Saturday, Oct. 18, 2014 – Wild Horse Auction at NNCC

After spending an uneventful Friday in the bungalow, we decided to get up early and take a trip down to the North Nevada Correctional Center today, where they have a program in conjunction with the BLM to train the wild horses they cull from the every-growing herds on BLM land. With over 1700 head of horses, the prisoners learn to train a handful every year, and auction off about 70 "saddle-broke" horses to the public in two auctions a year. What a great program, and a great time! We had a good hour to meet the horses and talk to their trainers, then the show began with a rodeo-like opening with flags flying and national anthem singing, then each horse was brought out one at a time and ridden around the ring for the perusal of the 200+ audience in the bleachers. The horses sold from $575 to a whopping $4650 for a horse called California Gold, apparently because he had a splotch of white under his girth area that was perfectly shaped like the state of California, plus Baja! An older gentleman in front of us, who is a regular at the auctions, said it was the highest price he had ever seen paid for any horse there! He was beautiful, but I'm not sure he was worth it at that price. In any event, we had a great time! Plus we learned a lot just by watching the trainers work with the horses, from novice to experience. One thing I learned, that despite all the riding my horse has had, he's really probably not much more than green-broke! Could explain some of the problems I've been having... : -) Anyway, we'll work on that. Afterward, Hubby and I went out shopping, grabbing lunch at a very nice little Chinese restaurant near the Walmart, did some more running around, until it was finally time to pick up the van from the body shop. It looked fabulous! Clean and washed, everything looked perfect, almost like a brand new van! Now all Hubby has to do is touch up a couple of other small areas and it won't look even close to it's age! Nice job Peter! Headed back to the ranch, though Hubby went back in to get some ice cream, and I stopped briefly at a place where I saw stacks of hay by the road and thought maybe it was for sale. As I was looking at it, a man came up to try to help me, but he spoke no English, and my Spanish is dubious at best, though after straining my brain for a few moments, I remembered when we were in Costa Rica, and we passed a couple of farms that were for sale, the sign said, "Se Vende." So that's what I asked the man, and he immediately said, no, no, and explained, as best as I could understand, that it was for the animals (I think he said alpacas) on the farm there. Anyway, it was worth a try. I have enough hay for at least a week or more, especially now that everyone's on this high alfalfa mix, so I've cut down on the amount they get, so no real hurry. Got back and found the horses comfortably standing around in their pens, gave them a flake, then settled down for the evening, though I did a quick load of wash, getting a head start on my big chore for tomorrow!