By Rraine Jones, Grand County Search and Rescue
Let me start this story by saying I don’t know how to spell Petey. Is it Petie or Petey or Pete-y? When you say it in your head, think small Pete. I’m going with Petey, but I apologize if I got it wrong. Good thing is, Petey was a donkey who thought he was a horse, so I’m sure he would not have cared.
Around 3:30 pm, we got a call for three subjects that fell from horses, one that might have had a head and neck injury and one that might be unconscious. The page said we were to meet by the pool of a local guest ranch. The juxtaposition of “unconscious” and “meet by the pool” threw me.
I drove into the ranch and immediately felt like I should not be there, even though I know I should. There was a pool full of vacationers, people sitting on porches, and horses, lots of horses. People vacation like this – guest ranches? This was a new idea to me. I could see the appeal of it if you like horses. I like pools. I followed one of my teammate’s trucks into an area that looked like only employees should drive there. I felt my teammate might know more than I did about where to go, so I followed. Actually, it was highly likely ALL my teammates knew more than me.
After I parked and gathered all my gear and my pack, I was told to hop in the truck with my teammate. We stopped at various places as we drove up a dirt path. When we stopped, I would hop out and tie flagging (brightly colored survey ribbon) to places where it could be easily seen so others could follow our path to the right location. How my teammate knew the way was beyond me, but he did because at some point we got to a place with sheriff’s vehicles. There was a horse and several other teammates. They were putting one subject with a severe concussion, but otherwise ok, into one of the sheriff’s vehicles. Just as I arrived, the rescue was over. I did nothing useful, served no purpose, came, saw nothing and it was done. How did my other teammates get here so fast? What even happened?
I later learned there were two people, not three, in the accident. The one without a concussion was taken down on an ATV. I had no idea how the horses got off the trail or why there was only one horse when I arrived. What happened to the other? Welcome to what a lot of SAR incidents were like for me: I arrive, something happened, yay! We saved the day, I’m confused, I go home. Over the years, I would learn that sometimes that is the nature of rescue incidents: you drive, arrive, turn around and go home. Other times, you drive, arrive, wait, then turn around and go home. It’s not the glamour you might expect.
This day was a little different in that a lot happened between “I’m confused” and “I go home.” One of the women on the team worked at the ranch. In the past, she had tried to describe to me the running of the horses. It sounded amazing and I had always thought of asking her if I could come out and watch one day. She was working that day, and she saw me. She said if I wanted to see the running of the horses, I should wait a half hour. Oh yes, I wanted to see this.
Every day, the ranch’s horses are in a fenced-in area near the stables, waiting in case anyone staying at the ranch wants to ride. Every evening, the horses are taken out to a different pasture to hang out and do whatever horses want to do. Apparently, the horses want to do this pasture thing because when the gates are opened from the area around the stables, they run. They know the way to the pasture. The ranch has over 200 horses. I wasn’t sure that all 200 are running at once, but I was excited to find out.
Several other search and rescue teammates must have known about the running of the horses too. As I approached the paddock, I saw several teammates standing on the split rail fencing around the stables. I crawled up on the fence with them. There were so many horses. I doubt it was all 200, but it still was more horses than I’d ever seen in one place. There were some cowboys too. I’m not a country girl, but if I have to stand around watching cowboys, I guess I have to. They were tall, and with the boots, the hat, the well-fitting jeans, I couldn’t decide if I should watch the horses or the cowboys. Then someone pointed out the real man of the hour: “Oh, look – there’s Petey.” I followed where they were pointing and saw a donkey, Petey the donkey. He was just milling around with the horses and looked completely at home with them. He didn’t seem to notice that they were so much taller than him. He was the only donkey in the paddock. None of the horses cared, either – all was right with the paddock world.
We were told the running was about to happen so we moved to another vantage point where the horses would run across the road I drove in on. A couple horses were saddled with cowboys riding them. The excitement of the horses could be felt as they waited for the gates to open. They were fully aware of what was about to happen. Surprising to me, none of the guests lined up to watch the event. They were all still in the pool or their rooms. How could this get old? How could you not want to watch? Do you know what is about to happen? This should be the highlight of your day.
The gates opened, the cowboys took their positions to make sure no one ran astray, and the horses ran. The excitement was palpable. Could I even go so far as to call it joy or elation? If horses could feel elation, this was a solid wall of elation running by me. There were so many that at some point I could barely see individual horses; it was a sea of horse movement. My heart beat louder as the sound of them running drowned out most other sounds. They appeared to be towering over me. They knew where they were going, not one strayed, not one took its time and not one cared I was there. It was terrifying and awesome all at once. Feeling the mix of terror and joy at the same time is such a humbling, life-defining combination. Every experience in life suddenly melded together and became one amazing existence. There was no separating the terror from the joy, no separating the horse from me, no separating this experience from the last. It was just one blur of movement.
Then I heard someone yelling, “Go Petey, go!” In the massive height of horse legs, here came Petey. He was running as fast as the horses, oblivious to the fact that he was not a horse. We all cheered Petey on. Go Petey go! If Petey could run with these beautiful strong horses, maybe the rest of us could be beautiful and strong too. Go Petey go!