Not a bad view to wake up to
The ranch is stunning, cattle heaven, with a new pond dug
and lots of coops for the hunting. Did I mention that I have a few things I
want to return for? Fox-hunting here is extremely high up the list! Hunting for
Pueblo Indian ceramics made for an excellent substitute until I was forced to
tear myself away and set off eastwards to the Texan border.
Life-saver for the cattle in the desert
Not very different to when the Pueblo Indians lived here
As I was starting far south of Albuquerque, I chose to drive in as
straight a line east as possible, rather than diverting north to the
interstate. The sun was out as I left the ranch, winding along a near empty
road through rolling desert, dark green juniper bushes against sandy dry grass.
Ahead rose the Magdalena Mountains, over which furious clouds spewed sheets of
rain, black and misty. At their foot was the town of Magdalena itself, empty of
pedestrians and nearly empty of cars. Boarded-up shops and closed-down diners
flanked the street, forlorn signs fading and cracking. Hillary Clinton may have
appealed to the liberal-minded glitterati in their gleaming glass skyscrapers
in New York and Los Angeles, but it’s easy to see why she and her fellow
Democrats resonated not at all in these poor towns, scattered across the vast
centre of America, where there are few jobs and fewer prospects. After all,
this is where the ‘deplorables’ live.
Empty roads and crystal-clear air: New Mexico
The road goes ever on and on
Rain over the Magdalena Mountains
As I descended down one long slope to a plain backed by
mountains, black rock loomed up on either side of the road and before I knew it
I was driving into the Valley of Fires through a huge swathe of lava, the last
remnants of an eruption 5,000 years before. Rather than spewing from a volcano,
this 44-mile long river of lava, the Carrizozo Malpais, emerged from vents in
the valley floor. I pulled off for a closer look – nearly losing the car door
to the wind – and absorbed the view for a minute. There was not a soul around
and the only sound was the gale. Everything before me was black, with a
scattering of tattered grasses clinging onto the cracks, as if a dragon had
swooped low over the land and blasted fire for hundreds of miles. An
extraordinary place.
The Stars and Stripes over the Valley of Fires
Black, but not a wasteland: collared lizards nip through the cracks
and the Lily in the Desert, with tiny flowers and ribbonlike leaves, blooms
Returning to my eastward progress, I passed through the
1870s, also known as Lincoln, New Mexico, where the jail and courthouse played
host to Billy the Kid. The town is perfectly preserved, with the Tunstall Store
still selling 19th-century merchandise and verandahs along the street crying
out for a laconic cowboy to scuff his boots along them. Beyond the town of Hondo the land
began to flatten out, the plains on either side bare of anything but dry, tawny
grasses. I was approaching the alien capital, Area 51, Roswell, where
extra-terrestrials once landed, and, apparently, immediately left again because
the landscape was just so dull. It has a certain awesomeness to it, being so
huge, and it would be fun to chase a coyote or two across it, but after a while
the eye longs for something to startle it out of its lethargy. Only the
occasional wrought-iron archway with cut-outs of cowboys and cattle that
announced another vast ranch interrupted the monotony. One thing’s for sure, I
wouldn’t want to be rounding up cattle here without a darn good compass.
A last glimpse of mountains before the plains of eastern New Mexico
Flat. For miles and miles and miles
And miles
Finally, I reached the Texan border, which was equally
thrilling. But then dark clouds loomed ahead as the sun behind me slanted
through the grey blanket that had echoed the desert in its uniformity and I smiled involuntarily as it caught a water tower, so evocative of America, and lent
the arrow-straight road ahead an enchanted air. Leaving the back roads for the
interstate, a craggy ridge to the west was tinged pink as the sky above turned
gold, finally fading to darkness split by the insistent reminders of McDonalds
and Best Western.
Pressing on as long as I could, I stopped for gas (sorry,
British readers, but the word has started to trip off my tongue more easily
than ‘petrol’) and joined an elderly black truck driver at the counter. There
was a skinny white guy behind the till and a Mexican girl stacking the shelves,
when the driver grinned at the sound of my voice and wondered aloud which of
our disparate accents was furthest from home. He was from deepest Louisiana,
with that wonderful rich, honeycomb drawl, and an infectious laugh. We
exchanged tales of the road, and I set off again with renewed energy. Such
encounters are one of the chief joys of solo voyaging, the chance for disparate
lives to touch and part again, leaving all of us uplifted with a sense of
fellowship.
Dull prairie transformed to pure beauty
Unmistakably America
Texas! 'Drive friendly - the Texas way'
I spent the night in an Econolodge, which was more
comfortable than the name suggests. It was clearly breakfast that bore the
brunt of the ‘econo’ bit, with cardboard muffins and polystyrene cups. I longed
for bowls and silverware that could be washed instead of cluttering up gutters
and eventually the Pacific! The weather was gloomy and humid, with Fort Worth a
grey collection of grotty freeways and grubby glass towers. The temperature
gauge hit 82˚F,
60˚F
higher than the lowest point of the trip, 22˚F in Colorado. Getting out of
the car was distinctly unpleasant, especially considering it was February.
This sign was beside the road near Roswell, in an area one
would assume was pro-Trump. Was it left over from the Obama
years, or are the locals repelled by the orange one?
I had one hairy moment when an ancient truck carrying
scrap metal decided to fling a few chunks and strips of sharp-looking silver
across the road, causing cars to swerve. I thought I caught a sliver with
my wheels and pulled off in a panic, but my trusty Nissan was more than a match
for whatever it was. Returning to the interstate with a giant soothing cup of
French Vanilla ‘coffee’, a gang of workmen were already gathering and sweeping
the debris with insouciant disregard to the approaching traffic. It must be a
regular occurrence…
Americana: an old truck and an Art Deco store, seemingly defunct
A fitful sun lit my passage into Arkansas, over the wide
brown Tennessee River into Memphis, and then almost immediately out of
Tennessee into Alabama as darkness fell. Finally, I climbed the winding road to
my dear friend Cary’s house, where her adorable mongrel, Gwen, the ‘gas station
dog who won the adoption lottery’, gave me all the welcome I could help for. A
glass of chilled sparkling rosé did not go amiss, either!
Arkansas: 'The Natural State'
Which begs the question, how are the rest artificial?
Tennessee: 'The Volunteer State Welcomes You'
Well, that's nice
Mississippi: 'Birthplace of Ameria's Music'
Happy Birthday!
It was too dark to take a picture of the Alabama sign, but it reads:
'Welcome to Alabama the Beautiful'
or, of course: 'Welcome to Sweet Home Alabama',
which means you have the song stuck
in your head for hundreds of miles...
By lucky chance, my planned sojourn in Alabama coincided
with the Mooreland Hunt Week, with Bear Creek and Midland from Georgia the
visiting packs. To warm up, Cary and I took Tully and Nate, her off-the-track
Thoroughbreds, for a trail ride (hack) around the fields the day before. There
had been heavy rain recently and numerous animal tracks showed in the smooth
swathes of mud: deer, turkeys, coyote, rabbit. Both horses were behaving
beautifully, so Cary suggested a canter. I agreed, and we set off, but almost
immediately I felt my right rein come away. I called to Cary to stop, but as
she slowed down the bit fell out of Nate’s mouth, he spun round in panic, bunched
up his haunches and took off, flat out.
Nate, in more relaxed mode!
Courtesy of Cary McWhorter
It’s extraordinary how much one can think about when one
is gathering up dangling pieces of tack, grabbing the sole
remaining bit of bridle, the noseband, and trying to talk soothingly to a bolting horse.
Chief among my thoughts was that my mother was going to be very upset if I fell
off, followed by the sure and certain conviction that I was not going to bail
out. Even with the threat of armadillo holes and deep mud threatening to trip us
up, hitting the ground from a 16.2hh galloping horse would not be comfortable.
I don’t even know how I would have done it! Eventually, Nate slowed down enough
for me to hop off, whereupon I went to his head and he nuzzled me as if to say
‘that was scary, mum!’ He hadn’t been malicious, just frightened, and had never
stumbled.
Nate safely at home, with the Full Cry kennels in the distance
Courtesy of Cary McWhorter
It turned out that the loop of the gag cheekpiece had
snapped right through, cleanly and all at once, with no signs of prior
deterioration. A tad worrying, and it meant that we were then short a bit.
Luckily, Cary has been training Tully to go bitless, with the ultimate aim
of hunting him with nothing but a rope, so we swapped bridles and ambled home,
Tully behaving impeccably with nothing in his mouth. A stiff drink back at the
barn with the Full Cry huntsman Jay Athon and his wife Mopsy was extremely
welcome. We were all delighted to find that because I had had Cary’s tracker in
my pocket, we had proof that former racehorse Wildcat Nation was quick: 30mph!
Proof!
Note the sudden burst of speed and the amble home...
Four wheels proved a more relaxing option the next day
for the start of hunting. Cary, her husband HC and I hopped into HC’s super new
blue Jeep as dark clouds threatened to put the kibosh on the action altogether.
Fortunately, the hunting instinct triumphed over the fair-weather riders, and
we all set off after the joint pack of Bear Creek and Midland hounds. Following by car always requires a
certain amount of ingenuity, but HC and Cary are seasoned campaigners. We stood
station on a road for a while – one passing car asked what we were all doing,
storm chasing? Testament to the darkness of the sky, but not as fun as the
reality, and they wished us a good day – before the radio announced that hounds were on and heading back past the meet. We hared in pursuit and got into the
perfect spot to see a big red coyote circumnavigating a huge cotton field, water
splashing up from every pad. The first hounds soon appeared in pursuit, but it
was a long time before the riders could get up. Heavy going doesn’t begin to
describe the ground. We cracked on along a parallel lane, but soon came to a
near stop as the heavens opened and a deluge destroyed almost all semblance of
visibility. Normally, I chafe at being in a car rather than on a horse, but I
confess I didn’t mind in this case…
The coolest car-following car in the hunting world
Courtesy of Cary McWhorter
Happy me!
Courtesy of Cary McWhorter
Mooreland whip Rachael ready for the off on a soggy morning
Courtesy of Cary McWhorter
Leaving a wake!
Courtesy of Cary McWhorter
Trying to keep up - coyote and hounds were long gone
Courtesy of Cary McWhorter
Hounds lost (or caught, depending on which huntsman you
spoke to) the coyote in Nance Creek, which, in pleasing synergy, is named for
Juan Tomas huntsman Adren Nance’s family, who farmed over here before moving to
New Mexico in his grandfather’s time. Horses and hounds – and humans – were
exhausted by the ground, but revived by a fantastic tailgate back at the meet,
when, naturally, the sun came out. The day ended with a cocktail party, the
elegant dresses and glittering crystal a striking contrast with the soggy
mud-covered characters from earlier in day. Nothing says variety like hunting!
Cary the photographer in action under threatening skies
A tailgate worthy of the name - delicious!
My unrelenting schedule of riding or driving every day
caught up with me on the Friday, when my body refused point-blank at 5am to go
with Cary to the stables to get the horses. I went back to bed and slept
another five hours, missing a morning that, to my selfish relief, was hot and
blank. We were back in the Jeep the following day, and hounds worked well out
of our sight as we waited on point. We would have been useful had the coyote
run our way, but we lost the gamble on this occasion, returning to watch everyone
hack in – including the smart equipage of Earl Burchett with his ex-Amish
plough horse and buggy, wife Jen riding point. Easton drives and rides, and the
beautiful blue vehicle, picked out in silver, with its wide axles and sturdy
tyres, goes everywhere.
Three of the best huntsmen in America: Rhodri Jones-Evans of Mooreland,
Steve Clifton of Bear Creek and Ken George of Midland
A motley crew of hunt staff ready for the off.
Trying to get them all to pose at once is nigh impossible -
Steve and Ken, I mean you!
A paved road? For wimps
From Amish ploughshares to the Alabamian hunting field
Courtesy of Cary McWhorter
An equipage of which The Duke of Edinburgh would be proud
Courtesy of Cary McWhorter
Hacking home in the heat
Courtesy of Cary McWhorter
Steve and Ken bringing them home
All smiles: Mason Lampton MFH and Leslie Crosby MFH
Mary-Lu, Paula, Mason and Jenna of Midland looking good
One of the indispensable staff who keep the whole caboodle on the road:
Jenna of Midland
That night, Mooreland huntsman Rhodri Jones-Evans proved he
could pull off a flamingo hat at the hunt ball, the surreal culmination of an
evening that began with cocktails at the beautiful home of Mooreland’s senior
master Leslie Crosby. She and her fellow masters Hal Barry of Bear Creek and
Mason Lampton of Midland welcomed us all, and David Twiggs, executive director
of the MFHA, paid tribute to the huntsman and staff who had put on a great show
despite unseasonal heat and bottomless going. We all decamped to the Huntsville Museum of Art for dinner and dancing, although the latter definitely took
precedence as the music defeated conversation during dinner. Perhaps dinner
first, next tme, and then music… which was brilliant, especially the
saxophonist. We tore up the dancefloor in fine style, until we dragged ourselves
away to get some sleep before moving out with Full Cry first thing in the morning.
HC pulling off the neon crown look; Bear Creek whip Mel and me
With Southern royalty Warner and Tish Ray
Me with party animal David Twiggs of the MFHA
Oh yes, Rhodri can rock the flamingo look!
Patience is a virtue, and huntsman Jay Athon proved the
old saw in spades when he quietly kept going for four hours around sodden coverts
and muddy corn fields, until we and the hounds were rewarded with an absolute
cracker of a run. They put up a coyote that streaked away across stubble and
dived into a strip of trees a quarter of a mile away. Hounds needed a touch of
help to get on the right line, but once on, they were on! They screamed through
the trees, across grass into sparse covert and flashed through the thickets
with us galloping outside, their music a clarion call. Nate was as thrilled as
anyone to be on the move, but never tried to get away from me; it is such a joy
to feel so much controlled power underneath! We crossed through a hedge line
and galloped flat out in Jay’s wake down the tramlines of winter wheat, hounds
already far ahead. Finally, the coyote crossed the railway line, forcing us to
give it best, but we were all well satisfied with the blistering pace after
such a long period of determined searching. The overcast, cool weather and the
damp ground (I kept wondering where the ‘very wet’ bit was
that I had been warned about, before realising that what Alabamians consider soggy
is normal winter going to me) made for excellent scent, but with the coverts flooded, finding the coyotes in the first place was the tricky thing.
Thank goodness for a huntsman that doesn’t give up.
Heading towards Death Valley... not an advisable place
to be if you're Wil E. Coyote
Cary and her law intern, Natalie, who is as quick to learn the
whys and wherefores of hunting as the law. One to watch!
Jay Athon and David Twiggs setting off on a thankfully cool morning
Gathering hounds after a blistering run, just reward for our patience
David Twiggs, executive director of the MFHA and an
enthusiastic follower. He chose a good day!
Tired hounds after a fantastic run
Hacking back to Hall Place, a sadly dilapidated historic plantation house.
If only I had a million or two spare...
Successful selfie
We had another such huntsman on Tuesday, when my last day in Alabama was spent
with Rhodri and the Mooreland hounds. On a beautiful morning, soft and warm,
like a perfect June day in England, Cary and I hacked from the barn to her
farm, where four staff and five field members had gathered. Nate and Tully were
on excellent form, easily fit enough to do five miles there, and the chance to
warm up and enjoy the landscape the old-fashioned was very special. I would
always choose to hack the meet over faffing with trailers, so it was super to
have the chance.
Hacking to the meet on a perfect morning
Rhodri has done an excellent job with this handsome pack
of crossbred hounds and his unobtrusive control is wonderful to watch. After
drawing a covert blank, they return like iron filings to a magnet, flocking
towards him from all points of the compass, showing how hard they work, how
trusted they are and how biddable they are. We crossed some gorgeous country,
more rolling than much of Alabama, lush and green under a clear blue sky. The
Tennessee river formed the northern border, curving in a wide loop that has
been known to confound the giving of directions; if Rhodri says ‘north’, he means
‘towards the river’. We rode part way along an ancient track, known as Lock A
Road, a reminder of when the Tennessee was made navigable by a series of locks,
through sun-dappled woods where the breeze soughed in the branches and around
fields of young wheat.
Finally, hounds spoke deep in the woods by the river, and we followed the sound of the music past the meet and to an overlook, where they lost the line. We had been out for nearly four hours and were close to the trailers, so we might have called it a day, but Mooreland people are made of sterner stuff and he recast the hounds in the wood. A 3½-mile point proved he was right to do so! Nate was an absolute star, and it was fantastic to see these Mooreland hounds do their stuff. The only hiccup was when, on a slippery field boundary, the field master’s horse flung up a mud-covered stone than hit my left eye with some force. Fortunately, I only needed one to see the armadillo holes!
Whip Rachael on duty
Hacking up Lock A Road
Cary looking sharp! We were doing the English thing of wearing formal
throughout the season instead of ratcatcher in the week,
although we felt a little too smart!
Rhodri and the Mooreland hounds hacking on to the next draw
Welsh-born Rhodri, one of the best in the business!
Finally, hounds spoke deep in the woods by the river, and we followed the sound of the music past the meet and to an overlook, where they lost the line. We had been out for nearly four hours and were close to the trailers, so we might have called it a day, but Mooreland people are made of sterner stuff and he recast the hounds in the wood. A 3½-mile point proved he was right to do so! Nate was an absolute star, and it was fantastic to see these Mooreland hounds do their stuff. The only hiccup was when, on a slippery field boundary, the field master’s horse flung up a mud-covered stone than hit my left eye with some force. Fortunately, I only needed one to see the armadillo holes!
Calling them up after losing the line the first time
Perhaps this time would be more successful... Rhodri being patient
More than three miles later! End of the line
A very satisfied huntsman and hounds
We glimpsed red-tailed hawks and turkey vultures on the
ride back, cleaned tack and drove home, tired and content, to collapse in front
of a classic Southern film, Steel Magnolias. A perfect last day in Alabama.
Thank you all, Cary and Nate especially, for a blissful week!
Me and Nate, doing his Dobbin pose. Ten minutes earlier
he had been showing the field his turn of speed.
Sign of a good hunt horse, being able to preserve energy
when hounds aren't running. He's a keeper!
BFFs: me and Cary at the Mooreland Hunt Ball
Next time: to George Washington's childhood home in Virginia!
Gateway to England
The sun is finally out on this side of the pond, and we were treated to a superb display of equestrianism at the Mitsubishi Motors Badminton Horse Trials last weekend. Congratulations to Jonelle Price on a truly well-deserved win.
Read all about it in the May 10 edition of Horse & Hound, which also
happens to include my report on the Arapahoe Hunt in Colorado!
If you would like the chance to ride across the heavenly English countryside yourself and stay in houses as historic and beautiful as Badminton House itself, email info@gatewaytoengland.com
Gateway to England
The sun is finally out on this side of the pond, and we were treated to a superb display of equestrianism at the Mitsubishi Motors Badminton Horse Trials last weekend. Congratulations to Jonelle Price on a truly well-deserved win.
Read all about it in the May 10 edition of Horse & Hound, which also
happens to include my report on the Arapahoe Hunt in Colorado!
If you would like the chance to ride across the heavenly English countryside yourself and stay in houses as historic and beautiful as Badminton House itself, email info@gatewaytoengland.com
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