My New Friend: The Roadrunner

January 19 2016

Walking into Jose and Smokey's pen one cool morning to clean horse poop, I was startled to see a Roadrunner hanging out on the tack room porch. I froze, wanting him to stay a while. Jose walked right by him; Smokey walked right by him. I approached Jose and scratched his neck, 20 feet from Roadrunner. Roadrunner just sat there, blinking in the sunlight.

I slipped on the other side of Jose, still scratching him, now 15 feet from Roadrunner. He didn't care.

Jose walked off, and I casually took a few steps toward Roadrunner. He didn't flinch. I walked within 8 feet of him, and sat down. Roadrunner blinked in the sunshine. I struck up a conversation with him. I think he was listening.

After a while, he hopped off the porch and walked 2 feet closer to me. He pecked a bit in the dirt, then turned his back to the sun and fluffed up his feathers, so the sun would strike his dark skin which quickly absorbs heat. I like to think he was showing off a bit for me, too.

I kept talking to him, he continued to be unconcerned, and as soon as he warmed up enough, he turned back around, and stepped toward me again, digging in the dirt. And he walked toward me again, totally unconcerned, even if I moved my hands or shifted my seat. I was conversing with and sitting 4 feet from my new Roadrunner friend.

Roadrunners are fairly common in the southwest deserts. They have a zygodactyl foot - 2 toes are directed forward, 2 are directed backward. The X-shaped footprints they leave behind are said to be used as sacred symbols used in some southwest Native American tribes to ward off evil spirits, because the X-tracks disguise which direction the bird is traveling (it throws the evil spirits off track).

My close encounter with my new Roadrunner friend happened two mornings in a row. The second day I had my little camera with me.

Sweat

Wednesday January 19 2011

If you want a good workout in the Ridgecrest desert for your endurance horses, you haul to Brady's. The trails are no-nonsense, as they go right up and into the foothills of the Sierra Nevadas.

If you do the short loop, your horse has a mile-long climb up to the water pipeline road (water for Los Angeles that comes from Owens Valley), which gets steeper toward the end. He gets a little breather before he has another mile-long hard climb up, before descending back to the valley. (If you do the long version, he has the mile climb, then a couple of miles of flat road,

then a 1 1/2 mile very steep climb up before descending a steep trail down to this second mile-long climb.) We did the short loop today.


The views of the Ridgecrest basin get broader as you climb, and the views of the Sierras grow even as you ascend towards them.


With their wooly coats, Kav and Spice and Raffiq were coated with sweat. As were we three girls. And that was just at a walk. Even when it was a mild 71*. If your horse is really really fit, as in Tevis-fit, he might trot some of these trails; but today, with the horses' winter coats, they didn't need to trot to get the full-on super workout.

When your horse's eyebrows are sweating, you know they are working hard. It should be 10* cooler for next weekend's Fire Mountain ride, and we'll shave some of their thick hair off.


If you can't appreciate what your endurance horses willingly do, you probably shouldn't be riding them. I could feel every muscle working beneath me as Kav dug his toes in the sand in his efforts to get to the top of these little mountains. I heard his huffing and puffing, and I rubbed his sweaty neck. And he was done with one hill, I pointed him toward the next, and up he went.

It was a good day's work on our amazing mounts.

Trails A Fire

Monday January 17 2011

Today Gretchen and I rode her two horses on one of the loops of next weekend's Fire Mountain endurance ride.

The 50 and 30 mile rides will loop up above Ridgecrest California into the Rademacher Hills, with views of the Sierra Nevada mountains to the west, the Argus range to the northeast, and the Panamint Mountains of Death Valley to the east.


I'll name the 14-mile loop that we did the "Pontiac Loop" because we passed an old rusted Pontiac (or something of the sort - I don't have an eye for cars), or should I say, Kav didn't want to pass the old rusted Pontiac beside the trail. It was even scarier than that killer jackrabbit that attacked us.

On the trail you'll likely see some of the 40-odd old gold-mine pits and some scattered 'historical trash' from the mining days. It's a bit early for the burrowing owls to start nesting, but you'll pass some of their nest holes, and you'll surely see some desert Ravens flying about checking you and your horse out. And jackrabbits. Plenty of jackrabbits.


It was hot today (about 71 degrees!) and we girls and the two horses sweated up a storm. It should be ten degrees cooler Saturday, and the trails are in fantastic condition - very little rock (no pads needed), mostly smooth and soft single and two-tracks, a bit of sand but nothing too deep.

The Fire Mountain ride was almost cancelled before the weekend as the number of entries hadn't reached 40. The ride is put on by the local Valley Riders as a fundraiser. The funds don't add up when you lose money putting on a ride. Years past, ride management was turning riders away, but entries are way down this year, as they are in many rides. But by Friday, 38 had signed up, so they gave the Fire Mountain ride the green light.


The Ridgecrest area of the Mojave Desert claims to have sunshine 350 days a year. They already got their rain and snow out of the way, so it should be sunny from now till December 31st.

The cooler temperature and sunny day will make for some sweet riding on Saturday.

These Old Trails

Sunday January 16 2011


The skies glow as evening comes to the Mojave Desert of Ridgecrest, California.


The snow geese hit the skies by the hundreds, honking and squawking, flying in Vs to find the best spots in the desert to sleep, after dining on the grass that's sprung up from the winter rains.


As morning light reaches the snow on the Sierra Nevada peaks, we haul out to the Garlock road and get dropped off,


and ride up and over Laurel Mountain (with the big golf ball radar station on top), 15 miles back home.


I'm riding Gretchen's horse Kav, who I'll ride in next weekend's 50-mile Fire Mountain ride.


Gretchen's on her horse Spice, and Wendy (from Cool, CA) is riding her handsome young gelding. We make our way up the shoulders of Laurel Mountain, the horses working up a sweat in their long wooly coats, even as we pass a few remnants of ice and snow along the trail.


We all cool down on the top, before we start winding back down off the hills, and we cross the highway and join my old stomping grounds of trails that I once named. Here is Maggie's Trail, where I used to gallop a horse named Maggie. We cross Fadwah's Trail and Ross' Trail (both named after 2 of Jackie's old endurance horse). We pass Stormy Summit North, East, and West, where my retired Thoroughbred racehorse Stormy learned how to go out on the desert trails by himself.



It's been a month since I've been in the saddle, and my muscles are feeling it, but it's great to be back on a horse with friends on old familiar trails.