Riding in the snow

Recently my husband, son and I went for a horse ride up in the mountains.  The day was warm and we wanted to get at least one more ride in before we had too much snow.  Snow wasn't on our minds when we left our house, for although we had already had our first storm, warm days had melted it away.  Only the very peaks of the mountains showed the evidence of our first storms of the season.

We had decided in advance that we would ride up the Pole Creek Trail, a trail that leads back into the Wind River Mountains.  As our truck began to make the pull up the mountain, and ice and snow covered the road, we began to wonder if our choice in locations was a wise one.

We bundled up and went anyways.

The horses slugged through the snow, breathing heavily as the trail holds a gradual climb.

I had never ridden in snow along a mountain trail before. My little boy sat in front of me and as we moved through the trees I felt as though I could have been a mountain man or a squaw following her man on their way to a new camp.

The woods were silent other than a few birds.  My son talked most of the time and we could hear the breathing of the horses.  In several places we saw elk tracks where a herd had moved through.  A snowshoe hare darted in front of us, and at one point our lead horse stopped abruptly when a moose quickly moved deeper into the forest.

We went quite a ways down the trail. I could have ridden for miles and miles, but the cool air and the tired horses signaled our time to turn around.

Life stories come out of our many experiences, and our day of riding in the snow will be tucked away in my mind for may years to come.

Two pairs

We added two new members to our family this summer.

My husband and I knew we would like to find some horses for our kids to begin riding on, and after looking around in all of the local papers and online sites, we found some reasonably priced horses suitable for kids- Boots and Cowboy.

As far as horses go, they are nothing extravagant; but they are calm, easy to catch, tolerant around kids, and very friendly. Both are sorrels in color, although Boots is darker. Cowboy has a white blaze on his face and white socks on his front legs. Boots has white socks on his back legs and is a little smaller than Cowboy.

Like their names, Boots and Cowboy are a pair. The man we bought them from originally found them for his kids at ranch where they give trial rides in the summer. Boots and Cowboy have never been separated. The man’s kids outgrew the pair, so when we talked to him about purchasing them, he said we could as long as we took both.

Now, looking out in our pasture, the two graze together and walk around the property as the companions they have always been. My two kids are a pair as well, and Boots and Cowboy are already the topic of our conversations and our focus in the evenings as we bring them in to brush them, give them grain, and let the kids ride for a while.

“Quite the pair,” some would say, and I would have to agree: Two kids and two horses with plenty of memories to develop and adventures to be found.