Trail Ride

My eldest daughter & I went on a trail ride on Saturday. It was an all day ride to raise money for a local Bible camp - Brightwood Ranch Camp. They raised almost $21,000 which is fantastic, especially since this particular camp is focussed on inner-city kids and they don't charge the campers to come.

June is a beautiful month in northern Alberta. I think it's maybe the prettiest month of the year, although each season has its own beauty. We rode mostly on a Jack Pine tree reserve that the camp has permission to use.


This is the first time the camp has done this rideathon. They were hoping for about 30 riders. Instead, they had over 70. It made for quite a group. These pictures don't even show all of them. There were also two wagons that accompanied the riders. At the point these pictures were taken, we were waiting for some of the riders at the end to catch up.



We rode a little through trees but mostly over beautiful meadows.










We rode for about 2 1/2 hours and then stopped for lunch. The camp brought up lunch for all the riders and it was a nice break for both riders & horses.


I tried to get a nap....



I rode a wonderful horse. Our daughter's riding teacher graciously hauled horses for us and Zimra did really well all day. She liked to trot or canter, especially on the way back, and we weren't supposed to be going too fast so I had to hold her back but that was okay. Everyone else was having the same "problem". We held them down to a jog for most of it but occasionally we'd let them speed up, then reluctantly bring them back to a jog.

Zimra even held mostly still for me to take pictures as I rode, although she did have a tendency to start moving just as I got the camera turned on.



I don't have any pictures after lunch because the storm clouds rolled in and we had thunder & rain most of the way home. Thankfully, the thunder wasn't too close and I only saw one flicker of lightning in the distance. We were wet and cold by the time we got back but it was still a great ride.

This was the longest ride I've done and it was a wonderful day. I'm sure my husband is very thankful we live in town and not on an acreage or the push to own horses would be much stronger!