Dorsey Creek, Otto, Wy

Montana Skylark (Larka) Super Mare got a perfect vet score the second day.( Photo by Ross Tolman)
Love the Tolman rides!!!! The Tolman's are the ones who run several rides up in the Big Horn area including the Big Horn 100. They are super friendly, well planned and affordable rides. The Dorsey Creek ride is held in the 'badlands' around Otto, Wyoming very close to where the Tolmans live.
I drove our rig with

three horses ( Desi for Dorothy Sue, Gunny for a boarder Jill Kristensen to pick up and of course  Montana Skylark( Larka) for me to ride 100 miles) on Thursday and spent a leisurely day on Friday riding DS Desperado (Desi) around the badlands and napping in the afternoon. The only other Larrikin there was Bonnie S who came with Don. Don Golfed while Bonnie rode like the wind as usual! Us Larrikins did very well!! Others were not so lucky. Mary R fell and broke a wrist and Vicky W fell and knock her head but is thankfully OK.The horses went whoopy all over the badlands before they were caught.
The second day was windy so the horses were all a little stir crazy. The best thing is ... THE RAIN held off. No trudging and sliding sideways through wet bentonite. Nothing worse!! I rode with Beth on her fantastic Phantom the second day and had a great time. Got to catch up( and make silly bird calls )with a good friend. Rode a good part of the way with Sue Lyke the first day so got to catch up and have fun with two good friends! This is what it is all about.Or should be methinks. Sometimes the rides are not what you would call enjoyable so we describe them more as adventurous instead. This is OK, but sometimes we forget the importance of enjoyment. This week end was pure enjoyment! Tim French marked the trail magnificently so i didn't get lost( getting lost is hardly enjoyable) and i got to spend some time with him taking down trail and going for a ride on Monday.More catching up with a good friend .We laughed at the tracks the runaway horses left the day before. Holy Cow!! Some tracks went straight up and down places you wouldn't dare to ride. Crazy animals!!
Next ride is Shamrock on July 4th week end, then the Bighorn 100 on July 16 th. Gosh has it been a year since i camped out up on the mountain in the dark. Guess so!
Click on images to make bigger.
Cheers R

dome house pictures

Dome house from the outside. Fenced yard, big deck, some landscaping. Sort of cute. Total disaster inside!

Double garage with loft  (to be apartment) above. In great condition. Upstairs will be the living space while we work on the Dome.

Upstairs inside the dome. Smells marginally better now the carpet has been ripped out.

The loft apartment. This will be really neat once it is insulated, dry walled, has floor covering and furnished.Right now it makes an ideal camping spot! See below

OMG what's that living in there?

Now for the BEST. This is our back yard. The property of 5 acres backs up to BLM land with lots of riding trails right out our back door! We are surrounded by lovely horse friendly neighbors like Jim and Georgia Kinninger who loaned me their handsome TWH, Boojoe (phonetic Sp?) to go tour the area. At the back is Jim on his TWH Blue, an equally handsome blue roan.As you can see I'm in Heaven!!!
CLICK ON IMAGES FOR A BETTER LOOK.

Maximillian Mule

Got Maximilian in training for a 100 mule endurance ride somewhere. Piece of cake for a mule.(Although he's prefer a carrot). Nothin' like a good mule.Well here's one and he has a good mule buddy called Emanuel Notoriass. Amy Nagler, super mule girl has not one, but TWO good mules here at OAS. You may not know when you've got yourself a good mule but you'll sure as 'ell know when you've got a bad ass one.

Still here Nevada somewhere in the future

Almost looks like life just stopped after the Ozark. Well it was an event hard to top! But yes I'm still here doing this and that and a few other things. Sometimes ( actually a lot of times) its difficult to sit down and write a blog after a hard day on the ranch. It can and will happen though.
Life is good here. No traveling with horses due to an outbreak of a deadly disease spreading throughout the states. We are staying put until we know its contained. It's just not worth the risk when you have 70 + equines under your professional care.
The big news is we have purchased a property in Wellington, Nevada. This 5 acre former horse boarding facility  sits in a little oasis surrounded by mountains and settled sparsely by equine friendly folks. The house itself is a total disaster so only working vacations are being planned for now. It will be a while until we move there. I've asked Mernie to send over a picture from his file but that may take 'a while' also so stay tuned. Ronnie.
Oh and it's less than 100 miles from the Tevis!!

Some pics from before the Ozark compliments of Weiwen

Eating eyeballs Weiwen prepared.Washing down with Mernie beer!

From left to right Larka ( DS Montana Skylark), Ronnie and beautiful Weiwen.
See next post for commentary on an incredible ride.

OZARK 100. It CAN be done!!! 23rd April 2011

Rough draft, Pictures to come

This 100 mile ride through the beautiful Ozark Mountains of Missouri has been off and on my list since the middle of last year. The one in September that i almost went to saw NO completions. The trail was in bad shape thanks to Mother Nature's wrath and needed a ton of work. Since then it has received a great deal of sweat and attention from to Barry Cole, Paul Sidio, the Forest Service and other folks donating there precious time and toil.
Well, there were still people warning me not to attempt it but i needed a 100 under my belt to qualify for the 2011 Quilty to be held in my home town of Adelaide in Australia. So I roped Endurance Rider and good friend Yvette Haeberle and her trust little dog Pip into going with me.  It sure doesn't hurt to have a doctor along although thankfully those services were not required. Yvette was also there at the Big Horn last year (see older posts) so she was aware these rides are not without drama.
We met riders  Kerry Greear, Marirose and their trusty crew Colleen at Bass River Resort and set up camp. Actually Yvette set up camp in the pouring rain for everyone while K and M went for a pre ride and i went off to visit with my good friend Weiwen. Weiwen now lives in St Louis and agreed to meet us there and rent a cabin for everyone to share. It was soooooooo nice to see Weiwen she is as beautiful as ever.
Yvette and i arrived a day early so i took a pre ride to check out the trail that,  as it turned out we would not be on. Poor Yvette was waiting at the southern trail head but in true form yours truly went in the wrong direction and ended up about 18 miles north. Heart attack no 1 for crew! It was getting dark so i headed down county rd 78 and found a farm house. "Yoo Hoo, i think i'm lost" i called out! To which a reply came " come in and have some birthday cake." So a little girl held onto Larka while she demolish their lawn and  i sat on the veranda eating chocolate ice cream cake. They called for help which took about an hour so i just joined the family celebrations.
That was a lovely ride in spite of the mix up as the weather was pleasant for the only time of the trip. The rest of the time is was stormy with torrential downpour.
The ride didn't start until 7.35am  Saturday morning and was almost canceled due to severe flooding. Luckily Paul knew the trail well enough to figure an alternative route. We had to repeat sections of trail and road to give us our miles and still sloshed in water in total darkness most of the way. We were going well will Paul's horses General Lee and Piper leading. His friend Todd ( lovely guy) was riding Lee and both horse knew the trail well. It was scary but an incredible experience to be trusting the horses in the darkness moving at a good clip while riders blindly hung on.No light were used as it messes with the horses' night vision.If it hadn't been for a wreck i got into when Larka got tangled in something all would have been fine. I came off lost a stirrup and thought it was all over red rover. Anyway all i got was a bruise to my knee and nose, Larka returned promptly to the herd and we were off again. Only now i had no stirrups and was a bit banged up so the next twenty miles was sort of painful. BUT WE FINISHED!!!
23 something hours on flooded trails in pouring rain, lightning and thunder. We had the best crew friendship can buy but guess what, they could get to us due to flooding. They were stranded on the hwy praying we we OK. Heart attack no 19!
No one went for BC as we were all pooped! Larka, Dorothy Sue's mare other than leg weary and ravenously hungry look like she could go another hundred. Actually all horses (and Nelly the mule) looked pretty darn good. The order we came in was Paul, Todd, Kerry, Marirose, me and a rider called Keith who was on his own and constantly lost. He made it in time tho.
I've miss a bunch of things out  as i know this is going on and on and on. We have to ask Yvette and Colleen to tell us about their "Children of the Corn experience another time!
Cheers for now and thanks to all the wonderful management volunteers, vets for proving THIS CAN BE DONE!!!!
Yee Hah! Quilty Bound!

DS Desperado, Desi

CLICK TO ENLARGE

Manny, Notoriass Manuel

It's 7.30 am and I'm thinking the mule would rather me go feed him and his buddies than sit here and finish his portrait. So I'm leaving it here at this point.Scroll down to see another pic and Info on Desi.

This weeks OAS featured equine/Desi for sale

Manny Mule (Notoriass Manuel) Endurance mule extraordinaire! owned by Amy Nagler.
Sprinkled with a little snow frosting!
Portrait to come.

Here is a flyer from when we were trying to sell Desi last year.Click to enlarge.

this weeks featured equine

Angel's Grace aka The Curly Paint is a part Bashkir Curly and part Morgan mare belonging to OAS. I am adding portraits to the weekly photos as a way of practicing painting in Photoshop. Lots to learn! Cheers Ronnie.

This weeks OAS featured equines

Photo by Chris Compton bottom photo shopped by yours truly.

This weeks's OAS featured horse.

Big ole gentle giant. Myles, owned by Marjorie Daley.Click to enlarge.
For this week's featured equines go to http://rondaeden.blogspot.com  or click on painting of Arabian horse down and to the right. 
Thanks Dawn!!!

where to get my prints

www.cafepress.com/ronniesprints
contact me for originals
ronnieroo@hotmail.com

www.cafepress.com/ronniesprints

How long do you persevere with a project? I have this site www.cafepress.com/ronniesprints out there to sell my artwork and seem to be flogging a dead horse.Pun! To me it seems just perfect but i don't seem to be getting anywhere with it.( To go to this site from here scroll down to see the links,cafepress). I have prints and mouse pads and cards then a link to my other cafepress site that has all kinds of other stuff. I have to say i thought it would go better than this. Should i just stick at it or go in another direction.I welcome any ideas and feedback. Just a little bummed i suppose. To get to my 'artwork in progress' site go down and find the image like the one above and click on that.
Cheers for now Ronnie.

Bloody cold

The top picture is of the temperature this morning. The last time i saw F and C degrees come together like this was when i first arrive in the USA. I came from 104 F in Adelaide Australia to 42 below in Fraser, Co. This place was once considered 'Ice Box of Colorado until contested. I guess there's always somewhere hotter or colder than where you are! Click on images to see better. The pic at the bottom was yesterday and we don't know by that how cold it was as the mercury on the thermometer had disappeared! It hasn't been above 0 since Monday!

New Year Blizzard and Resolutions

Time to contemplate the New year. As you can see from the top picture here taken from our back door, the first couple of days into 2011 gave us blizzard conditions here on the ranch. Mernie is currently outside moving snow. Not snow which has fallen, but snow blown in from elsewhere. They didn't want it either! Our well went out on New Year's day and the  pumped stopped leaving 64 equines, three people and a fat barn cat without water.Lots of ice, but no water. Mern had to haul in water from Rod and Beth's place over the road to tide us over until the water situation was fixed. All is 'well' now but it's still cold. See the picture below. If you can make this bigger you will see the thermometer has no mercury. It's down as far as it can go.Well below freezing.
As for NY resolutions, yes i have given it some thought. I think this will be a year of change. Or at least the beginning of some changes. I want to revive my studio practice and have started already with new media and style ( see http://rondaeden.blogspot.com ) . I want to slow down, do more yoga and meditation, read more and talk less. I'd like to spend more time with Mernie and start planning the rest of our lives together. We are approaching retirement. Whatever that means! I think 2011 being the beginning of a new decade, will see changes or new beginnigs for many of us. I know they'll be good ones. Happy New Year. Ronnie

New Years Eve in Laramie Wyoming

http://forecast.weather.gov/MapClick.php?CityName=Laramie&state=WY&site=CYS&textField1=41.3109&textField2=-105.583&e=0

Cut and paste in your address bar.

If you can access this link you will know why I'm thinking I might just sit in my studio and contemplate New Year's resolutions today!!

http://rondaeden.blogspot.com my second blog

Hey there y'all, i now have a second blog dedicated to artwork only. Please book mark the following to keep up with what i'm doing. My goal is to make daily additions. http://rondaeden.blogspot.com
Cheers R

Merry Christmas everyone.

To my friends and family all over the world, have a safe and happy holiday season.

A Dwawing Fool! That's me!

Wild horses, pencil sketch.
Trying to think of a name for my new series of drawings and watercolors. Any suggestions?

Welsh 8 x 10"
Ink and coffee washes on bristol board. Draw Draw Draw Draw!!!