Wednesday, August 03, 2022

Riding Horses, Painting, and Drinking Wine

Last week, I decided I needed to do something for myself for a change, so ended up at a nearby ranch for a Ladies Retreat! That basically means that a bunch of ladies got together and rode horses for a while, then relocated to the nearby house to paint a picture, eat a bite of dinner, and drink lots of wine.

It was fun. I grew up with horses but had not been on one in a very long time. My recent trip down the Grand Canyon on a mule had reminded me of how much I enjoyed it. I will admit, however, that the horse they put me on was a bit much for me to handle. His name was Hootch (named after one of my favorite movies: Turner & Hootch) and he was a little pill to say the least. He knew right away that he could pretty much do anything he wanted to, and I could not make him behave.


And as luck would have it the weather turned sour on us that day: it was not raining, it was POURING! I discovered that my spiffy new hat is not waterproof, my rain pants eventually do let the water soak in, my 25-year-old raincoat no longer works very well, and I really REALLY should have been wearing my Xtra-Tuffs. I cannot believe how wet we all were – which may explain some of the attitude I was getting from Hootch.  


Once we’d all gotten thoroughly soaked, we headed inside to warm up and eat our dinner. Our host’s husband had been cooking Pulled Pork all day long, not exactly my kind of food – but I’m told it was very tasty. The wine table had pretty much any kind of wine you could think of – so we all got to sip while we painted our horse.


Desert was a chocolate brownie with clotted cream and caramel sauce! I decided it was totally worth breaking my gluten-free diet - since it was a special occasion and all that. It doesn't look like much, but it sure tasted good.




1 comment:

  1. Anonymous8:12 AM

    did you go with anyone you knew? (heather)

    ReplyDelete