Barrel Racing in the Wild West!

Beatle and Heather are such warm, welcoming and lovely people! Beatle has a Blackfoot heritage and Heather belongs to the First Nations Peoples of Canada - they love horses and Beatle is a self-professed proud cowboy! They invited us to come along and watch Heather barrel race on the weekend! Yiiiiiii-haaaaaaaaa!

Barrel racing is a rodeo event in which a horse and rider attempt to complete a cloverleaf pattern around preset barrels in the fastest time. Though both boys and girls compete at the youth level and men compete in some amateur venues and jackpots, in collegiate and professional ranks, it is primarily a rodeo event for women. It combines the horse's athletic ability and the horsemanship skills of a rider in order to safely and successfully maneuver a horse in a pattern around three barrels (typically three fifty-five gallon metal or plastic drums) placed in a triangle in the center of an arena.

Heather and Beatle keep their horses Gilbert & Clifford at stables just off of Fort Qu'Appelle and we headed down for an action-packed afternoon!

Sara and Amy fell in love with Charlie the cat

Here is Gilbert and Clifford

Notice Gilbert is wearing a beautiful beaded brindle!

The barrel racers are starting to arrive

H-u-g-e horse trailers at the farm!

Today it is Clifford who will race with Heather - Beatle is getting him ready to go

Gilbert has a day off and really wants some of Hollie's energy-bar (hidden in her pocket, but he can smell it)

Alex and Clifford sharing a moment

Heather taking Clifford for warm-up before the race

So excited!

Warming up for the race

We're watching the warm-up and loving Beatles' stories

Howdy cowboy!

First up are the Pee-Wees :-)

Cheer squad! Go Heather!!!

After the barrel racing season tally-up, the winner is awarded this amazing buckle!

.....aaaaaaand GO! Pffffft, go Heather!!!!

Heading for....

...the first barrel...

....second barrel.....

.....and the last one...

...third and last one...

...bring it home, Heather!

Checking out Heather and Beatles trailer. Room for 3 horses and the front bit contains the living quarters!

All of us (I'm down left hand side corner...see me?)

 Thank you so much for having us, Heather and Beatle! We loved every minute of it!