Three days in the Moab sun. The place where most of the great scene's from "West Texas" cowboy movies were filmed. It's no wonder so many people from my parent's generation have a great love in their heart's for "West Texas." The place they really dreamed of riding horses and chasing cattle was really Moab, not Texas.
We too come to Moab to ride our horses. Our's are of the "iron" variety, but still it's much the same as the Western dream of the previous generation. We come to escape, to chase freedom. We long for the place where a cell phone will not ring, and one is only as good as the legs that will... or will not return him to civilization.
Andy was trying out a 29er for the first time. He had heard the big wheels were good for rolling over rocks?
And Mrs. Mary MO was pretty excited to be out rolling over rocks again too.
Every now and then it's good to give the horses a break, to let them graze and relax.
And then climb aboard the saddle and "give em' some reins" for the race back to the barn.
After quite a lot of time out of the saddle lately, I awoke after two days of hard riding, tired and sore. I was needing silence, some peace, a slow pace. So I found a trail that most won't ride, a trail full of sand, and jumbled rocks. Dinka and I found cattle too, stinking and defiling a place that should be, but luckily is not, a National Park. It's a conundrum, cows or condo's? Wilderness??? It's a riddle that won't be solved any time soon. A place that is open to my kind of horse, yet closed to the lunacy that follows man where he is "allowed"??? Whoh there pardnor, it's getting complicated in here.
So I trudged on through the sand, the trail hoof pocked all to hell, my little dog and I happy as ever.
Who's out there? Is someone coming? Are we alone? Dinka seemed to wonder these things as we rode alone for many hours in the just barely warm enough winter sun. I forced my sore, tired legs onward through a desert canyon that could only be this empty in February.
Fifteen miles from the nearest human being. Think about that. How often are we ever that far from other humans? Scary? To some, but to others it keeps us sane. I'm so glad we still have places like this. For a GPS map and easy to follow directions go to---- www.westtexasfunfinder.com
Love this post!
ReplyDeleteCan't wait to get riding around Moab!