Menu
Riding toward their dream
It's not every day that you see a couple of long riders leading a packstring down a lonely stretch of Vernon County highway, but that's exactly what some motorists encountered on N Highway between Sheldon and Bronaugh on Tuesday morning.
Wearing ball caps or stocking hats instead of fur hats, leading their string down the blacktop instead of through the back country of the Rockies, Jeannette and Richard McGrath of Jackson, Wyo., are on a long riders' trek that began in March of 2010 in San Francisco, Calif. and will end in Cape Henlopen, Del., sometime in May.
If all goes well the pair hopes to have raised the $2 million needed to get the Hearts Up Ranch off the ground and running. The ranch is "a lifelong dream" of Jeannette's, said Richard; and it is intended as an emotional healing facility and experience for war veterans, rape victims and others who have experienced severe emotional trauma. The organizational groundwork for the non profit ranch has been laid, so now the couple is riding across the country to raise money to build, equip and fund the ranch.
Jeannette, 29, used work at the local airport and Richard, 32, is a gunsmith and works for an outfitter guiding elk hunters and summer pack trips into the mountains. Richard said the realization that the ranch could be a reality came to him on a summer pack trip. A woman in the camp, he said, had been raped many years earlier, but had failed to mention that traumatic event during 10 years of working with a therapist. McGrath said there's just something about the mountains and riding horses that often makes people want to talk to him. The rape victim hadn't been on her horse for an hour, he said, when she "told me everything."
McGrath saw what that emotional release did for the woman, but still had his doubts. "I'm just a cowboy; what do I know?" he said. He did know that it touched his heart and he and Jeannette decided that if they could add some counseling and prayer to the comfort of horses and majesty of mountains that they might be able to make something that would help a lot of people. They founded the Hearts Up Ranch.
The McGraths worked for the better part of three years preparing for the trip, said Richard. They had to acquire more horses, more gear, plan a route suitable for traveling 2,500 miles across the continent on horseback without a support vehicle; they had to stock up supplies; "We spent a year and a half dehydrating food," said Richard. "We eat a lot of elk jerky."
In the end, "we had to buy a bigger horse trailer" to haul everything to the starting point just north of San Fancisco. "It was kind of scary quitting our jobs," said Jeannette, but the couple finally found themselves on the trail.
"We've had some major wrecks" along the way, said Richard. The worst was when "me and two horses fell off a cliff in California ... I got pretty bruised up, he said, and, "I had a dislocated jaw," and one of the horses was lame for several days after the fall. Jeannette hasn't had a mishap as serious as that, but she did get stepped on by one of the horses and had to deal with "badly bruised foot" for several days.
They have all of the original livestock they started with. And they've picked up another horse and a dog along the way. The Ute pony, similar to a mustang, traveling with them now was a gift from another long rider, a man who was traveling from Canada to Mexico that they happened to meet along the way. And it couldn't have come at a better time.
With Jeannette riding one horse, another lame and the other two animals, one horse and one mule, used as pack animals, Richard was reduced to walking. His feet were severly blistered, and the couple began to think they may have to give up their dream when the man gave them the horse.
"He really wanted to help us finish our trip," said Jeannette.
Sleeping on the ground wherever darkness found them or occasionally resting someplace more comfortable, thanks to the kindness of strangers, the couple continued on their walking pace journey of twelve hour days where everything became measured in riding days rather than hours or minutes or weeks.
"Two riding days from Missouri," the couple adopted a mixed breed dog that a helpful stranger was trying to find a home for. Jeannette told the man that if he follows when we leave us, we'll keep him, and the dog, now named Bella (Beautiful) is part of the string.
The McGraths feel like they are on the downhill side of their fundraising odyssey. There have been many trials and tribulations, wonders and rewards. "It has, at times, been a strain on our relationship," said Jeannette, but "I think it's made us better." The couple has been inspired by the beauty of the Rocky Mountains and humbled by the fury of a mountain thunderstorm. They were riding high in the clouds of the Rockies when a sudden storm gathered around them. The violent tempest hurled its lightning from side to side; it flashed and crashed all around, rather than streaking up and down.
Jeannette said, "I was in tears," but "all we could do was keep riding," said her husband of eight years.
The pair has been awed by the silence of the desert. Normally there are little sounds in nature, a bird, a bug, perhaps a whispering breeze, but in the desert of Utah, the McGraths awoke one morning to a silence so profound that "our heartbeats were deafening," said Richard. "It was a complete void of noise," according to Jeannette.
Long parts of the trip have been deviod of people too, but "the people we've met have really made this trip" said Jeannette.
They've been helped wherever they have been. Sometimes with food, sometimes with money. They have even woken up to find that hay bales had been left in their camp over night. And "it was good hay too," said Jeannette, "not just something somebody wanted to get rid of." They are still finding out that "there's way more good people out there than bad."
When the riders got to Vernon County on Feb. 14, they had been through a couple weeks of real bad weather that "really slowed us down," said Jeannette. The generous residents of Vernon County found the couple leading their string east near Bronaugh. Gary and Mary Comstock just happened to have a rental house on the riders' route that was empty and still had the heat on in it, so they offered to let the McGraths spend the night there.
We were grateful for someplace dry and out of the wind to spread out or bedrolls they said. Mary Comstock found them an interesting couple pursuing a worthy cause and said that even if they hadn't had the empty rental house "we'd a put em up anyway." The next day Gary made arrangments for them to stay with someone he knows east of Sheldon. He couldn't get them on thier solar charged cell phones, so he drove across the county in the afternoon to let them know about the lodging.
Charles Feldman also encountered the McGraths as they were traveling east on N Highway. He noticed the dog immediately. When he learned the story of how they came by Bella, Feldmann, who owns a kennel, took it on himself vaccinate the dog for Parvo, distemper and the like. "That just made my day." said Jeannette.
On Wednesday, the McGraths remounted and led thier string east across B Highway into Cedar County where they had some supplies waiting on them south of Stockton, Mo.
For those interested in keeping up with their progress they hava a Web site. Simply go to www.heartsupranch.com to find they McGraths' blogs and a GPS feature that relays their location in real time. There is also a link on the site for anyone who wishes to donate to the Hearts Up Ranch.