This morning Felipe rode out of Hidden Valley Ranch as did Terri and Deb – the latter will ride with him to the Chena Lakes Recreation area, then they will part company. Tomorrow, Deb and Terri will head home and Felipe will continue his supported journey. Clara, girlfriend, will provide RV support.

Now we are heading to Tok, four hours from The Hidden Valley Ranch, where we spent the night. Once again, we got lucky – the owner of the facility had panels and a flat patch of land on hand, and so she let us set horse camp, as did Chelsea at Chelsea’s Pet Resort.

This morning we spent considerable time socializing – I talked for a long time with Cathy Herrin, who lives in our area and

was providing logistical support for Deb and Terri. I noticed that she had a drone and asked her to show it to me. She promptly pulled it out of a Pelican case and put it through its paces. It even has a digital camera, one in which you can change the settings. Up it went, down it went. I am not, nor will I ever be a fan of drones. I fear that some users might put them to bad use. But, I thought, well, a little knowledge is a good thing. It was also a great way to kill time while everyone got ready to leave.

I discovered that I have a hard time with the cowboy way of doing things. Some, like Felipe, do care about the animals under their care, but even so, they are also of the mind that they are beasts of burden. And they are, as in this instance, being trained in the trial by fire method.

I don’t understand why anyone would put themselves at risk for the sake of their sponsor. And in this case, one of Felipe’s sponsors is a hat company. And I can only think of his followers, of which he now has thousands, who after seeing him will eschew wearing helmets when out riding.

I didn’t have the time, but if I had I would have told Felipe that his obsession with documentation of this project is getting in the way of common sense. Yesterday WAS unnerving – Pete and I agreed today that a pre-ride meeting (like the sort we talked about in wilderness first aid class) would have been most useful. It might then have been determined who amongst us had first aid training, what the route might be, and which horses were fractious.

This being said, Felipe is a smart, intelligent, compassionate individual with clearly defined goals. So I have my fingers crossed that he remains safe on his journey down the Alcan. It is going to be very challenging, for sure.

Pete pointed out that our trip differs from his in that were doing a wilderness pack trip and he’s doing a long distance road ride. There are differences, I prefer what we are doing.

Next: 137. 5/19/19: Tok