Montana Cattle Drive photo © Nancy D. Brown If you are of a certain age, like me, you'll remember the movie City Slickers starring Billy Crystal & Jack Palance. This comedy is about an unhappy Manhattan yuppie who is about to turn forty years old. His friends rope him into joining them [...]
Horse heaven at Los Cedros. Photo © 2014 Nancy D. Brown These hotel guests are fed three times a day. Their blankets are removed from their bodies in the morning and put back on them at night. They have a swimming pool all to themselves and all of the residents on property [...]
Kid's will love MacDonald's Ranch. Photo © 2014 Nancy D. Brown Old MacDonald had a ranch, e-i-e-i-o. And on that ranch he had a farm...and so the story goes. MacDonald's Ranch, in addition to pony rides, trail rides, train rides and gold panning, has a farm - with goats and chickens and miniature [...]
Cowboy College; sleepaway camp for adults Arizona Cowboy College is the equivalent of sleep away camp for adults who want to play in the desert. No, this isn't Burning Man. Instead, city slickers hoping to escape their corporate cubicles or experienced equestrians wanting to learn new riding skills will find their happy place [...]
Water Mark equine sculptures prevent Scottsdale, Arizona floods A reporter for a local newspaper asked me what my most treasured art possession was. That question was posed to me almost thirty years ago, yet my answer would be the same today. My parent's commissioned an artist to create a pastel portrait of [...]
Wyoming's Red Reflet Ranch is open year-round for horseback riding Everyone seems to have a bucket list of things they must see and do at least once in their life. Many of these things to do before I die lists involve travel to far off places. I know I have my bucket [...]
Rancho de los Caballeros Wrangler Dallas and Corral Foreman Willum Malernee in the Sonoran desert at Rocky Ridge Overlook. Photo © Nancy D. Brown Family first at Ranch de los Caballeros "I grew up coming here every Thanksgiving holiday," says 49 year old Ande Torgerson McCally of Washington D. C. "My grandmother and [...]
City Slickers take a horseback riding vacation at the Elkhorn Ranch in Arizona City Slickers take an Arizona Dude Ranch horseback riding vacation It's been 20 years since Billy Crystal’s City Slickers hit the big screen and with the new film Rango, featuring the voice of Johnny Depp, taking a visit to [...]
Forget skiing and snowboarding in the winter. My vote is for a horseback riding vacation in Wickenburg, Arizona. We'd had snow on Mt. Diablo where I live in Northern California and that's rare. Like the snow birds that flock to the desert every winter, I grabbed a riding partner for a girlfriend getaway weekend [...]