I don't even know where to start, there are so many stories
to tell. Maybe I should start with the seven horses we brought from Virginia to
Arizona to be the starter set, if you will, for Hideout Ranch. Craig
and I each brought four horses to the mix, laughing we were the Brady Bunch on four
feet. I went back to Virginia first with Sammy and Riches. When I got to
Fareed’s, Doodle was there, so I had my pony back. Not
long after Craig got to Virginia, we went to retrieve Sport from the people who
had had him for the years I was in Arizona. So I had my four horses back
together – Sambora, Riches, Sport, and Doodle.
Craig brought Kansas, Calvin, Tonka, and Sebastian with him
from Arizona. Bear in mind Sebastian was "Pancho" when he arrived in Virginia. We changed
his name, schooled him English, and he became this amazing very talented event
prospect, enjoying his new life under English tack very much. At some point,
I'll have to get into the Sambora story, the Sport story, Riches', Doodle's - each and every horse who had an impact and left a mark on me, Craig, our guests. As
I said, there's so much to tell, so many stories, so much information.
But for now, let's focus on the horses we brought with us to Arizona from
Virginia to start the ranch.
Sambora, my sainted first horse, was the foundation. She was
the axis upon which my world turned. She was my heart. And Riches, her first
born, was the very blood Sam pumped through me. They had both already been in
Arizona. Riches was on the guest ranch with me, then Sammy came to me when we
were on Craig’s first ranch. Riches loved it. They both did, so coming back to the
desert was nothing for them. (It is easier on horses to move east to west than
west to east because of the humidity. The four desert rats suffered a bit until
they were able to acclimate. Snow was something else entirely…). Doodle, my
pony, my precious little bug, took several guests out on trail and gave even
more lessons. She was a tough little cookie, as Craig would say, a little
mountain goat. She went right out there, wrinkled her nose, and got it done.
My BigMan, Sport, sadly did not make it across country with
us. Months before, he had tweaked his back. His front end would walk toward you
and his back end would walk sideways. He was likely in his thirties and had
just been through so much when he wasn’t in my care. One morning, I jumped on
him bareback – truthfully, I climbed up there. He was so big I couldn't “jump”
on him. But I climbed and rode him bareback down the driveway to turn him out. It
was the last time I rode my BigMan. I loved that horse beyond reason, and he
would have loved it out here. We got him in the trailer, but he slipped and
fell. We had to back Sebastian out over top of him, across him, and Craig pulled
him out of the trailer with the tractor. He lay there on the ground, heaving with
the stress. I was convinced I killed my horse, but he got up because that's
what my BigMan did. Sport had heart, and it belonged to me just as I belonged
to him.
 | |
| Sport, my BigMan "The Highwayman" |
Paul Anikas, the vet, showed up and looked at me with that
vet look which clearly said, “Tamara, you should have done this a long time ago.”
I said yeah but I couldn't. I couldn't. Wade and Kareen McGee offered to let Sport
stay there as I had to drive across country then fly back to finish work (I was
working on a proposal at Accenture but had the week off to drive across the country). Sport stayed there, hanging out in the barnyard, and I was to meet Paul the next week to put him down, arranging
with the rendering plant to remove his body and make use of what could be useful.
That decision alone shredded me, and it took God Himself to make me accept such
an ignoble end for my BigMan. Melissa had walked down there with me and somehow,
she managed to walk me back to the farm. She never once let go of me and kept
me standing. And breathing. We finished loading up and left my beloved BigMan in my cherished
Virginia.
I was driving Craig's black truck with the old steel trailer
where Doodle, Sambora, and Riches (in that order) had been patiently waiting and
munching during the entire Sport incident, across the country. Craig, in the
newer truck with air conditioning and a CD player, had Kansas, Calvin, Tonka,
and Sebastian – and twelve cats – in his trailer. Having left a huge part of me
at the McGees, it was a very long drive.
We left Markham early evening on Sunday March 30, 2008,
driving as far as we could before pulling off in a parking lot somewhere to
sleep a bit. We got back on the road well before dawn, driving all day to hit Nashville
at rush hour. There was a small mishap which delayed us, and we pulled into a
rest area this side of Memphis where a huge thunderstorm made a fitful night
even worse. We had reservations for the horses to enjoy some overnight stabling
in Abilene, Texas on Tuesday evening. Of course, this meant we humans were going
to enjoy some overnight stabling.
On a lovely spring Tuesday evening, we pulled into the ranch
in Abilene where we had reservations and offloaded the horses who were all
grateful to be out, able to stretch their legs. We had given each horse a 200lb
compressed bale of hay. (When you put this type of bale in the hay net and cut
the strings, poof! It explodes.) We figured 200 pounds of hay would get them all
the way through to Arizona. Pffffffffft…
After we'd turned the horses into their paddocks and began
cleaning out the trailers, Craig remarked, in a very puzzled voice, that Sambora,
Riches, and Doodle were completely out of hay. They had none left. In response
to his genuine and loud questioning, I merely said they were girls. They were
stress eating. Hay was like chocolate to them. The boy still had hay (who knows
what the boys were doing to amuse themselves on the drive), so we had to give the
girls some of the boys’ hay to finish the trip. Craig never got over the girls
eating 200 pounds of hay each from Sunday to Tuesday. I would
just look at him whenever he brought it up.
We were in Deming, New Mexico about two hours from the ranch at sunset,
and there was no way we were going to roll into the ranch at night and try to
offload animals. Just not going to happen. We stayed in Deming, asking the desk
clerk at the hotel if they wouldn't mind checking on the horses every so often.
Kindly, they did. Missing our target by 12 hours, we rolled on to the ranch
Thursday, April 3, 2008. We offloaded the horses, made sure they had hay and
water, then the boys had to go pick up the cows which had been shipped the week
before to the Willcox auction grounds. We girls emptied the trailer of the
household goods and life began on Hideout Ranch.
The original seven horses were unquestioningly the
foundation of the Hideout Herd: Sambora was
excellent for everyone, but best with those a little hesitant and children. Riches was mine. In her 24
years of earthly existence, I doubt more than ten other people have ever sat on
her. Doodle went out on trail many times and spent lots of time in the round
pen with kids. Kansas was Craig's horse. Craig stopped riding Kansas in 2006, and
there is a whole big story to tell about it. Believe me. Kansas got to be
Kansas for rest of the time he was with us. He was Kansas. He was here. And that's
all that mattered. He was just Kansas. Sebastian spent many miles on trail with
guests, and was a favourite for those we’d indulge with English schooling. Tonka
went out with guests frequently. He was fun, reliable, and very comfortable. Craig's
first horse, Calvin, was his Sambora while Kansas was Craig's Riches. Calvin
took many guests out.
Craig was insistent upon developing the horses. He figured
people could sleep anywhere and we ate in the Livery, but a guest ranch wasn’t
really a guest ranch without horses. The seven we brought with us certainly
aided us in our efforts, but we quickly began adding horses to ease their burden.
Mose was the first to join us. Then Yaqui. We’ll talk about them. Trust me…
