11/14/16 The plan was to leave for South Dakota on Friday
to get Jayden’s weanling. Mark and I had the week to prepare. Luke mentioned he
heard there was going to be snow in South Dakota over the weekend. A little snow
didn’t scare me too much, however when I looked at the forecast, it didn’t
t look
good. Along with the snow was blowing winds, and a gigantic drop in
temperature, down as low as the teens. I did not want to be traveling in that
kind of weather, let alone hauling a trailer and hauling a young horse. It was 8:40 when I came to the realization
that today was the only option we had to go. With a 10 hour trip, the sooner we
left the better. I knew Mark didn’t want to make the trip and my Dad did, so a
quick phone call and he packed his bags and headed down. Mark came and got the
horse trailer and washed it and the truck. He and Tony got to work building a
wooden partition for the slant load so the baby could be in his own section without
getting hurt. We had to take a buddy horse, that being Traveler. On Friday we
had his blood drawn for a coggins test so we could haul across the border.
Thinking we had a whole week to get the paper work, I had to make a phone call and our vet
had to do some quick paper work. She had
to send them via email and we got the info at 5PM. We were well over the boarder and thankful not have gotten pulled over. Once the trailer was ready,
horses and bags packed, it was 11:20AM when we hit the road for Gettysburg, South
Dakota. It was a long drive with all the detours and construction we ran into on
20 didn’t help matters. Jayden drove the first couple hours through the
detours. It seemed like we were always stopping to get fuel, go the bathroom
and get a bite to eat. We ate lunch in the truck and supper we made a stop. We
made one rest area stop to unload Traverler and let him move around. My Dad was
the driver going through Pierre. We had directions from google maps, a road map,
directions from the ranch owner, and from Siri via the phone. It seemed everyone
had a little different route. That made for a lot of confusion and
disagreement. We ended up going an extra 20 miles out of the way. It was 10:20PM when we pulled into the ranch. It is interesting when you envision what this
great ranch will look like with all these amazing horses and then the reality of what it's really like. We pulled up a 3 mile
long lane to a property with 3 small older ranch style houses. Everything kind
of looked old and run down. The trucks were beat up, there is junk here and
there. There were horses wandering. That was something I had never experienced,
horses loose on the property munching on stacked round bales. They would walk
right up to you. There were no fences, just a long 3 mile lane kept them on the ranch. There was piles of horse manure right up to the front door. And
cats, they had over 35 cats everywhere. Georgia met us at the trailer, not warm and welcoming. She was to the point and showed us where to put our buddy horse. Georgia appeared to be very hard working and it showed in her face of wrinkles that probably made her look much older than she was. She was a short lady that seemed all business and serious. I didn’t know what happened to the husband, later I googled and discovered he had died while trying to control a fire that got out of control on his ranch, how very sad. Now it is just a mother and daughter run ranch. Heather Sutton is a vet a little older than myself. The two of them run the ranch with over 80 mares, over 100 herefords, and over 100 bison.She looked much older than she probably was, lots of We unloaded Traveler into a pen of his own. Georgia had
made up a batch of molasses and oats for him and he had his own round bale. They offered us a place to stay since they
live so far out of town. We stayed in a mobile home that someone evidently
lives in. It was interesting and a little odd to be staying there. A hotel
would have been nice, but we didn’t want to be rude. Sleeping did not come to
easy, but we tried.
t look
good. Along with the snow was blowing winds, and a gigantic drop in
temperature, down as low as the teens. I did not want to be traveling in that
kind of weather, let alone hauling a trailer and hauling a young horse. It was 8:40 when I came to the realization
that today was the only option we had to go. With a 10 hour trip, the sooner we
left the better. I knew Mark didn’t want to make the trip and my Dad did, so a
quick phone call and he packed his bags and headed down. Mark came and got the
horse trailer and washed it and the truck. He and Tony got to work building a
wooden partition for the slant load so the baby could be in his own section without
getting hurt. We had to take a buddy horse, that being Traveler. On Friday we
had his blood drawn for a coggins test so we could haul across the border.
Thinking we had a whole week to get the paper work, I had to make a phone call and our vet
had to do some quick paper work. She had
to send them via email and we got the info at 5PM. We were well over the boarder and thankful not have gotten pulled over. Once the trailer was ready,
horses and bags packed, it was 11:20AM when we hit the road for Gettysburg, South
Dakota. It was a long drive with all the detours and construction we ran into on
20 didn’t help matters. Jayden drove the first couple hours through the
detours. It seemed like we were always stopping to get fuel, go the bathroom
and get a bite to eat. We ate lunch in the truck and supper we made a stop. We
made one rest area stop to unload Traverler and let him move around. My Dad was
the driver going through Pierre. We had directions from google maps, a road map,
directions from the ranch owner, and from Siri via the phone. It seemed everyone
had a little different route. That made for a lot of confusion and
disagreement. We ended up going an extra 20 miles out of the way. It was 10:20PM when we pulled into the ranch. It is interesting when you envision what this
great ranch will look like with all these amazing horses and then the reality of what it's really like. We pulled up a 3 mile
long lane to a property with 3 small older ranch style houses. Everything kind
of looked old and run down. The trucks were beat up, there is junk here and
there. There were horses wandering. That was something I had never experienced,
horses loose on the property munching on stacked round bales. They would walk
right up to you. There were no fences, just a long 3 mile lane kept them on the ranch. There was piles of horse manure right up to the front door. And
cats, they had over 35 cats everywhere. Georgia met us at the trailer, not warm and welcoming. She was to the point and showed us where to put our buddy horse. Georgia appeared to be very hard working and it showed in her face of wrinkles that probably made her look much older than she was. She was a short lady that seemed all business and serious. I didn’t know what happened to the husband, later I googled and discovered he had died while trying to control a fire that got out of control on his ranch, how very sad. Now it is just a mother and daughter run ranch. Heather Sutton is a vet a little older than myself. The two of them run the ranch with over 80 mares, over 100 herefords, and over 100 bison.She looked much older than she probably was, lots of We unloaded Traveler into a pen of his own. Georgia had
made up a batch of molasses and oats for him and he had his own round bale. They offered us a place to stay since they
live so far out of town. We stayed in a mobile home that someone evidently
lives in. It was interesting and a little odd to be staying there. A hotel
would have been nice, but we didn’t want to be rude. Sleeping did not come to
easy, but we tried.
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