Another beautiful late fall day ride. The temperature was a bit chilly but nothing that avid riders couldn’t overcome with jackets,hats and gloves! As usual we headed over the ridge to relax and have lunch at Ribs. The group was a little larger than usual, consisting of Liz, Leigh, myself, Elaine, Ron, Susan and Beth and of course the gaited horses: Dulce, Grace, Casanova, Pumpkin, Luna, Holy Smokes and Danza. Beautiful views and great trails are the course of the day but those were topped by Elaine’s story of her 1st experiences in the East Mountains.

Elaine is a transplant from California, a polished executive type that wanted to get away from the CA scene!  She moved here to enjoy life more, ride horses, raise Alpacas and spend more time with her young son!  Shortly after moving in to her country home with acreage and room for those horses, Alpacas and chickens she needed to fix her fence so she found a local person to take care of the fence.  I hope you have the vision of good looking California executive transplanted to the wild wild west because here is where it gets interesting.  The fence mender casually invites her to dinner at his place.  Feeling flattered and enjoying the hospitality of the west she accepts.  The fence mender then tells her that on his way over to her house he saw a wild turkey on the road, swerved to hit it and they were having Wild Turkey Road Kill for dinner!

My hat is off to Elaine for actually joining the fence mender and enjoying Turkey RoadKill dinner!  She said acutally it was pretty good!  I have lived in New Mexico most of my life and first of all have never even seen a wild turkey much less had the pleasure of dining on one, road kill aside!  Just another example of the Wild West Hospitality!  Way to go Elaine!

One of the delights of trail riding is observing nature at her best!  On the rides in the Sandia Mountains we typically see the Abert Squirrel.  My first exposure to one of them was on my third story deck hopping around and making a nest of the chair cushions.   It was amazing that this little critter climbed the stucco exterior of the house 35 feet straight up.  Of course I was worried that he couldn’t get down so I supplied him with peanuts, bird food and water.  He visited 2 days and then disappeared, fortified with the gourmet food I furnished!  I always kid about Linda’s Bed and Breakfast in the mountains, I guess that goes for squirrels too!

These squirrels prefer the nuts, seeds and  bark of the Ponderosa tree.  Although they exist in our area there are not any very close to our house.  My little visitor must have possessed a wanderlust spirit.  I hope he made it back to the Ponderosa forest!