Not such a pretty pretty princess

DISCLAIMER: I'm sorry for all the grandmas, moms or motherly figures of you out there reading this. This isn't one of my finer lady moments in life but it sure is funny.

Meet Dale...my archenemy. Don't be fooled by his beauty, he saw a city girl coming from a mile away. Justin really wanted to go horseback riding which I thought sounded like fun too. I thought one hour sounded like enough fun but Justin convinced me the two hour ride would be more fun and we could go up higher and see more of the mountains. I knew I should have listened to my gut.

Let me preface this by saying that anytime in my life that I've gone horseback riding, I ALWAYS get the crazy horse. It must be my energy. When I was 8, I vividly remember riding a horse at a family reunion and the horse just taking off from the rest of the group and my Uncle Kent sprinting after the horse to take me off while I'm screaming bloody murder. I think that might have been the last time that I rode a horse until Dale...now I remember why.

All those feelings of nervousness came back as soon as I got on Dale. The ranch hand helps me up and immediately leaves me after I tell her that I'm from Texas like we ride horses to work or something. Awww, look at how naive I am in this picture before we leave for our ride.


Somehow I end up at the very end of the pack. Justin is on this beast of a horse. I'm scared to get within a 5 ft radius of him because he's so huge and he might just knock over my horse by sneezing. I'm sweating through my shirt like a guy already and we haven't even left the ranch. I brought my camera but immediately handed it to Justin because I knew there was no way I was taking my hands off the reins. The praying begins.

Call me a city girl but I had absolutely no idea how much gas horses have. Justin is in front of me riding Costello AKA Goliath and the guy in front of him is on another giant of a horse as well. I'm pulling on the reins every two seconds trying to keep my distance for two reasons:

A. Because both of their horses are tooting something terrible literally every 30 seconds. One would go and then that other would start in and let me tell you, it was awful! There's nothing like looking at the beautiful mountains hearing a whoopie cushion sound the whole time...kinda takes the edge off the beauty aspect.

B. If I got too close to Justin's horse, Costello, he started to pee and it splattered all over me!

So I'm starting to gain my confidence but Dale suddenly sees a tree that looks like a might good butt-scratcher. So as the group is going on, I'm completely being mauled by a tree. As soon as Dale figures he got enough of a good scratch, I look like I just got into a cat fight with scratches all over my arm.

I look down at my watch and realize that we've only been gone for an hour and I have an hour more to go. My knees are burning and my bottom is already aching. I start into my inspirational "Little Engine that Could" talk to myself...I think I can, I think I can. We start descending down the mountain (thank goodness!). Dale goes down the mountain like he doesn't weigh half a ton and have toothpicks for legs. I tried to get him to slow down but I've already discovered this horse has a mind of his own. As we go down, it's really rocky and Dale loses his balance. Justin said that he looked something like this...
So Dale spooks Justin's horse and Costello AKA Goliath takes off up a mountain. Justin calms him down and our guide tries to get us moving probably because she is so ready to get rid of me at this point. As we get close to the ranch, our guide tells us that sometimes when the horses see home, they like to take off. Well, at this point I have Dale so tight on the reins he can hardly breathe. Costello AKA Goliath takes off. I mean not just a trot, I'm talking like there's a Kentucky Derby on the line. So now Dale is spooked and freaking out and going up on his back legs. Once again, I just hold on for dear life and look up to see Justin look like a jockey on his horse heading straight for the highway looking like his horse had no intention of stopping for miles. I say a prayer that my husband won't get killed on our anniversary trip.

Costello finally stops within feet of the highway. Justin throws up his hat like he just had his first had his first experience in a rodeo. Better him than me! I was so ready to get off that horse and get Justin off his. The ranch hands can't believe that the horses acted the way they did because they "never do that"...yeah right.

I won't tell you what I said to Justin after I finally got off that horse. It wasn't exactly the nicest thing to say to your husband on your anniversary. After a much needed shower, Justin redeemed the day by taking me to a really nice dinner that night. It was so wonderful getting to talk and have a conversation and not having to cut up food. Or even worse, not having any food after Campbell eats it all!