We travelled up to Montana in the van, via Utah's Zion and Bryce Canyon parks and Wyoming's Yellowstone, staying briefly for one night in Bozeman where I picked up my sisters who flew in directly from London. Then it was on to Bonanza Creek Country for two weeks either side of the July 4th weekend.

This holiday was a long time in preparation. It started the when my sister mentioned the Billy Crystal film, "City Slickers" and said she'd like to do that if such things were possible. "Sure" we said. So it grew. If they were coming all the way from England they didn't just want to come for a few days and they didn't want to do the "dude ranch" thing where you just go out in a string of horses nose to tail, no they wanted to round up cows. So I found Bonanza Creek and they assured me we could round up cows if we came in July. If we came at the 4th of July we could also see the local rodeo in which hands from the ranch would be taking part. How cool is that? But of course to really take advantage of it we'd have to all learn to ride! So we all took horse riding lessons, my sisters in England and me with the kids at the local equestrian centre where Alison and the kids had been riding for years.

The ranch is a working ranch and they had put up some cabins and a lodge for guests to use. They assured us that the real ranch hands and the real bunk house would not be to our liking! The lodge was a nice lounge with fireplace, a dining room for meals and a kitchen in which sumptuous meals were rustled up. I highly recommend this ranch.

The City folk meet up with the Country Critters on the first morning.

They call it Big Sky Country. I wonder why?

To be continued...

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Last modified: Sat Dec 30 12:14:02 PST 2006