Edmonton, Lone Pine Ranch B&B and Sunwest Equine Ranch

On Monday morning I headed to Edmonton. It wasn't too difficult for me to leave the ranch, because the last two weeks hadn't been very pleasant. I felt tense and uncomfortable, and upon departure I felt a certain relief. I was glad that I could spend a night in Edmonton to close everything out and look forward to the new ranch. I arrived in Edmonton at noon, checked into the hotel, and took a taxi to West Edmonton Mall. It was a big shopping center with all sorts of stores. I spent the whole afternoon there before going back to the hotel.

On Tuesday, I slept in, then explored downtown Edmonton and enjoyed the sun in Rossdale Park on the North Saskatchewan River. In the afternoon, my bus left for Edson, where my new host mother, Sylvia, picked me up. When we arrived at Lone Pine Ranch, we had dinner, then played a game of Sorry! with Sylvia, myself, and the other 6 'ranchstays' before going to bed.

On Wednesday morning, before breakfast, I helped feed the chickens and bottle-feed one of the three calves. After breakfast, I spent the whole day with 2 other ranchstays, walking along the cow fence and checking it, patching it up where it was torn or too loose. When we returned, I helped feed the geese. Since there were no guests at the bed and breakfast at the moment, we had no work to do. After that, we had dinner before making a bonfire outside and winding down for the day.

On Thursday, before breakfast, I helped feed the geese and ducks. After breakfast, we had to deworm the lambs. We drove all the sheep into a small enclosure, then caught the lambs one by one while Sylvia dewormed them. Afterward, we released them back into the pasture. Once all the lambs were done, we also checked the adult sheep, but they were all fine. Since it was raining in the morning, we cleaned the floor inside the house. After lunch, we all went to the garden to weed. In the late afternoon, we went to an auction with 'the Brothers'. The Brothers were two older men who were neighbors of Sylvia's and were often seen on the ranch. At the auction, all the equipment from the house and property was being auctioned off, as the owner had passed away. Sometimes even the property is auctioned off, but not in this case. The auction went quickly, with half of the items sold after about 1.5 hours, and then we made our way back home. Sylvia, who had stayed at home, had already fed all the animals. We had dinner, and then we watched 'The Shoe of Manitou'. We were able to watch a German movie since all the ranchstays were from Germany or Austria, and Sylvia grew up in Bavaria and therefore understood German.

On Friday, I once again helped feed the geese, ducks, and emus. After breakfast, I packed my things and we set off for the new ranch. We were on the road for about an hour until we reached Sunwest Equine Ranch, owned by Carolyn and Lavern. They showed me around the ranch and the camper where I could sleep, as they didn't have a guest room. In the afternoon, they had some riding lessons, and I was able to watch to see how it all went.

On Saturday, I was able to ride a horse myself in the afternoon after the riding lessons. I had hoped that at least while riding, I wouldn't constantly have to think about everything that had happened in the past few weeks. However, it didn't work out that way, and I didn't feel quite comfortable on the horse. Since I had been contemplating all morning because it somehow didn't feel right to me that I was here, I made the decision that it was best for me personally to end the ranch stay and spend the remaining five weeks before my trip to the Rocky Mountains in eastern Canada. However, it wasn't easy for me because Carolyn and her family were very nice and took good care of me. The ranch would have been great too, and I could have learned a lot from Lavern, who had a lot of experience with the horses. But I was relieved after talking to Carolyn about it, and it felt like a weight was lifted off my shoulders. I was also glad that I didn't wait too long, because I had stayed at the first ranch for too long and didn't leave immediately when it started to become uncomfortable.

When I told Carolyn on Sunday morning about my time at Tanya's ranch, I realized how much the whole thing had affected me and how exhausted I actually was. I was glad that I had the whole day to myself to pack, because Carolyn will drive me to the airport on Monday afternoon, where I will fly to Toronto.