The Friday night show went off without a hitch. All the teams turned in good performances and the crowds enjoyed the show. The trick riders always thrill the crowd.
The turning teams were having a good time as you can see in the similes.
During the show, a heavy storm front blew through the area. It dropped the temperatures to something more comfortable, blew around a lot of dust and put on a spectacular lightening show over the mountains. It sprinkled very lightly for a short period of time and then the real "fun" began. Horses started to colic. We had three horses that were in distress and there was no large animal vet in the area. The three horses were loaded into a trailer for the hour drive back down the mountain to the vet we normally use. After they left, one of the horses in our barn was acting a bit off so we watched for a bit and determined that it was colicing. The Westernaires trailer had not returned but we needed to do something for the horse, a mustang named Sally, so I went and hitched up my trailer, loaded up the horse and headed out about 10:00pm on the hour drive to the vet.
As I got out of Estes Park I started to pick up rain, fairly heavy rain in some spots. If it had been a movie I would have said that the rain was foreshadowing for Septembers record rains and flooding. In any case, I slowed down to make sure I stayed on the road, turned up the radio a bit and did my best to enjoy the drive. Since I was on the tail end of the storm, I was in and out of the rain all the way back. But as I came out of the canyon I was treated to the most beautiful electrical storm over the Front Range. It was spectacular! I wish I had a picture to share but since I was driving I figured I'd better keep both hands and both eyes on the road.
I got to the vet and we got Sally settled in for the night. I held the twitch as the doc ran a tube up her nose and pumped some magic juice into her. She was going to spend the night so I was free to go. Since I was barn dading, I was supposed to spend the night in the barn but I didn't relish the one hour drive back up the mountain at midnight. So I went home, enjoyed a quick shower and a comfortable bed for the night. Beats the heck out of a cot in a horse stall.
The next morning I headed up back up the mountain at about 6:00am. I am normally up and feeding my horses around 5:30 so I just wake up at that time and go. Again, the Saturday night show went off without a hitch. The young men and women that make up the Westernaires Red Division work hard on learning their drills. When show time comes around, they take it up a notch and do a great job. Since the Saturday show was over at about 9:00pm, the plan was to return to Westernaiers to Denver on Sunday. So we settled the horses into for the night, food and water, and settled into our own stalls for a fairly decent nights rest.
The next morning, we started cleaning things and loading horses for the trip home. One of the horses in our barn didn't look right and the girls who ride him said he wasn't right. We checked for sounds and he had good sounds, but looked uncomfortable. The girls were walking him around and he was not doing well. We checked sounds again and they were much softer. There was no way the horse could ride in one of the big stock trailers but one of our owners had and extra slot in their trailer and agreed to take the horse to the vet. Sadly, we were not able to get the horse to the vet in time. The horse was alive when it arrived at the vet but it was to far gone. They tubed the horse and got some water and electrolytes and mineral oil into the horse but it was to little to late. On Monday the decision was make and Westernaires had to put Snicklefritz down. It was a sad day for the kids that rode him.
We will miss you Snicklefritz!!!
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