at the end of my last post in AUGUST, i noted there would be more. so no, i’m not stuck in a ravine in the sierra nevada. i made it back home in one bruised piece. just questioning heavily why my vacations don’t look like other people’s vacations (which i’m ok with, but i just wonder). i still have leftovers of my biggest bruise on my leg- 3 months later! i’m ok with that!

in a nutshell, after our horsebacking trip, we drove up to Sequoia National Park (big fat trees), then further up to Yosemite (tourist-infested valley), and then further up Yosemite to the Hetch Hetchy Valley (NON tourist-infested valley). and because i have to be weird and different and pack too much into my “vacations,” i made us wake up at 3am, pack up our tent at 4am, and hit the road at that ungodly hour to drive 7 hours back into LA to catch our 2pm flight. smelling like the great outdoors all the way back to the VA.

i’m proud of the fact that i managed to go on a camping trip, after a work trip, and pack all our camping gear in our luggage (thank you, Southwest airlines). i think this formula will be repeated in my future.

the real reason i came back on my own paid-for domain was to post a recipe. so that i don’t forget it. i’m a weird one. note to self: this recipe is from the best cake-maker i know in my community. it’s for a soft chocolate ganache, and it is heavenly. and i intend to use it in cakes in the future.

L.A. is all that others say it is, but it’s not for me.  so as soon as i was done with work this past saturday, we (me and tariq, who flew in the night before) hit the road.

first order of business- car.  we picked up a mazda 5 (a glorified minivan) and rolled out- slowly- of the city.

then headed for the hills.  somewhere 40+ miles beyond porterville, ca, up just about the windiest mountain roads i’ve ever driven on.  think 25mph, MAX.  more like 20 if you value your safety.  we arrived at 9:20pm, which was an hour past nightfall, which was an hour of some really um…scary…driving.  thar’s no electricity up on thar mountains, and certainly no gas stations or people.  after fumbling around for a bit and realizing our solar-light-equipped cabin had run out of juice, we finally got to sleep.

and woke up to the prettiest horses you ever did see.  we were slated to ride out on a half-day horseback trail ride at 9am.  we met our hosts- steve and rinda- got ready, and loaded up.

we were riding for about 1.5 hours, and Moose (my horse), seemed to be doing fine.  trail/pack horses are, for the most part, on autopilot – they follow the leader.  steve was in front, i was in the middle, and tariq/Bailey were in the back.  we were on a pretty narrow section of trail coming off a steep incline of mountain.  as we approached a spring coming out of the ground (muddy area), Moose decided to take a step left instead of right, where it seemed there was ground under some ferns.  instead of ground, there was a rock ledge.  his back left leg slipped off the ledge, sent us both tumbling towards the trail and straight into the mud, he slipped further down the mountain, and in the span of about 2 seconds more, jumped over me and back onto the trail, narrowly missing like, all of me.  it took about 5 seconds more for me to stand up, for steve to jump off his horse and grab Moose’s reign, and for me to realize that i was conscious and unbroken.  i looked over at Moose to see that his leg was cut – i didn’t know how bad, because i know nothing about horse injuries, but bad enough for my blood sugar to take another deep hit – i nearly cried, and steve kept saying the horse was fine, but i’m a skeptic of any cowboy who says something is fine when it’s clearly not.

:(

i gave it one more shot, after steve said to, and got back up on moose (soaking wet, both shaken up and running on adrenaline), and we turned around to head back.  Moose slipped again, this time not completely, i said “NOPE. HE’S NOT DOING IT.”, hopped off, and steve hand-led moose back towards the meadow we had just come from.  i eventually just switched horses with steve and we slowly and carefully made our way back to the pack station.

most of all, i was just very sad to see an animal get injured.  they bandaged him up when we got back and let him have free reign over the grain bucket, but i still can’t get over the feeling of seeing a beast of burden in pain and afraid.  i remember that after a minute of coming to grips with the situation, i asked steve how HE was, and he, cowboy though he is, responded, “scared.”  dang, but that doesn’t happen every day.

so that was my sunday morning!  more to come when i have more time and more internet.