Photos: Jeff Brandsted
"the sun setting but still beating on us like a campfire with no flames"
It sounded like a marching band blaring in a parade. Quack, quack—ducks droned like trumpets and trombones. The feud among the roosters resonated like saxophones as I stepped out of my car and into the air of a warm afternoon in rural Kansas. I knew by the ambience of the farm animals wailing like instruments that my experience saddling up on the horses of Happy Trails would be a memorable ride.
For the past couple years, Tracy Keller has been a trail guide for Happy Trails, which she manages from her home in Auburn, 15 minutes southwest of Topeka. She has six horses in her barn and three ponies. She also has ducks, a couple peacocks, three dogs, chickens, roosters, guineas and a goat. In addition to being a trail guide, Keller treats injured horses. She buys or borrows horses and treats them from home, usually calling a veterinarian to her house for extreme cases. "It's starting to become a retirement home for horses here," she says.
Keller chaperones people one-hour rides during the weekends, which are $35, and longer rides that can last between two and three hours for $45. Trail guiding is a side quest for Keller. She uses the revenue from the rides to handle the costs to fix and upkeep the horses. She also works as a cook at a nearby high school. Keller has taken people as young as 7 and as old as 80 on the trails near her home that she knows as well as the back of her hand. She says she rarely gets repeat riders because people regard horseback riding as a once-in-a-lifetime experience. "You're either born to have a propensity to love horses or you don't," she says.
Keller arranged for me to ride Stormy, a black, 28-year-old Tennessee Walker. Tennessee Walkers typically have a quicker gait than other horses. Despite being 28, Stormy was truly no exception, as the horse consistently attempted to take the lead during our ride. Keller mounted Annie, a 20-year-old Morgan mare, and her friend Felicia Leary, who's training to
become a trail guide, rode Brandy, the gelding horse.
Riding a horse is similar to driving a car. The reins, like a steering wheel, are pulled left or right depending on the direction a horse needs to go. Getting a horse to start walking is
analogous to pressing a gas pedal. Applying a little pressure on the horse's side with the back of your heals is sufficient. The occasional click- click spoken to the horse also works.
We took off east away from a soon setting sun, the undulating plains still golden from a warm March afternoon. The horses treaded at a comfortable pace while Keller pointed out the scenery and wildlife and her dog Ozzie followed us closely. We continued to meander around the plains alternating from walk and trot, taking advantage of an unusually warm winter day. When we weren't talking, all I could hear was the music of the horses blazing the trail, a sweet rhythm of Stormy's hooves galumphing on the moist ground and the bells on her saddle straps chiming at every stride. Pants from Ozzie could be heard faintly in the background as he plodded to keep up with the horses.
The end of the ride neared as we turned toward the sunlight and back to Keller's house, the sun setting but still beating on us like a campfire with no flames, embers simmering to their ends. We continued to trot, Stormy still pulling on the reins, desperately wanting to gallop. I held him back as the ride ended and the horses cooled off. Like cowboys, we marched into the sunset.
— Guillaume Doane can be reached at gdoane@kansan.com.
4.08.04 Jayplay
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