The Day Before

Here we are, still at Jackie Bumgardner's place in Ridgecrest. This is Zayante being shod before we left for Valley Wells on Monday morning. You can just see Zini's pink and brown bottom in the background on the right in her visitors pen (thanks Jackie!). Seeing pearly white horses (even dirty ones) suddenly makes you realise how cruddy your horse actually is...

That morning (Monday), I was able to wash the middle part of Zini - just the bit under her saddle. I'd not had a chance at home, and she was quite pink from our red dirt and I was worried about chafing from crud. (note, by the end of the ride, she was fluffy white all over... or at least on her white bits).

After a quick trip to the gas station (not much gas past Trona) and supermarket, we drove out to Valley Wells (about five miles north of Trona, 30 miles north of Ridgecrest).

DVE is held almost entirely in the big Panamint Valley, which is the next valley over to the west of Death Valley.

The camp at Valley Wells

The camp at Valley Wells was a big flat rectangular carpark made of decomposed granite (DG). Lookit!! DG everywhere!!! (at home you pay large sums of money to have DG delivered to your property to pretend you don't really have red dirt mud).

Riding out with Nick Warhol (on Zayante) and Judy Long (on Color) to stretch the pony legs.

That afternoon, Nick Warhol, Judy Long and I went out for a short pre-ride. When we got back (we just walked), I noticed a small scrape on the front of Zini's pastern. I think she tripped on a rock at some point. It had hardly bled so I didn't worry about it (as scrapes go, it was pretty pathetic), but when we went to vet in, I could see her bob slightly. Ack.

(It's odd - she's so smooth that when she shows up lame, it's really obvious. I mean, I was trotting her out and *I* saw it).

The vet said to put a standing wrap on her leg (<gulp> you mean I have to put a real wrap on? for a reason?) overnight and he'd check her in the morning. 

("Great, I thought. Patrick's going to kill me. All I did was ride an hour at a walk and lamed his horse...")

The next morning when we checked her, she was fine - just had a wet leg, from the quilt getting soggy. The scrape was nice and clean, though. :)

Day 1

That night it began to rain and it rained and rained and rained. I don't have heating in my trailer (still working on the living quarter part), but we have more or less finished the insulation, so I wasn't too badly off. And a camping stove kind of warms it up to about 55 degrees if you wait long enough.

Because of the rain and weird weather throughout the week, the days' trails kept changing - sometimes while the ride was going on, which was kind of fun, since you didn't have any idea what was going to happen. The LDs were a little more stable than the 50s - and I think mostly did the trail they started out to do at the beginning. :)

Tacking up in the pouring rain first thing was not the most pleasant thing, but there didn't seem much point staying in camp, since it would be just as nasty. Zini's tail was tucked so tight that morning, I had a hard time attaching her crupper because it wouldn't reach underneath.

Zini and I rode with Judy and Color which I was really pleased about because Judy wanted to take it really easy (a definite plus, since I wanted to crawl along) and Color would be a nice stable horse to ride with. Every time there was the slightest bit of sand, we slowed to a walk (or crawl, as it was a couple of times). The sand was fairly deep in places and I was paranoid. 

Because I'm disorganized, and because someone was occupying the portapotty so I had to "loiter" for a bit (eventually gave up and made use of a bucket in my trailer... endurance riders definitely aren't proud when it comes to needing to pee), we started about 20 minutes late, but this meant that we did get to watch Dave Rabe and Lightning do their rodeo impersonation. Thank goodness Lightning didn't go running back to camp (if he had, he would have come right through us). and Dave had soft sand to land in. 

The LDs rode two loops (and came back into camp in between them), but they eliminated the 30 min hold because it was raining so hard and they didn't want the horses standing around. So we just went back to the trailer and stayed long enough for me to attach my HRM (which turned out not to work because the battery was dead), so Zini got about three bites of hay and then we left again, heading out into the wind and rain. 

As we were riding along, we kept meeting trickles of water coming towards us - which was the start of a wash beginning to run, which was fascinating to see. Luckily, the big washes we were in didn't flood, although we kept an eye on things <gulp>.

It was an nice trail - sort of twisty turny in the desert, winding along the foot of the hills. Sometimes it went along long straight dirt roads (of which there seem to be a lot of in the desert). I enjoyed the twiddly parts (what I could see of them in the rain, anyway). At one point there was a nice waterfall off in the distance.

We were pretty much soaked through, but by the miracle of polarfleece, stayed warm. Everything was soggy. In the middle of the second loop, I asked Judy to stop so I could empty the water out of my boot. It is possible to remove a boot while sitting on a horse, even though you are wet through and crampy from cold.

By keeping my hands (clutching the reins) inside my sleeves I was able to keep them kind of warm. And I could pull my waterproof hood over my helmet and it would stay until the wind blew it down again.

Drowned rat—here's Zini at the end of her first ever ride...  It was actually kind of dry by then.

You can see where the dye leaked onto her sides. I'm not sure if it was from my sheepskin or my new saddle. My new saddle has a delightful white tide-mark on it. It is officially broken in.

Lucky I took my sponge along, eh? <grin>

You can see the small river running through the middle of camp. Luckily, Zini and I were parked on a very slight (inches) rise, so not in the running water. Poor Zayante, hung off Nick and Judy's trailer next door, was standing in a creek in the morning.

Judy and I did the first 12 or so miles in 3 hours (like I said, we took it *really* slow <g>) and we completed in 5:15 (negative splits, or what?), which was about perfect. Judy had on her GPS and the trail measured 24.6 miles. Hmm. Because we started late, I guess we actually rode for just under 5 hours.

Color, doing his white-trash impersonation. His blanket from the previous night was soaked through, so they jury-rigged this rather natty little number and duct-taped the trash bag to the top. It worked - he was still dry (ish) in the morning. 

The 50s were supposed to go over the Slate Range (small mtn range) and end up at Indian Ranch (where us LDers were supposed to drive to, after finishing our ride). Keeping in mind it had poured most of the night and most of the day, they decided that was a bad idea - the 30 miles over the Slate Range was deemed too dangerous (fear of riders being washed away, and you couldn't get to them if they got in trouble) and in any case, Indian Ranch would be too soggy to get to - along a dirt road several miles long.

So the 50s went out and did the two LD loops again, and we all stayed at Valley Wells that night.

I didn't wrap Zini's legs (it was too wet and disgusting and I didn't fancy squatting in the water next to her) and her legs were quite filled in the morning :(

Day 2

The next morning, those who were riding got up at 6:30 and drove up the road about 15 miles to the Ballarat turn off and parked on the dirt road off the highway there - and rode I know not where.... just rode around on what parts of the trail they could find. The previous night, Jackie couldn't tell where they would actually be able to ride, so I guess they decided that morning once they saw the trails. 

It poured with rain all night long and I was pretty glad I'd decided days before that I wasn't going to ride Day 2. :)

It was still raining hard when Nick came and banged on my door at 6:30 that morning to tell me they'd decided to go home because they weren't having any fun any more. Judy had a cough, which had gotten worse in the night.

I think a lot of people left that morning, when they'd "had enough". Many were sick, but some just didn't want to play any more. 

This was the view leaving camp the following morning. Note it had stopped raining by the time I took this picture. Contrast with the one above of us pre-riding, taken at nearly the same spot. With everyone leaving, standing there in the dark, in the rain, I briefly decided to leave too, but thought "don't be stupid, you didn't come all this way for one day of riding". I was parked next to Sue Benson and her husband. They had a satellite TV dish, so I asked them what the weather was due to do, and they said it wasn't going to get worse - that this was the worst of it.  I decided to just drive up to Panamint Springs and ended up leaving Valley Wells about 7:15 ish and by the time I passed the Ballarat turn off where the ride was starting, it was sunshiny and nice, so the people who rode actually had a good day.
And here I am, coming down the hill toward the temporary ridecamp for Day 2's ride at the Ballarat turn off. Those white things are the rigs lined up, getting ready to ride.
Panamint Springs was dry and lovely, so I spread all my wet stuff out on the rocks and bushes and trees and got most of it dried out. It was toasty and I sat in the sun with my sunglasses on and read my book.

The only part of my sheepskin saddle cover not completely soaked was the very back part (at the bottom of this picture). The rest was sodden and took two days to dry out.

In the afternoon, I rode out for an hour or so with Becky Glaser and her horse "Julie". Julie trotted long and fast, and Zini was scrabbling to keep up, but having fun.

Because my [new Barefoot Treeless] saddle was still soggy, I rode in Patrick's Sportsaddle, which I haven't ridden in for two months, although I rode in it most of the year. Ack. Not comfy at all. So it was imperative that I got my saddle dry.

Becky and I rode up towards Darwin about two or three miles and I told her I was trying to decide whether to do Day 3 as well as Day 4, and she said "If it was my youngster, I'd just do one day" - so that decided it (Becky has been doing this forever, so I value her judgment and it was nice to have someone to balance my enthusiasm against. I have a habit of trying to do too much, too soon).

My difficulty then was that they said the weather on Day 3 would be lovely, but dubious for Day 4. But the trail on Day 3 wasn't as good, while it was supposed to be really fun on Day 4.

I did vet Zini ready for Day 3, but what decided me in the end was Jackie saying at the ride meeting that they were planning riding along the highway (towards Death Valley), then going along the "dry lake" (which was seemingly under 2' of water when I drove past the previous day). If the lake was still covering the trail, then we'd just ride along the highway. 

Nah. 

Zini isn't great with traffic and the though of riding her for 25 miles along the shoulder with 60-70 mph traffic didn't sound thrilling (although it probably would have been <grin>).

So I decided to gamble on the weather, stay home on Day 3 and ride Day 4.

Day 3

As it turned out, the weather was lovely, the lake was dry, and the ride went well for those that rode it. Even so, I was glad I sat it out. I got my saddle and my sheepskin dry (by then, the only wet thing left was a long-sleeved cotton t-shirt and my socks from Day 1).

Around noon the wind came up and it got quite "brisk". In the afternoon, I took Zini out on her own. Or at least tried to. The wind was blowing pretty hard and she took a dislike to the flag whipping in the wind outside the restaurant across the road and didn't want to leave her 80 "new best friends" in camp. I finally got her out by following some other people, but she was shaking her head around and jumping about in a hissy fit (I'd taken the precaution of giving my neighbours Patrick's phone number before I left, "just in case"). I eventually rode her into the desert and rode along a dry wash, which was kind of interesting (to see what it looked like after the rain).

On the way back, we rode along the road a bit - me looking anxiously out for traffic. Came around the corner and found out that there was a Caltrans road-block. Earlier in the day a helicopter had landed across the road at the air strip. Apparently, when it took off, it went about a mile and promptly crashed near the turn off for the dirt road for Darwin where Becky and I had ridden the day before :(

The Caltrans guys said that one guy had been life-flighted out and the other two were taken by ambulance :(

At the ride meeting that night, Jackie wasn't sure what we'd do, since the road was still closed, and they wouldn't be able to get to the VC. Talk about another fly in the ointment.

Day 4

Zini was banging around at 5 am, so I got up to check on her and gave her some hay. It was warm and pleasant. I got back in bed and almost immediately it began to rain. Rude words were uttered.

To avoid soaking my saddle again, I tacked her up under her blankie (only looped a couple of things through the neck hole by mistake). I got her HRM hooked up and was ready to go at 7:03, which I was pretty proud of.

As I was finishing up her tacking up, Pam Bowen came over and said she'd just talked to someone who had TV or internet or sommat and she said "This is just the *tip* of the weather - it's going to get worse". <sigh>

I told her I didn't want to know. That I was going anyway.

Rode up to the start to find out where exactly we were going that day. Found out the plan was the normal one - the helicopter road was clear and open.

It was drizzling. I rode out with Bob and Peggy Eaton, walked for a while, then trotted and I looked back and realised that my rump-rug was still out. I managed to pull it up and loop the elastic over and snug it up on its toggles, while trotting with three other horses. Not something I'd ever be able to do on Provo. As it stands right now, I have about $10 in materials in this prototype rump-rug, so I'm pretty pleased with it, although it still needs some refining.

By then Susie Niebergall caught us. On the way up the long steep mtn road, the Eatons went on ahead. Susie and I trudged up carefully and I was pleased to be able to go so slowly on that long climb (what with being paranoid about lameness).

Susie Niebergall and Koady

After the climb we dropped down again into a flat sandy wash that wound its way through the steep rocks, which was really neat. The rain stopped and it was even a bit sunny. 

Fred Emigh on a horse-in-training caught us up and Zini took a shine to his horse, so we stayed with him for a while, trotting, trotting, trotting (I was glad we'd done our continuous-trotting practice). Eventually he pulled away and left us when we got to "Darwin Grade". On this hill, the horses really slowed down. It's a long, not-very-steep-but-very-dull road that we trudged up. We had a cross-wind and Zini wouldn't go straight and kept weaving from side to side (I think she was hoping to hide behind Susie's horse, Koady) and wanting to turn around for home. 

Trudging up Darwin Grade. Susie, Fred, and the Eatons in front.

Although it was sunny, I looked over to our left and could see another front coming in. <sigh> 

And then Zini started acting funky. Susie would trot Koady slowly and Zini would sort of shuffle after them, hopping every few steps. I was convinced she was lame. It started raining, and I felt miserable... getting pulled on Day 2 of Zini's career... <sigh> ...horses are so fragile <sigh> ... I should just give up now... <sigh>. I figured we were getting close to Darwin, so I'd be able to pull her there <sigh>.

We went higher. We started riding in snow. We were still in the lee of the wind, but when we popped out on the ridge above Darwin, the sleet hit us, and I just burst out laughing because it was just so horrid.