Stampede Ranch

When My Mom and Clint were here she said she wanted a tour to the Stampede Ranch, she knew it was close to us but never realized how close.  Its about 12 miles away.  We have 2 neighbors that work there and so we hear a lot about of it but I too had not been in the yard.  So we phoned up the managers and asked if we could come up.  She said they were at a rodeo that weekend, her hubby is also a pickup man but the other guy Charlie was there and he would show us around.  Sounds good, we had no real big plans just kinda wanted to see it.

(Outside the gate is the graveyard, they don't bury the horses there anymore but they used too)

(The loading chute in the yard)

(I just liked this bridge going across the creek to the barns)

(the gate into the yard)

So we headed up there and he met us at the gate and led us in.  They put up a locked gate this spring just to keep crazy people out.  They spend a lot of time keeping it looking nice, they do a lot of fancy spancy deals there where city people come out and "trail horses" in and then have a meeting.  So they want it to look nice and it does.  There is a lot of pens and this time of year not much in them which we kinda knew but thats when they were out.

(the saddle horses, even the mini under the feeder lol)

(a sore clydeish horse in the pen, he was super interested in us)

(and some bulls)

(the nephews looking at bucking bulls)

(the chute, under a roof, sure be a long day trimming 600+ horses)

(the retired horses halters)

They had some horses, some bulls and a few studs up close and so we toured them and then he took us in to see the chute where they trim feet and brand and then into the tack room and then the boardroom where they have the halters of the retired horses hanging in there.  Neil had been there quite a few times as a kid cause the kids went to school with him and even he said it was changed and updated, looked a lot better.

(Speedy Delivery)

(Wanamaka Rocket, we saw him at the bronc match in Pollockville)

(Shadow Warrior, 

he was an older horse, really calm just stood there eating while we were there chatting)

Kinda a cool day there.  I would like to go when all the mares and colts come in.

My Calgary Stampede Day

I headed to the Stampede on Sunday.  I was going to the Reba concert that night so we decided not to go super early cause we knew it was gonna be late.  We got there about noon and boy was it HOT!!  We took pics of us in the frame, we went through the new Agrium building it was kinda cool.

We walked through the building with all the selling stuff, didn't buy anything and then through the art building, always some really nice stuff and some slightly weird stuff.  Then we walked by the Bell Adrenaline ranch and last year it was on water this year BMX but we had time so we grabbed a drink and went to watch it.

Got a few videos of it, it was really pretty impressive even if I have no desire to usually watch that kind of stuff it was still a good show.

Its amazing how much time there is to do stuff down there if we don't go on rides or to the rodeo.  I woulda loved to do the rodeo but seeing as it was showdown Sunday I'm sure it was sold out and if not I couldn't afford tickets to it anyways.  Then the best part of the night, the reason we went on the last day....REBA!!!

She was sooo good, not sure if she has any new songs, but she did a kinda neat concert as a progression of her career, from her first song, her first video, her first movie, her TV show, her Broadway show, it was pretty cool.  She never sang all her songs but lots of them she did.  Got some video of part songs too.

And after that it was still daytime, haha unexpected but we had a couple more things we wanted to do...

And then home for the night and not enough sleep.

Calgary Stampede 2013

Every year I try to spend at least a day at the Calgary Stampede, I love the atmosphere, the food, the rodeo, just everything (well maybe not so many people, but that is what makes the Stampede what it is)  This year my sister was getting tickets from one of her customers from work, but the day before we were to get them someone had stolen them.  He felt bad and so gave her money for the boys to use to get in.  It was kinda disappointing cause they we including admission, rides, and rodeo.  But we went the Wednesday and went early so we got in free and they were having a pancake breakfast sponsored by my bank (how nice of them :) )  that we had and we bought the boys ride passes and we just didn't go on rides.

(we made them go on the swings and they closed thier eyes the whole way 

said it was too high, pretty wimpy I thought, lol)

(the sky ride, I think Jaret musta just spotted us)

We had fun anyways, but since it was kids day we stayed away from the agriculture part and the kids zone, my nephews are big enough they want real rides anyways.  I like to see the draft ponies, but its crazy over there on kids day.   I woulda liked to watch cutting but they moved in to another venue cause the Saddledome couldn't be fixed in time.

(always say I have a pile of ponies, and so here is one ;) )

(new show this year, Bell Aqua ranch, says some ride horses, we ride waves. 

 Was a neat fountain/water ski doo show)

The flooding a couple weeks before made it kinda hard for the stamped to be ready in time, they had just put new dirt down the infield and the track and it was all contaminated, so out it went and in new dirt went, 196 million tonnes of dirt, 148 trucks working 24 hours a day for a week to get it done, pretty amazing really, but they were not gonna quit for a flood when they had run consecutively for 100 years, including through both world wars and the depression.  Thier new saying was through Hell or High Water, they sold T-shirts all stampede and the money raised went to flood recovery for Calgary and Area.

More of the Stampede

On Thursday me and Neil headed to the Stampede and on the off chance my sister was going, I phoned her to see what she was doing, well lo and behold she was on the c-train on the way to the Stampede as well!  How cool, so we met her there and hung around all day.

Her kids and Rob wanted to go on a bunch of rides and they had ride passes so they went on a few.  Its kinda a tough age, at 9 and 11 cause they are too big for the kids rides, but kinda a little afraid of some of the grown up rides.

After a few rides, we went through the agricultural area and the boys were pretty interested in the mini grain elevator, I'm sure they woulda stayed there all day if we let them.  And of course milking Bluebell was fun!

We saw all kinds of stuff, and some pretty cool items in the round up center I could have gone home with, but all I got was food, lots of it, fudge, mini donuts, a chip stick, and fresh lemonade.  Rob had a donut burger and said it was good, but I didn't try it.  It was nice weather, but in case it got really hot all over were these cooling stations.

We entered to win the dream home and there was also tickets on cars and boats and trucks and all kinds of stuff, I kinda wanted the boat, just cause the cool decoration on it.

All in all it was a fun day, and since we left by 7, we stopped at Best Buy and Future Shop and looked at tablets and laptops.  We are not sure about the tablets yet cause I don't understand how to transfer storage cause there is no USB drive or any type of ports, and so we are thinking of getting a toshiba laptop, but we are gonna wait till the one we want is on sale, probly this fall for back to school deals.  But on the way out we did see this guy in front of us at a red light and I had to get his pic :)