Arizona, Days 1-2 (Horses & more)

Just flew back yesterday from a much needed vaca to Arizona to soak up some sun and visit my sister's family. Also I had the purpose in mind of finding an apartment that I can move into in 2 years for the winter months--I'm thinking January through March or at the very least, Jan & Feb. More on that later!

Friday I flew out there with my friend K (who also accompanied me last spring to Houston). We got there late that night, what with the trip from the airport to the car rental taking as long as the flight from Omaha to Phoenix! But fortunately things went much better after that.

Saturday we went to a horse ranch and did a 1.5 hour beautiful desert ride.

My neices came along for the free pony rides.

Here is my neice Laurn; she's my goddaughter as well. I think she looks a lot like Lm and her sister Sof looks a lot like Lk.

Here she is with her helmet on, all ready to go!

We wait for our horses...

I won't elaborate here (or elsewhere for that matter) but K&I have basically the identical relationship that my sister had with her ex-boyfriend. Which is really too bad considering what nice guys they are and very easy to get along with. But it's ended up more of a friendship, though a good one at that.

This was an exciting experience for me. Though I'm from a farm, I have only done a couple of trail rides in my life, embarrassingly enough.

And we're off! I gave my sister the camera to take pics of my neices on the ponies.

The horse ride was for me an amazing and inspiring experience. Words nor pictures can describe the beauty that we saw. It was simply a gorgeous landscape with cacti, the mountains, and the desert. The guy who owns and runs the ranch was the inspiration for the Horse Whisperer character in the movie.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch...

...my adorable neices got their pony rides. So cute!

I just want to squeeze those chubby cheeks! Such a cutie.

I had a couple of close calls out on the range, with my horse wanting to eat some of the greenery along the way; he got frightfully close to a cactus on a couple of occasions! Otherwise, definitely an experience that I want to repeat.

Later my sister took my neices to the local park and Sof told a woman there about her pony ride:

"My horse didn't have a penis," she announced.

The woman didn't raise an eyebrow, she just said, "Oh, so yours was a girl horse?"

"Yeah," Sof said. Gotta love her! She is a card!

My boys are going to love it when I take them to that ranch on our next vacation.