So remember that awesome bluff/ mesa/ huge mountain that I mentioned hiking up last year during a point count… the epic day that I almost got trampled by a stallion for the first time??? Well, if you don’t… just take my word for it that that bluff just won’t let me go. (If you’re really curious, the first mention of it is in the blog titled “A Point Count” from last summer.) I thought I was done with it last year when I completed the vegetation analysis on the points up there. Not so. Just earlier this week I was doing a point count route in that area… I pulled out my GPS unit and compass to find the next point, and found it was straight up the bluff. Again. Up and over even. “You’ve got to be sh*tting me!” I mumbled… then began the trudge up the hill. It’s pretty much like hiking up that first steep section on Upper Blast Off for those of you who know Sunapee… or like hiking up Avalanche, for those of you who know Cannon. Think steep black diamond. Needless to say I was not too interested in the two horses who stumbled across me as I was making my way up. I just gave the “Hey!” shout, then picked up a few rocks and threw them in their direction. They waited for me to cross the horse trail that they wanted to follow, and then moved along, occasionally looking back in my direction. I’m sure they were wondering why anyone (or anything) for that matter would be hiking up that slope. So the horses moved along… apparently right to where one of the other point counters was making his way across a different ridge. They bumped into him, and he did something entirely new in the Sheldon repertoire of feral horse repelling… He brandished a huge horse skull that he had found and was carrying back. The horses did not like this. And left him alone. So add waving deceased horse body parts to the list of things effective on deterring horses from trampling you. Prior to the skull the list of things waved/ thrown at horses includes clipboards, rocks, and their own poop (when nothing else was available.) The skull is currently sitting on the top of a post in the yard at Badger, with some three pronged mule deer antlers stuck in it. I think the other night Berti even placed his newly shorn dreads (They’re really gone!!!) on the top for a brief bit. Thus was born the horselope.
(Disclaimer: as much as I gripe about “the bluff,” it’s really not so bad… It’s more like we’re arch enemies or something, matched in a battle of wills. Except it’s an inanimate object…right.)
Here’s a list of the most recent interesting things to happen on Sheldon:
1. Berti cut his dreads. (I’m really not kidding.)
2. Ben and I have started a Scrabble tournament between the 2 of us. So far I am winning 2-1. (Winner gets a prize at the end of the summer, to be determined.)
3. I’ve stumbled across quite a few junipers while out doing point counts around Badger… where they’re supposedly not supposed to be. So I’ve been dropping waypoints.
4. Last week on our town trip we got a flat on one of the work trucks… and spent more time figuring out how to get the spare out from under the bed, than actually removing the flat, and mounting the spare combined.
5. Jan and I are awesome cooks, and I am eating much better food than when I was just cooking for myself last year.
6. Ticks are rampant. I think everyone has woken up at least once during the night to pick one off of themselves.
Jan and I have returned to our sweet little bouldering area up behind the cabin again. We’ve got a good traverse that’s become our little project. I think the highest you get off the ground is 3 feet, but the route travels all around this section of rock, probably for a grand total of 30 feet plus of good climbing. We’ve got one section down, and now we’re working out a second.
Since we are the pioneers of the Badger Cabin bouldering area we’ve decided that we are going to name the routes up there. Candidates are “The Sage Thrasher,” and “Dust Devil Nest Failure.” (The second of those we can’t really take credit for, as it is what Berti says if he ever has a punk band he would name it.) We also discovered an awesome cave underneath the traverse boulders… Jan went in to explore, and found it went all the way out to the other side.
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