the truck. One of the riders needed another horse to ride because his was already “scaleded” from just the past 2 days, so I let him ride my mare, and I went back to the gelding. Besides, my mare had an easy walk. I didn’t have 2 bridles, so I put the bridle on my gelding and just the halter and lead rope on my mare. The mare did real well without a bridle and we rode her the rest of the week just that way.

We ended our ride on September 8th at the pregnancy clinic in Taos and the end was well welcomed. During the ride, I found that my gelding has rubbed a deep gash into his left upper leg, where the gerth set. I doctored the gash on the gelding the rest of the week and replaced my eurethane girt with a wool-stranded gerth and kept it away from his front leg. It worked well the rest of the ride. My mare had started to show rubbed marks underneath her front leg, so I adjust the girth on her, also. It worked O.K.

Lessons learned were: to carry a good first-aid cream for the horses; change gerths to mohair or wool (which I should have had in the first place because they breath, expand, and don’t irritate the skin); get a wider air mattress; have a spare bridle; get 2 new saddle pads that were also wool; and you can’t be prepared for everything, but do the best you can.

Rocky

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