Road Trip!

A couple of weeks ago Briar, Christy, Lyssa and I went on a road trip to Anchor Point, Alaska. There was a horse we were interested in for Briar. His name was Shorty but that didn't deter us from heading out for a 5 hour (each way!) drive on a beautiful day in October.
Briar is 15 now and has her permit so I let her drive part of the way. We were hauling the stock trailer so she didn't drive in any traffic. As you can see we pretty much had the road to ourselves. Above is Turnagain Pass. By December there will be feet and feet of snow and the parking lots will be full of campers and snowmachines on the weekends.
This is Cook Inlet and the range of mountains you can see through the haze is part of the Pacific Rim Ring of Fire. There are several active volcanoes including Mt. Redoubt that erupted in 09 and Mt. Spurr that erupted in 91 or 92.
The wildlife is amazing. We saw about 50 swans on this trip. Many of them were on Potter's Marsh just south of Anchorage. These are in a pond at the junction of the Seward Highway and the Sterling Highway. We have so few major roads in Alaska that they all have names.

Here we are almost back to Anchorage. Briar snapped this picture as we were zooming along so it's kinda blurry and really doesn't do justice to the beautiful sunset.

And this is Shorty. We hauled him back to Wasilla for a week trial period but he really did live up to his name. Briar is about 5'7" so she really needs a taller horse. Shorty was a good horse but just not a fit for Briar.

There's another horse we looked at though. That story will follow soon!

For Funder

This is the container that we used for Briar's cow, Alice. I have 9 more just like this one and one that I have already modified for the rams.

My plan to to put two cans together with the open ends facing with an alley between them. Then we'll roof that alley way so I can put their feeders under cover. The fiberglass sides will be cut out (leaving the aluminum supports) and the sheep will be able to use the cans as three sided sheds.

The weather in October has been beautiful except for one weekend of 100 mph straight line winds that had many people without power for up to 2 days. We have a generator, wood stove, gas lanterns and a gas cook stove as well as several stock tanks full of water so the power being out didn't affect us. The sky in these pictures is what we have had for the past week. However, the downside is that the high temperatures are in the low 40s and it's been below freezing every night. Termination dust is slowing marching down the mountains and we will have snow on the ground in less than a month.

Where has the time gone?

We are frantically getting ready for winter. There is so much to be done in a short time. First all the landscaping jobs we have been contracted for must be finished. Then the equipment can come home and begin working on getting the snow plowing stuff ready.

My sweety's plow truck has been stored all summer behind 8 cargo containers from Alaska Airlines. They were not air worthy so the containers were going to be crushed. They will make perfect sheep houses so I drug 11 of them home. To get his plow truck out from behind them we have to clean up where the chickens were and build a gravel platform for the feed shed to be moved so we can clean that area and move 2 containers to make a shelter for Briar's cow Alice. The 2 sheep pens need to be cleaned and platforms made for 4 containers to be moved for sheep shelters. The other 2 containers will be spotted in the yard as storage for my big Ferris mowers. All that work to get his plow truck out and ready for winter work.

The winter horse pen will be built as soon as the ground freezes. Then the horses will come to the upper lot for the winter. I must say that I really enjoy having the horses 27 feet from my front door. It makes feeding at 40 below much easier.

"They" say there are three seasons in Alaska: winter, getting ready for winter, and road construction.

Lots more going on. More posts to come with pictures!

Wordless Wednesday

Back in the Saddle Again!

Whew!! The Alaska State Fair is finally over. While it was not without it's share of drama and awful weather this year's fair was worth attending. I took my 4 month old lambs for the open shows and the 4-H shows. Pepper (the ram) took first in his class, Rigby (the ewe) took first in her classes, Floyd (the wether) took first in his open class and Best in Division. The three lambs were also shown in Get of Sire and received first place. I got second in sheep showmanship.

In the 4-H shows Floyd and Briar took 4th in the market class. Briar was second in sheep showmanship. She also showed the 2 wethers and a ewe in the get of Sire class and won first. She was allowed to show Pepper in 4-H because he is under 6 months. He took first in his class as did Rigby in the ewe lamb class.
This is the Get of Sire entry. Floyd is on the left, Wolly is in the middle and Supreme is on the right. They are all the same age but Wolly's dam and Supreme's dam are crossbred Suffolks and much taller than the registered Suffolks I have.

In the market lamb class Wolly was Reserve and Supreme was Grand. The young man showing Supreme chose to market his turkey instead of the ewe lamb. She's coming over to be bred this month.

Now that the Fair is finally over I can get back to "normal" life. I haven't ridden since the middle of August but have a ride planned this weekend if the weather cooperates. We had no summer to speak of this year and I'm afraid that we will go directly to winter. The days are much shorter and I'm putting on a heavier jacket to do chores in the morning. No ice in the stock tanks yet.

Hopefully I will be back to posting more often. Thanks to everyone who checked in while I was gone.

Rain Rain Go Away

Sorry I haven't been around but we are in the process of building an ark. July 2010 was the seventh wettest July since records have been kept in Anchorage. My horse "dry" lot is a muddy, mucky, nasty mess. Over half of the first cut hay is still standing. The poor sheep are almost to the point of shrinking.

We've been riding - in the rain - and even had a poker ride last weekend. Everything was wet but the rain stopped for several hours during the ride. This ride even had drama. We had two riders go through red "do not go here" flagging and ended up way off the trail. Both are good riders but really unfamiliar with our trail system. They finally retraced their steps and returned to the river. The drag riders (me) had come through and pulled the directional arrows so the two lost riders had to figure out how to cross the river. I didn't pull any flagging though so they were able to figure it out and get back to camp.

The next six weeks are full of things to do. The Kenny Lake Fair, then a Poker Ride close to the Matanuska Glacier, our Alaska State Fair in Palmer and finally PENDLETON! I haven't booked my flights yet but plans are for Briar and I to attend the 100th Anniversary RoundUp with my Unlce Chan. I'm so excited!

On another note: Wild Horse Annie had a really bad trailering accident with her TWH gelding. He has a dropped hip and will require stall rest until October 15. The vets say that if he makes it until then he should be 100% healthy and useable. Please keep them both in your thoughts.

I'll get pictures of the ark as we work on it. August doesn't look any drier than July.

Bald Mountain Butt Buster 2010

I should have lots of pictures and plenty of stories for this post after the CTR I have been working towards since the first of the year. But you know what they say about the best laid plans........

July 10 and 11 I rode the dress rehersal and final timing for the CTR. Vooshka was great - 21 miles on Saturday and 19 miles on Sunday. She rode with horses she hadn't ridden with before and even stayed with me when the horse we were riding with decided to leave his rider at the P&R and head down the mountain. Voosh and I were left at 1200' by ourselves and had to ride down a gnarly deep brush trail in bear country. The absent horse and rider were reunited and finished the ride with us.

At the very end of the ride Voosh came up lame on her right front. We walked home and I didn't plan on riding her until Saturday the 17th. We were supposed to be drag safety rider for the Novice/CP division.

Saturday dawned clear and bright. I was at ride camp by 7:30 am and had Voosh saddled by 8:00 for an 8:30 departure. My trailer was parked right by the timer's tent so there were 50 horses and riders gathered in the presentation area beside us. Long story short, Voosh lost her mind with all the activity and energy level. She did the best impression of "airs above the ground" that I have ever seen. Thank goodness there was someone to take my place as safety rider because there was no way I was getting on that horse.

I actually did ride her later because she couldn't get away with that nonsense. I rode the Mare after lunch for the PM trail.

The rest of the weekend I was camp go-fer. I used the wheeler to set signs and mark trails. I got all the ribbons and prizes organized. I picked up trash. I helped enter data into excel spreadsheets. I brought the judges their dinner (smoked prime rib, baked potato, green beans and corn on the cob, chocolate cake).

Although it wasn't the CTR I imagined, I still got to participate in some way. And I will get to ride more because all the flagging has to be taken down!