Horseback Riding

A couple of years ago while we were in Wisconsin Dells, Amanda and I took the girls horseback riding. We "doubled-up"; Caitlyn sat in front of Amanda and Hannah sat in front of me. Now that I think of it, allowing two adults who have never gone horseback riding go while holding onto a child was very silly and dangerous. Either horse could have been spooked and since we only had one hand on the horse reins, we could have either been thrown from the horse or dropped whichever child we were holding. According to the folks at the Horseshoe J Dude Ranch, "doubling-up" especially with a child is "against the law" in Canada.

Since that Wisconsin trip, Amanda has kept telling me how she would love to go horseback riding again. Well, yesterday (Saturday) morning while she was still in bed I did some Googling and made a phone call. I found that the Horseshoe J Dude Ranch was only about 20 minutes away from our house. The girls and I went to "wake up Mommy" and I told her that I was going to take her out and it was going to be a surprise. Right away Amanda asks "Are you taking me to that Dude Ranch that's around here?"

Apparently only the evening before, Amanda was Googling too!

I guess great minds do think alike!

We called up Gramma & Grampa to see if they were busy, dropped off the girls and then went off on our own. Going out on our own usually involves shopping for clothing for the girls or grocery shopping. An afternoon date is definitely not that common for us!

The Horseshoe J Dude Ranch has 50-100 horses, each named of course.

This is Chester - the horse Amanda rode.

This is Captain - My horse.

We had a lot of fun and both of us were walking a bit funny back to the car.

I promised that I would download pictures of our new gazebo/awning with our deck extension.

Here are two pictures:

For some reason, both girls thought that it was COLD out tonight.