Rodeo Days

When in Rome...or the west, do as the westerners do...go to a rodeo!

This past weekend was the Collegiate Peaks 91st Annual Rodeo and Stampede, and we thought it would be an interesting event to attend on our Sunday afternoon off. First, though, we took the dogs for a walk and run on a ball-playing field we found back in the forest.

Lots of wide-open space for Casey to run, which is what he needs.

Chelsea, not so much room...you throw the ball TO her, and then she tries to bury it...to each their own!

 

The road leading to the field twists up behind Mount Princeton Hot Springs, an extremely popular visitor attraction in the area. We sell lots of tickets to campers wishing to soak away the day's exertions. These are the upper pools, with a long slide that is very popular.

These are the lower pools. You can also walk down to the creek, and soak in the natural geo-thermal pools as well.

After lunch, we headed to the rodeo grounds. This is Al's first rodeo ever, I had been one WAY back when I was 10 years old and had spent the summer in Kansas City with my aunt and uncle. Not that I remember much of it! This is a much smaller one, here in Buena Vista. It was interesting. We drove in, and received a program that was pretty much all advertising for the local businesses, and made our way to the grandstand. Standard fairgrounds food was here, not extremely tempting, except the funnelcakes, which were on the other side of the arena. We had just missed the "mutton-busting" competition, which looked like kids roping sheep. Oh well. 

Cowboys, and cowgirls, milling around getting ready for the calf roping contest

I have to say, more calfs got away than were roped! 

Next up was a synchronized ride by the girls from the local 4-H organization. 

Co-ed team calf roping was up next..I really liked watching the horses ;-); again, don't feel bad for the calf...most got away!

Bronco-busting was wild. Here he is coming out of the gate.

This cowboy did pretty well...

This one did not!!

Women's barrel racing was next...the beauty and power of the horse is awesome. The horse and rider work as a team to make the tight turns around the barrels.

Last up was bull riding...now these guys are crazy!! These are the slots where the individual bulls and riders start from

Here comes one out of the chute..this was the only cowboy wearing a cowboy hat...the other riders all had helmets on.

Cowboys dressed in red and fluttering tails are in the ring to disttract the bull after he gets rid of the rider

Wow..not a position I would want to be in!!

better run faster around that barrel...that's one unhappy bull!

on the way to the ground...

Oh, what a place to land! Ouch!

(all rodeo pictures can be seen here) 

Bull-riding was the last event of the afternoon, and we slowly made our way out of the stands as the wind started whipping across the rodeo grounds. You could see lightning bouncing around the 14000 feet peaks, and we hurried back to the campground before the storm hit. The monsoon season is here, which means pretty much every afternoon the clouds roll in, storms pop up, and we MAY get our 100 drops of rain for the day :-). Usually the storms go north or south of the campground. The rodeo was an interesting diversion for a few hours. We're trying to get a well-rounded flavor of the area that we're staying in, and the rodeo is one of those small-town events that the local people are very excited about and enjoy showing to their out-of town visitors. 

We've done some other fun things this past week on our days off, I just have to get the pictures edited and ready to go..Between working and playing, there isn't much time for writing! Stay tuned, though, because we have more interesting things here in our small part of the world!