Well, I must preface this blog today by stating that this particular story has nothing whatsoever to do with Sinwaan, but I wasn't sure where else to put it, and since it is an endurance ride story, I thought it only fitting it belong here.
The ride: Virginia Highlands Endurance Challenge on August 23rd held in Ivanhoe, VA. Managed by Don and Nicki Meuten.
My dad dropped me off at my auntie Kim's in Luray, VA on Friday afternoon. She wanted to leave by 11 pm. Well we got there about 11:05. I went down to the barn and met my mount, Red Dog Dan. I had seen photos of him but this was my first chance to meet him in person (horse?) He and Falcon both looked fat but since Kim has been riding them both up her mountain I figured they'd do fine. We each haltered our horses and led them up to the trailer. Posed for a couple of photos and then got them loaded up with no problems. I threw my overnight bag and purse into Kim's truck, hugged my dad, husband and toddler goodbye and off we went.
Kim wanted to stay off I-81 as long as possible so we took some smaller parallel highways, which also got us around a mountain instead of hauling over it. This worked out well until we realized how long we would be on the road at this rate. So eventually we did get onto I-81 and it was pretty packed, Friday evening traffic. Some of the semi-trucks were driving crazy, waiting until the last minute to jerk over to pass and riding people's tails. Kim and I had some good conversation on the road.
When we got close to ride camp I read out the directions and they were very clear but we found the milage increments to be a bit off. It didn't really matter, we made it with no trouble. It said to look for Tom Sites and he would park us. Well we never did find Tom. Ride camp looked packed. I got out and walked clear down to one end and there was room so I had Kim pull back there and she got turned around, we unloaded horses, and then she backed into the shade. We got the horses tied to the trailer and walked down to registration to figure out where everything was without the horses. We also wanted to give them time to eat their hay and rest before vetting in.
Well turns out we were parked as far as possible from registration and the vetting area. Go figure! We hiked down there and got our ride packets. Mine was incomplete, so I filled in the info for Red. Then the lady wanted to see our AERC cards to verify that they were current. I have never heard of this before. (Kim says "well Shana, things are different here in the east!" - this was to become a familiar phrase over the weekend) So we hiked clear back to our camp and got our cards and hiked back again. It felt like a mile but Kim had her GPS this time and it was about .36 of a mile one-way.
I asked about the ride dinner, if it was for the night before, or the night of the ride. They told me I could choose, and if I wanted to know what they were serving to go and ask. So we hiked over to the building housing the kitchen and discovered Friday night was spaghetti night with both meat and veggie options. Saturday night was taco salad night with meat and veggie options...but also vegetables and pasta salad and cake and ... WOW! I am eating after our ride!
So after we got that squared away we went back for the horses. We led them to water and they weren't interested, but they did nibble along the way. The ride camp was in a really nice grassy area. Red vetted through with all A's and a heart rate of 46 I think. Great! Kim said Falcon got a B on muscle tone and she meant to ask about that but didn't. She couldn't believe Red started out better than Falcon already.
So the horses were taken care of but it is now about 6:30 pm and the dinner starts at 7 with ride meeting to follow. We still had to unpack the rig and set up camp and tend to horses. We decided a pre-ride was out. Oh well. So we tied the horses and set up Kim's portable corral (that thing is neat, but heavy!) Once they were squared away and fed with water in front of them we got to working on our camp. Kim had brought everything a person could want, even her own personal toilet. HaHa! Well I helped her lug everything out of the front tack room so she could inflate a mattress in there for bed tonight. She didn't feel like setting up her truck-bed tent and it was already getting dark, so we decided one person in the trailer and one person in the truck. She has a four-door truck with a nice back seat so I volunteered to sleep back there. I am quite a bit shorter than Kim and I figured she may not sleep too well all cramped like a sardine. Plus, her trailer smells like cat pee. She said she has shampooed it numerous times and the smell will just NOT come out.
I kept looking around camp since I didn't have a watch on at the moment, and noticed people started grabbing chairs and leaving so I told Kim we should get on down to the meeting area. I was paranoid we would miss something, and had fresh memories of my last ride where I never did hear the horn for the meeting and missed it entirely. I made up our PB&J sandwiches for tomorrow's vet check hold and said let's go! So Kim gets some last things done and feels rushed and unorganized but oh well, off we go. We hike the .36 miles for the fourth time in a couple of hours and realize after we get there that we should have brought the chairs!! Well Kim is tired and achy and I still feel ok so I tell her I will go back for them. As I ran off I overheard a lady say to Kim "she's a lot younger than you are. Well, I don't mean you are old!" And Kim says "yes, she is about 20 years younger than me!" (although if you stop and do the math that isn't right, Kim has a ways to go before she gets to 50)
Not long after I had picked up the chairs and was struggling back to the meeting with them I met a lady named Mary who was walking two horses. She said if I could make it to her truck, she would give me a ride. Fantastic! When we got in the truck she mentioned that it had been through hurricane Isabella and because of that the gears didn't work right and she couldn't put it in reverse. Well I am not complaining, a free ride is just that!
I got back with the chairs and we reclined together and ate pasta salad she had made and drank our ice cold water and waited for the ride meeting to start. I must say, I have never sat through a more enjoyable ride meeting. I believe it was Don and one other guy doing most of the talking and they were both such a RIOT they had me rolling in my chair laughing. They were talking to an audience of A) people who already rode the ride today, B) people who would do the ride tomorrow for the first time and C) people who would attempt both days. So when asked about the trail they would say "ask your neighbor because the rocks will be bigger and the trails will be steeper when they tell the story" They explained for the 30s that the trail would start out with a trot out one at a time at the start, and then follow the road we came in on for a little ways, then take a right and go up on a jeep road up the hill which would turn into a single track trail which would become switchbacks up the mountain and then after some more climbs we would reach highway 94 and there would be volunteers there to help us across. At the vet check there would be home made ice cream and the hold time is 40 min. It was noted there were climbs on both sections and a fair amount of rock but it should be fine and everyone should have a good time. Plenty of water on the trail, provided for us by the Ivanhoe Fire Department. So that was that, they talked a little about the 50s/55s? and then said that the beginners meeting would be given during the awards meeting off to the side by Stagg Newman. I told Kim we should go to that too since she was a new rider and secretly I just wanted to meet Stagg and hear what he had to say since I see his photo and read his editorials all the time in Endurance News.
So Kim agreed, even though by now it was pitch black. Stagg went over the usual new people things and allowed plenty of time for questions and I thought did a real nice job. He even handed out back issues of Endurance News and I got a classic from 2006 that I may not already have :) They also handed out some reading material and a stethoscope to everyone there. Impressive! Don or someone had mentioned during the ride meeting that "tomorrow when you start out in the rain..." so I asked about the weather prediction for tomorrow and was told it should be a real nice day. Good weather. Super!
Back at the trailer we did more last minute preparations and called it a night.
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