horses

Evening rain

/ Gin Getz / 2 Comments

Evening settles into a downpour.  Deep and grey and heavy.  Rain and hail, loud on the thin walls of the
tent.  We are in here, dry, protected by
no more than thin canvas.  More than
enough.

Lightening touches down above tree line across canyon.  Our horses are out there with their heads
down, ignoring the massive blasts of thunder that heave onto the walls of the Divide,
rumble and roll around the peaks like water shaken in a glass jar, round and
round it seems while we sit cradled in the center, in the shelter of the tent.  Yes, the tent I did not want to bring because
it somehow seemed decadent to have anything more than a tarp to crawl
under.  Me, who likes it simple.  Sleeping under a tree this month would have
left us wet and cold.  We’re here to
work.  A good night sleep is not a bad
idea.  I conceded.  I confess the boys were right again.

So here we are under a canvas roof with a small woodstove
hissing against the seeping sides of the stovepipe, water pouring off outside
walls filling buckets half full with sweet clean cold bounty free from the
generous sky.  Allowing me one less trip
to the creek with sloshing buckets in each hand.

I sit by the open tent door and look out at the horses through
the shroud of heavy misty rain.  They
remain seemingly unaffected.  This has
happened to them before.  Seems like
every night for the past few weeks.  And
when we lead them into the shelter of trees at night and offer them a simple
handful of treats and a gentle touch, I smell deeply the musk of dampness on
their steaming coats that appear already to be thickening with the first hints
of winter fur.

Thunder begins on the other side of the tent now, the other
side of the Divide. Rain lightens and sky attempts to brighten, a brief flight
of sunlight through a weak spot in thin clouds.
And then the sun will drop down beyond the Pyramid, the high point on
the mountain we know is there but cannot see.
Blind faith.  Like knowing we’ll
see the sun and be warmed and dried when morning comes.

Now our vision is limited to the valley and the foothills of
the mountain across from us, a familiar face hidden behind a veil of heavy
clouds, hardly demure, but strong and powerful.
Comforting in her solid feel. There, a mother and baby moose cross
between our horses and the trail that leads up and away into the clouded
shrouded horizon.  The little fellow
scampering with gangly legs only partially in control, playfully ahead of
mother, who nervously runs to keep up, ahead, protect, do what a good mother
should do.

They are unconcerned with our horses who out there now remind
me what a giant step closer to wild they are than me.

Me, safe and warm and sealed off from the elements by
nothing more than a tent.  Which too
often, is enough to separate.  And I feel
the growing rift when what I want is connection.  How we fool ourselves to believe we too are a
part.  For only a never lasting moment.

Meet the new guy

/ Gin Getz / 11 Comments

How do I describe him?  If you were here, I bet the first thing that you’d say would be “Big.” Or note his super sized feet.

The two year old son of the woman who raised Norman called him “bright.”  And indeed, in his slick summer coat and highlighted hair, he shines.  He glows.  He has a halo about him.  Although he is somewhat big, I think what we have here is a four legged angel.  With furry wings on his feet.

For those who have known me for at least a little while, you know a big part of our summers consists of heading to the high(er) country and “digging ditch” deep in the Weminuche Wilderness.

Gizmo had been our faithful ditch digging companion for the past four years.  But out of due respect, we decided it was time to allow him retirement.  We’d rather let him enjoy his later years in style (Texas style, no less) than keep pushing and using and possibly wearing him down.

Besides I love a challenge.  That’s how I learn and grow.

So here’s Norman.  My newest challenge.  A big horse for a little woman. A five year old Percheron/Belgium cross draft horse that I can tell you already has a similar heart of gold that Gizmo has.  A heart as large as his big ol’ feet, and then some, maybe.

Norman found us by way of a friend in Pennsylvania who saw an ad for a draft horse in Texas.  Five years old and never been trained. But handled with love and kindness.  That’s the foundation I look for.  Forget those who are worried about “spoiling.”  Just like with kids, kind and gentle care is the best I can ask for.  No baggage, no fear, no worries about people and dogs, and when he sees you coming, he perks up and walks over to greet you.  I’ll take “spoiled” any day, thank you.

Not a lot of folks out there breeding, training and using draft horses.  When it was time to look for a new draft horse to replace Gizmo, the most common recommendation we heard as we asked around was to ask the Amish.  “Get an Amish trained draft horse,” we were told more than once. But since when am I going to do what I’m told?

From what I saw last year, the first and only time we’ve seen the Amish and their stock make it high up this mountain horseback, I’ll stick with doing my own training.

Before we even encountered this group we saw the tracks. Far bigger than Norman’s and the trail was just not built for a side by side team, though the tracks told us that’s what these horses were used to.  Our trails are narrow, twisting, tight and fine.  Not the best place for a really big horse, not to mention attempts at walking side by side.  They just didn’t fit.

So there we were, end of last summer, heading to another few days of digging ditch, riding up the trail in our usual silent smooth procession, looking down following these giant tracks, most of which are off the trail (“Trail?  What’s a trail?” Not what a valley farm horse knows.).

Lo and behold we meet a man, a frantic rider on a nervous horse. The horse is small, made for riding, but clearly not used to the mountains and elevation.  He’s being pushed on, his eyes are wide, head high and tight, nostrils flaring, in full sweat, froth dripping from his chest, ears and between his legs, exhausted and clearly out of his element as he whinnied and pranced in place and carried on with the man on his back.

“Have you seen a loose horse,” the man asked us as he tries to control his mount?

No, and we point out to him that you could tell if you looked at the ground, there were no recent tracks in the soft trail heading down the mountain from where we came.

Next we arrive at our camp only to find a Forest Service employee wondering if this was our camp… or the camp of the Amish that they could not find.  We look across the valley and in the distance see a loose horse still running wild through the trees, another tied alone to a tree, we could hear his crying from over a half mile away, and a couple more going back and forth, containing the carnage.

Then he told us of the Big Wreck.  Now, I suppose many people starting out have wrecks. Packing is not as easy as it looks. And this was a doozie.  World class wreck for high mountain horse packing.

He tells of odd gear sprawled across the hillside, spilled open sleeping bags, the old fashioned kind you used in your backyard tent when you were a Boy Scout, and various pots and pans sprinkled all over the trail. He tells of horses running, gear flying, people yelling.  And he tells us it was the worse of the wrecks he’d seen, and was in awe that so far, the horses made it through relatively unscathed.

He’s told me enough!

You know, if you place me behind a team out in the flats somewhere, you’d probably find a similar wreck. Out of my element.  But for now, I’ll stick with the mountains.  And mountain horses.

Well, all this story does is show you why I was happy to find a draft horse that was NOT Amish trained, not too big, and just darned nice.  Now, turning him into a skilled and seasoned mountain horse is our next adventure. 

Or at least, one of the many that we’re embarking on as the season progresses.