Holy $hit Bullwinkle

July 26 2025

Hillbillie Willie loves riding new trails. He is also loving staying the Spa at DWA Arabians in Bellevue ID. Helen was kind enough to give Willie and Connie’s 3 horses refuge from the Owyhee heat for a while, and between my work days I’m able to come up for a few days at a time. Willie LOOOOOOOOVES walking around the farm sampling all kinds of GREEN GRASS (of which there is zero at home), green weeds, green alfalfa, green lawn grass, etc. Not to mention it is cooler here and the bugs aren’t so bad.

Today DWA Papillon and Connie, Willie and I went out for a ride on the BLM foothills near Bellevue for a good uphill workout on great footing. We were far away from the busy Ketchum/Sun Valley trails that are inundated with speedy bikers and loose outtacontrol dogs which make riding some of those trails on horseback impossible (and can sometimes make for scary hiking).

Willie led the way for a while, trotting up a soft 2-track road alongside a creek lined by aspen trees. 

Then Pappy took over the lead, cruising along, then - BRAKES! Pappy wheeled a bit, and Willie just braked behind him.

It was a giant moose! Holy $hit Bullwinkle! 

We’d startled him and he certainly startled us! He watched us and we watched him. Big daddy! There are moose in this area, Connie has spent plenty of time hiking and looking for a moose, but she’d never seen any, and when we least expected it, we came across this giant moose! Willie wasn’t worried at all (he has seen moose on the Old Selam ride, though not on the trail and not this close!), and he just curiously watched the beast.

Luckily Monster Moose was more interested in avoiding humans, and we were just fine with that. He went up and around a stand of trees and ended up back on the trail in front of us. We gave him plenty of space and kept walking upward (we wanted to stay on this great trail), and eventually he disappeared, probably back down in the brushy creek. We made plenty of noise as we rode along so any other moose would know we were on the trail!

The horses got a good uphill workout till we ran out of road/trail, and we walked back down. Pappy was all amped up from the moose, while Willie was the one mostly lingering and enjoying the great grass along the trail (he’s usually all business and won’t eat).

Then we headed up a harder steeper hill toward a ridge, trotting much of it to near the top. When we reached the ridge, the road went onward and upward, but that was a great workout and a great wildlife encounter for our boys today!