Latest Ride Calendar:
 

• March 26/27/28 - Cuyama 50-50-50
• April 3/4 - NV Derby 50-50
• May 1/2 - Washoe Valley 50-50
• June 12 - NASTR 75
• June 26 - NV Moonshine 50
• July 3 - Mendocino 50 (Fergus and pft probly won't be ready)
• July 24 - Tevis (Dan and Gina's badly scheduled wedding <grump>)
• August 14 - Bridgeport 50   
• September 4/5 - Cuneo 50-50
• September 18 - VC100   
• (October 15 - High Desert III 50)
• (October 23 - Sonoma 50)
• October 28/29/30 - Moab 50-50-50 (Face it, how exactly am I going to have enough vacation to do this one? it was added to the calendar long before I knew we were going to England. Maybe next year. I would *love* to do this ride)

Rides colour-coded for Roo and Uno

Rides in Green are part of the NASTR Triple Crown

Rides in (italics) are possible alternatives

Bridgeport ended up on the cards afterall - woo!

Looking back - the cemetery is in the furthest "V" on the horizon >

We got onto the long dirt road that leads out to the Cottonwoods vet check and trotted along in the sunshine. I'd been here before a few years ago - but it had been in a car in the middle of the night (crewing for someone during the ride) - and was surprised just how pretty it was - lots more juniper trees and the valley was more closed in.

We passed the split in the trail - to the left goes to Cottonwoods which is where the last vet check and 30 minute hold is during the ride - but first we had to make a short loop around to the east and then come back around to it. 

Pretty soon, we were climbing a big mountain - amazing volcanic outcroppings, beautiful views all the way over to Mt Rose just north of Lake Tahoe. 

The countryside is BIG around here.

Although much of the 100 miles is on "dirt/jeep roads", NV's dirt/jeep roads can be a bit like riverbeds in places - rocks, rocks, rocks and more rocks. You can trot for 10', but then have to walk for 30 as you pick your way through them.

We continued to climb before dropping down a long grade towards a huge valley. We hopped off and hand-walked the horses to give them a break.

At this point I was a little confused because the layout and scale didn't seem to match my mental picture of what it should be like out there, but then I'd never been there in daylight, so what would I know?

Uno made one short protest on the way down - stopping dead to express his sadness that we seemed to be going further and further away from where he felt we should be - and he was thirsty. I assured him that as soon as we got to Cottonwoods - just down here - he'd get a drink (there's a year-round spring there).

Uno expressing his displeasure

Eventually we got to the bottom of the hill and Fancy (Tami's mare) decided we should make a left turn onto a dry riverbed. We got a chuckle over that and instead turned left at the next riverbed jeep road. 

Up until now, every so often we'd seen old trail markers - ancient chalk scuffs on the ground, clothes-pegs with scraps of ribbon on them, so we knew we were on the right trail, but upon turning onto this track we never found a single indicator. Although there were some footprints, they appeared to mostly be wild horse tracks. Scrabbling along, we eventually made our way back to a fork in the trail and - hah - there were our own footprints. ? huh? we'd gone around in a circle...?

We backtracked to the split and continued up the hill a ways (still on apparent riverbed) before deciding - nope, this wasn't right either - turned around again, went back down the jeep road (for the third time) and this time made a right turn onto what we were sure must be the correct trail.

To be quite honest, this didn't really look right either, but we knew if we made our way to the west, eventually we'd hit the dirt road that comes in from the north and leads to Cottonwoods - which should be just over the next hill.

Suddenly Fancy looks over her shoulder and - look! - wild horses on the top of the hill! How cool is that! The horses whinnied back and forth a few times, but stayed on their hill.

We tried going across-country to make up some time but this turned out to be a Really Bad Idea. What had appeared to be wide open flat grasslands was actually covered in volcanic rock that was impossible to walk on without scrambling and teetering at every step. 

The horses began to get pissed off. Tami and I began to get pissed off. 

Finally we started looking at our GPSs a little more closely. Inspecting a GPS in detail while riding a jigging horse and clambering through rocks, is much harder than it sounds. For one thing, you can't see anything wearing sunglasses, and the sun is either reflecting off the screen or the shadow is obliterating the map. For another, trying to judge distance when you're scrolling in an out makes for difficult navigation. Tami tried to take us to a "road" - but all we found was a vertical cliff. Hmm. But look, more wild horses down there in the bottoms! How cool!

Fancy stopped to pee. Her timing was perfect - over the horizon appears a trotting wild stallion. Great. She's just filled the air with her delicious mare aroma and he's definitely interested. Uh oh. 

We turned around and headed back to our crappy "jeep road" as fast as we could scramble. I'm trying to keep Uno straight, he's trying to stay close to Fancy, and Fancy's trying to veer towards her new beau. <sigh>

In the next 1.5 miles, we saw probably 40 wild horses in many small groups. Although some of the younger boys came towards us, most showed little interest.

We finally arrived at the end of our crappy jeep road and hit the "main road" under the powerlines. This proved to be a slightly less crappy dirt track which promptly ended at a cliff. We'd neglected to notice the way the trail went around the Mini-Grand Canyon in front of us. The powerlines went straight across, but we certainly weren't going to.

Backtracked again, around the chasm (cool scenery, if you weren't wondering where the heck you were) and did more detailed inspection of GPSs. This time, we really studied the distances, the roads, and discussed our options. We discovered that we were about 6 miles *north* of Cottonwoods and had no idea how we'd gotten that far off track. Off we went again with a purpose - we would follow the powerline trail due south. The sun was starting to set, so we needed to make some time - but we would also consult the GPS at regular intervals - like, whenever we came to a turn. Surprising, most of the trails we ended up on showed up on the GPS maps - even if they were just dotted lines.

Our main worry at this point was that the horses had gone about 20 miles/6 hours without a drink and the promised spring at Cottonwoods wasn't going to be appearing any time soon. As luck would have it, at the bottom of the next steep hill there was a creek with plenty of water in it and both pones drank and drank and drank and drank.

That'll teach Uno to not drink when there's plenty of water available. Hah. 

Of course, 30 seconds after leaving the creek, getting onto the best footing we'd been on all day and trotting off to "make up time", one of Uno's back gloves (strangely, the one *with* the PowerStrap) flipped off on a side slope and he promptly had a hissy about the monster attacking his ankle, completely destroying the gaiter (on its second outing ever). <sigh>

Over the next hill, we came across another wild stallion standing right next to the trail. Only this one wasn't doing the "timid wild animal" impersonation. This one wanted to play. He whinnied at us. Tami (on her mare)(me? glad I was on a gelding?) yelled at him - which didn't remotely faze him and he fell in behind us with much enthusiasm. I tried turning Uno towards him - the way you'd face down a barking dog - but he wasn't really worried about that either and continued to approach. Then we used our secret weapon: endurance horses that can trot without stopping for long periods of time... uphill... (boy was I glad Uno's rear boots stayed on for that little escapade). After a few minutes of this, sure enough, the stallion decided we were too much work and stopped trotting behind us (mucho relief, given Uno's fear of Things Behind).

Down another long hill we got off and ran with the horses. Finally we seemed to be making some headway. The footing was getting better and better (relatively speaking)... or it was getting darker and darker and we couldn't see it? There was a fork coming up in the road which we opted to take after some discussion and after another mile or so, we *finally* rejoined our "main road" that we'd been on earlier that morning. We'd added approximately 15 miles and 5 hours to our ride.... <sigh>

But hey, we were there to pre-ride the trail, right? And now - much cheered by knowing where we were - we were happy to be mimicking the trail-on-the-day perfectly now that it was 9 pm and completely dark. 

Fancy amazed us one more time (although we didn't realise it until afterwards, looking at the GPS track) by trying to take a short-cut that would have gotten us right to Cottonwoods within a minute or so of riding, but by then we weren't sure exactly where it was (even if she was) and weren't willing to spend more time riding around in circles looking for it. Thankfully, it was a fairly cool day (mid-70s) and we'd walked so much of the trail because of the rocks that the horses had hardly broken a sweat, so we were confident that although thirsty they would be OK without water.

We walk-trotted the rest of the dirt road back towards civilisation in the dark, admiring the multitude of stars. It's actually surprising how much you can see when you've been out there in the dark so long and there's some ambient light from Reno and Carson City over the mountains. Our night vision was doing great until we got alongside Lousetown Road (yes, it's really called that) and car after car after car kept coming towards us, blinding us with their headlights. Each time, we'd stop and turn away from the lights, then turn back and trot another ten feet before the next one came along. Then Uno started kicking at his rear boot again and I was sure it had become dislodged, so hopped off and had to feel around in the dark to figure out what was going on. Curiously, everything was still in place (including that front boot with the missing rear screw), so I've no idea what that was about.

The almost omnipresent NV wind picked up in the last few miles and Uno got a little squirrelly (he can't hear the monsters back there), but we made it back up onto the highway without incident (if you don't count Fancy biting him in the bottom because he had the audacity to go in front for once). 

From the highway, we dropped down again, thankfully out of the wind, and hand-walked the horses down the steep, slithery hill (remember that one? at the very beginning of the story?), stumbling and falling down on the sudden side-slopes that we couldn't see (all we could really see was the pale grey trail and "bush shapes" either side of it).

Back up on the horses for the last mile or so, Uno perked up suddenly and took off at a trot up the hill, happy as a clam, knowing that we were nearly home. And that was the whole point of the exercise, right? <beam>

What we actually did >
Total mileage = 35 miles >

Thursday 9 September
There's a Man in my Tree!

Bobby from Sonshine Tree Services was supposed to come on Friday (the day pft works from home) to cut down the large dead oak entangled in our powerlines next to the front lawn. As it turned out, he had an opening today, so came a day early necessitating a work-from-home day for both of us.

10th September
Praying Mantis

My latest friend showed up a couple of days ago and has resisted attempts to put her outside. I think she likes hanging out by the desk lamp, waiting for unsuspecting flying things to fly past.

Here she and I read FB instead of getting ready for work.