Arrowhead Ranch: Endurance Ride

So, this is how I spent my birthday weekend.

My hubby was working in Phoenix, and my twinlings were on a weekend Boy Scout Backpacking trip up in the Pecos, so it was just Jen and me, and I didn’t want to spend the weekend home alone doing nothing. So, after stumbling on a new blog the week before, while doing some research on the Caja del Rio for this weekend’s ACTHA rides, I read that the AERC Endurance ride were going to be at the same location as our ACTHA ride and was wanting some more volunteers. And well, since I had no plans and I’ve always been curious about the equine sport of Endurance riding, and I can’t imagine time better spent than spending it around horses and good horses folks, I contacted the host of the ride, Anne, and offered up my services. Even though I knew nothing about Endurance, except for what I have read on other blogs, Anne was thrilled to have me come on up to help out.

So, Jen and I packed up our camping gear since we decided we’d spend all day Saturday bumping around Santa Fe doing some Letterboxing and then scoot over to the Caja del Rio around dinnertime on Saturday evening, and then set up camp.

(Our campsite. Photo taken on Sunday morning)

In the morning we drove Jax and Jem over to the Boy Scout meet-up place and dropped them off, then drove over to the grocery store and gas station to fill the cooler with ice and tank up with gas. And then we were on our way!

We only live less than an hour from Santa Fe and I consider it my second home and am quick to take every opportunity to head up to visit. We have a few friends up there and there are always fun things to do. Jen and I ended up having a great time tooling around Santa Fe looking for Letterboxes. We ended up finding 7 at the end of the day and one of them took us to the best frozen yogurt place I have ever been to. They had 8 different flavors of Frozen Yogurt and more than 50 different toppings all available as self-serve to make your own sundae. Jen reminded me it was my birthday so we should celebrate…and boy howdy! We sure did! I had the Pomegranate-Raspberry and it was so yummy! I wish I could eat that flavor every day! I did put a few toppings on my sundae, including some dark chocolate chips, some coconut, and those very cool fish egg looking bubble things that people put into tea. They pop inside your mouth and fill it with a burst of juicy flavor. Mmm! Jen layered on as many toppings as she could manage, including, sprinkles, chocolate chips, whoppers, chocolate covered marshmallows, fruity pebbles, some more of those bubble popper things, and I don’t even know what else. I’m still amazed that she finished it all. lol!

Check it out: Frogurt

At the end of the day we managed to make it over to the Caja del Rio and the AERC Endurance Ride Base Camp, introduced ourselves, set up our campsite, got a lesson on how to take equine P&Rs, and then enjoyed a great dinner of hamburgers cooked up by Anne’s husband, followed up with brownies for dessert.

All while being serenaded by two very loud, (albeit cute) obnoxious sounding mules that were very vocal about not getting any attention.

(This little gal is an experienced Endurance Mule. But she was naughty and gave her rider a bit of trouble on Sunday morning, not letting her mount.)

We all headed off to bed pretty early because the 50 mile riders were going to be starting out at 6am and we wanted to be up and ready.

But we had a little snafu.

(This little lady mule is a recent rescue and was brought along just for the experience. She was pretty anxious and couldn’t stand still. She got tangled up a few times and I went over and got her all fixed up and even though she was shy, she let me pet her on her shoulders and face. Her owner said she was surprised this little mule allowed me to touch her because she had been badly abused in her previous situation and is still afraid of humans. So I felt honored.)

Please take note. We’ve owned our current tent for over 15 years. And in all those years, we’ve camped in it at least 4-8 times a year from anywhere between one night to 5 nights. Most of our camping in this tent has been in New Mexico. Keep in mind that we’ve camped in it more than 50 times, and it has never rained during any of those camping trips. Not once.

I seam sealed it and waterproofed it right after we bought it 15 years ago, and we often use the rain fly, especially if we are camping during monsoon season in July and August, but we’ve never been able to test it to see if it’s waterproof.

Do you see where this is going?

(This mule’s number may have been 50, but they were Limited Distance (LD) riders and were riding the 30 Miler. They pulled at the 14 Mile Vet Check, though, because the rider didn’t feel like her mule was “in the game” that day)

Yeah, it rained Saturday night. The kind of rain that folks around here call a Gully Washer. The lightning was cracking, making it bright as daylight in our tent, and the thunder sounded like gigantic boulders were going to roll right over top of us. But Jen and I weren’t fazed. She’s like me in that rain and storms seem to relax us and help us sleep. We fell asleep quickly, even though, my poor Dobbie girl had shimmied down into the bottom of my sleeping bag and was quivering fearfully beside my legs.

(There’s Dobbie the next morning, enjoying the morning sunshine)

Well, sometime around 2am, I woke up feeling strangely….wet. For a moment I thought I had wet the bed. Then I reached my hand over to the floor of the tent and felt water. Uh oh.

I pressed my hand down on the floor of the tent and it felt like a squishy water bed. Hmm…who put THAT there?

(This is the next morning, Jen enjoying some hot oatmeal, after watching the Endurance Riders head off for the day. Yeah, that’s my wet sleeping bag hanging on my door trying to dry)

I quickly realized I must have made a huge error when placing the tarp underneath the tent. I failed to make sure that all of the tarp was tucked underneath. Ooops!

And you know what else? Tents are made better now than they were 15 years ago. Who’s stupid idea was it to place a seam right down the center of the floor of a tent? gah!

Yeah. So all the water from the lake underneath my tent was seeping up through that seam and my thick, comfy egg crate mattress had soaked up all the water like a sponge and it was leaking into my sleeping bag.

(That’s my egg crate mattress the next morning trying to dry out)

Yeah. That’s a great way to be woke up in the middle of the night out in the middle of a rain storm, many miles from home.

Thankfully Jen was sleeping on the opposite side of the tent and wasn’t on top of a stupid seam, so she was dry. Me? Not so much.

She was sleeping soundly, and even my dog was still tucked down at the bottom of my sleeping bag, in the only dry spot, snoring away.

But I had to do something fast before our lake became deeper. So I threw on a poncho and my boots and headed outside and saw that one little corner of tarp peeking out off the side of the tent. Darn. It had created a little aqueduct that funneled water directly underneath the tent.

So, with my daughter and my dog sleeping soundly inside the tent, I started yanking the tarp out from underneath the tent, watching the water gushing out from the sides of it as it slid out. I bundled up the wet muddy tarp and jammed it underneath the back of my GMC. And then I went back inside the tent and realized my sleeping bag was too wet to crawl inside of, so I tried to lay on top of it, but the temps had dropped down to about 40 degrees and it was just too cold. But I did remember that I had a fleece blanket throw inside the GMC and a fleece jacket, too. So, I went back out into the rain, grabbed those and brought them back into the tent. I would have just spent the rest of the night in the GMC, but I didn’t want to leave my daughter (and my dog) out in the tent alone.

Do you all know how short those fleece throws are? Good thing they stretch.

I slept off and on for a couple hours and was grateful for the warmth when Dobbie came up from the bottom of my sleeping bag to sleep underneath the fleece throw with her back against my side.

I didn’t think I’d be happy to hear mules braying at 4:30 in the morning, but I was.

Even though it was still pitch black outside, their crazy heehaw-honking-whinnying, while they watched their owners preparing for their 50 mile rides, gave me something to focus on besides my cold, wet, stiff discomfort.

Go ahead and listen and see if that racket doesn’t make you crack a smile, too.