Monday, January 20, 2014

JANUARY 11, 2014

Yikes!  Time goes by SO fast!  Here I am playing catch-up now with 2014 rides.  Being sick with the flu has really put me behind.

So.....Saturday, January 11 was an absolutely MAGICAL day in the desert ~ to quote my good friend, Mary.  She and I rode that day from about 8:00 a.m. until 5:30 p.m.  We ended up seeing 9 different bands of horses as well as getting up close and almost personal with a juvenile bald eagle!

It was clearly the "day for horses to run and play" in the beautiful, cool temps of the desert!  Before we had even parked the trailer, David and I spotted BEAU with LITTLE GIRL and CELESTE grazing across from the parking lot.  He went ahead and parked while I jumped out and started snapping pics and vids!

Our good friend, Mary, arrived shortly thereafter, and we climbed in the saddles with our cameras, water bottles and power bars.  :)

We started riding from Coon Bluff toward Goldfield; before we'd gotten 10 minutes into our ride, though, Sassy spotted CISCO's band.  Mary with the horses while I jumped down to get a few pics, but I had only walked a few steps when I heard hooves pounding.  I turned to look and saw the band of 5 bachelors frolicking with WYATT's band (The EARP Brothers as I call them) close on their heels!  This called for reinforcements for sure!   LOL

Grabbing my cell phone, I called David and asked him to walk over to hold the horses while Mary and I got down to taking some serious photographs.  He happily obliged, and was really glad he did! 

Shortly after he got there, MOON and his band made their entrance, and what a grand entrance it was!  BEAU, LITTLE GIRL and CELESTE were peeking from their breakfast area, and they watched as MOON came galloping toward all the bachelors ~ the EARP brothers as well as the 5-bachelor band!  The next thing we knew, there were horses surrounding us, all galloping, kicking, bucking, frolicking and whinnying!  Talk about beauty!  ... Wait, I mean, talk about B E A U T Y!  Absolutely breathtaking!  Here's a sample:
After the "uproar" settled down, they all turned around and came running back to the open area!  For the next 2+ hours, we enjoyed watching (and photographing) the EARP Brothers, MOON and his band, BEAU with his band, CISCO and his family, and the 5 bachelors; SPOT, MARTY McFLY, HOUSTON, CHRISTOPHER aka DAVID, and GEORGE.  There was so much "horse play" happening, we had trouble deciding which direction to turn in order to watch, video, and take pictures.  Absolute Heaven on earth!

You may be wondering what happens to our domesticated horses while all this lovely chaos is going on.   We had Sassy (of course!) and Chase with us that day.  Sassy, being the "Diva of the Desert" as well as Ranch Diva, sets "the tone" for whichever other horses we have with us.  Meaning, she stands quietly and watches and makes sure Chase or Maverick does the same. 

Seriously, though, our horses have never had any kind of "issue" around the wild horses.  Somehow they all know they are "guests" while in the desert; they sense that the wild mustangs live there, and we all just visit.  The respect animals give to each other is amazing; one could only hope humans would learn from the examples set by the animals!

Finally, the horses tired themselves out, and one by one started settling down to take naps.  I guess romping around and tackling each other on the ground, playing like puppies does tend to wear one out after awhile.  LOL
We decided to continue on when we looked around us and saw this kind of behavior:

We continued riding toward Goldfield, and stopped at Foxtail to let the horses get a drink of water.  Egrets, ducks and blue herons made their presence known while we were in the river, and we loved watching them play!

We rode up onto the river bank and continued toward Blue Point, which is where we encountered a juvenile bald eagle!  He was sitting on the top branch of a very unusually-shaped dead tree; it amazed us that such a tiny twig could hold such a huge presence!  Of course, I got out my camera and asked Sassy to please stand still while I took some pics.  I got the bright idea, though, to take a video instead.  All of a sudden, the regal eagle decided to spread his wings and soar into the wind!  Before I shut the video off, I found myself screaming with excitement.  I was going to edit that out of the video, but some good friends talked me into leaving it because it (was funny they said...ha ha) but it also shows how unusual it is to be able to catch something like it on video!  Here's the video:
What an exquisite creature, right?  Makes me wish I could fly like that!   :)

We resumed our journey toward Blue Point, and as we made the descend from Foxtail, we just about had a collision with KAYO and his band of young stallion bachelors!  I don't know who was more surprised ~ KAYO, our horses or Mary and myself!  LOL  Here are a couple photos of KAYO with his buddies:

They didn't stay around as long as the other bands did, so we once again, resumed our journey toward Blue Point.  We were already more than happy with all the horses we had encountered, and figured we probably wouldn't see any more that day, which would have been just fine.  Little did we know, however, who was waiting for us as we made the climb up to the plateau just before getting to Blue Point!

There at the top was CHAMP with his band!!  MISSY, TRON, CHAMP, AMIGO were happily grazing away with CHARGER and TREVISO nearby!  All the horses, of course, noticed each other, but no one ran away.  Instead, beautiful MISSY and TRON stood so still, it was as if they were asking us to please take their pictures!  Here are some of what we did take:

4 comments:

Unknown said...

Carol, what an awesome day you had! The video go the eagle doesn't work on my IPad :-(

Unknown said...

It was a really incredible day, Gail! I'm not finished yet, though! LOL When I get back from feeding the horses, I have more to add. That day was unbelievable. :)

How Sam Sees It said...

How absolutely exciting! We've encountered ranch horses on the Peralta side of the Superstitions, but have never ran into any of the wild ones. What great photos!

Unknown said...

nicely done Carol. Loved the story line. Made me feel I was there. Still learning the area