Went with the roomie today to a ranch in Alexandria, Scotland. It was about a 45 minute drive Northwest of Glasgow, past a neat towering natural fixture called Dumbarton rock. It was biting cold when we got there but fortunately there were no clouds in the sky nd eventually the sunlight offered some relief. We had a variety chores to help out with, including cleaning horse stalls, making bedding out of straw, preparing meal nets1, walking the horses, assessing possible health issues (limping), feeding them, and giving them treats.

Out contact was a wonderful woman named Jane, who owned two of the seven or so horses out there. One horse was named Flicka, a beautiful mature, black and white, giant, female that looked similar to a Clydesdale with her long-haired hooves. The other was named Aladdin, a younger brown and white Arabian horse with much more electricity flowing through his veins.

Jane is a hard working single mother that really knows her way around a ranch, and aint afraid to get dirty. The same can be said for my roomie eira, who has been helping Jane at the ranch for several years.

The ranch itself was fairly small, but stood in front of a background of rolling hills, and the small town of Alexandria in the distance. Another woman was there, much older, I think her name was Sharon, who was incredibly knowledgeable, and helped Jane diagnose a potential leg issue with Aladdin, as he walked with a bit of a limp at times.

After spending a few hours helping out, Keira and I headed up a road which led up a sizeable hill so that I could take a few photos. It was a hard hike at times, with the pitch of the road increasing much farther than setting ten on treadmill, but when we finally mde it up to the top the views were auite worth the trouble. There was also a small creek running down the hill. I climbed down to a pebbly part of it, and took three big gulps of water from it. It was really nice, and no I was not downhill from the ranch!