First off, thank you all for your donations to ‘Donna’s 10 Bucket Fund’ – (in honor of my mother). Thank you! We are over halfway there!
Dreaming a little… Do any of you live and ride in: Idaho Falls, Albuquerque, Golden Colorado, Oak Ridge TN or Ames, Iowa? What do you think of your riding towns?!
So, in time, Hubby may be required to move to one of these towns for his job. …Not right away and maybe not for several years, but I was dreaming about it all… Most of all, I was wondering about the riding.
Do you live in any of those cities? If so, how is the riding? Trails? Easy access? Weather? Shade trees? Good vets? Farriers?
I’d so appreciate an email me telling me what you think – good or bad!
Thank you!!
PS: Here is a horrible barnie with Dalton’s muzzle and my eyeball and hat.
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Thank you, I love this! (Didn’t know that about Idaho…).
Dawn, some resources to check if relocating and wondering about horsekeeping and riding in the target location: network with Back Country Horsemen chapters, and contact equestrian organizations that are more oriented toward pleasure riding and trail riding (rather than focused on breed competitions). Another online resource for trail riding information is Best of America by Horseback which is a long-running equestrian show on RFD-TV — all their locations are posted online with full information (btw, they formerly were located in TN so they have a lot of info about horsekeeping and riding in that state, they are now in VA). Interestingly enough, as opposed to the “left” coast, once you get a little further toward the Rockies, the midwest, mid-Atlantic and southeastern US there are so many more places that cater specifically to riders – both government agency run and private. I’m not referring to boarding and show barns, plenty of those – I’m talking specifically about outdoor riding in areas protected from “motorized” and two-wheelers and most importantly from hunting. In my various relocations over the years due to job transfers actually the first consideration for me was making sure that there were good veterinarians available – almost bought a fabulous NM ranch several years ago but learned the nearest horse vet was two hours away and the closest dog vet was 150 miles distant and wasn’t even a full AVHA member! You would think that horse vets out in rural area would be plentiful but sometimes that’s not the case. PS Idaho Falls is beautiful and mostly affordable but poverty stricken which brings its own issues. Idaho generally has some news-headline type politics going on that can impact general quality of life regardless of political orientation. Just sayin’.