Hee Haw!

Bill and ranch means one thing for the kids: horses. Misty (the youngest and Praline's daughter), Nugget (oldest "and sort of the boss" (Eitan)); Honey (yellow-golden) and Praline (she, just like Misty, has a white stripe going down her snout - pictured). Missing is Buckwheat, who was a cross between Nugget and Honey, with the same colour fur as Honey and a black main like Nugget (Eitan informs me). Nugget and Praline are ridable while Misty and Honey are too young with Bill "working them in." Martine takes each little cowboy for 45 minute rides up to and along the wall (she saw a mountain lion several months ago, and this morning - bear tracks!) in the evening and again, before breakfast. It is a lot of work, too, with saddling the horses. They are strong, beautiful animals whose line bread for the quarter-mile; they are excellent ranch horses as well, with sure footing and even temperament. Gentle souls. Bill is a real cow-hand who is able to break in the new animals, which requires patience and know-how. Every autumn he goes on a 100-mile ride into the Rockies, though this year may be more difficult after injuring, or even breaking, several ribs in a fall (Martine, with black toe-nails: "and that is why you wear cowboy boots"). The horses weight about 1,000 pounds. Fortunaly Bill tossed onto a soft, dirt ground - if the outback, "it would have been serious" Martine says.