When Kyle came riding with us earlier this year we had no idea he was the editor of a magazine until the rum shots after the ride. We were thrilled to receive the article today. Thank you Hyland Magazine!
Hyland_RanchoChilamate

Check out Hyland Magazine on your ipad:)

http://itunes.apple.com/ca/app/hyland-magazine/id468309586?mt=8

The inspiration for this blog is the recent opening of the beautiful new Zen Yoga Studio here in San Juan del Sur by my good friend Vanessa. Yoga is founded on a premise of “being in the moment”…. with your breath, your body and space. Now the rational side would be the amount of time we are in the saddle and the amount of physical and mental work it can be. Most of our riders are quite surprised how much energy it takes to ride a horse. And my body
thanks me each and every time I make it into town for a yoga class….. with special gratitude for those hip openers and back bends. Daily classes at Zen Yoga Studio are truly ideal for all those surfer and horseback riding chicas (and the guys too:)

I also found this great Cowgirl Yoga article on line that I wanted to share – written by MARGARET BURNS VAP -  founder of Big Sky Yoga Retreats, combining yoga, horses and outdoor fitness in Montana. Cowgirl Up!

Cowgirl Yoga: 5 POSES TO ENHANCE YOUR TIME IN THE SADDLE
“The thing I like most about these yoga poses is that they help stretch and strengthen the muscles affected by riding in different ways – depending on when you do them. If you use them as a warm up before riding, you’ll get your muscles limbered-up and ready to engage. If you try them after, they’ll help stretch out tight spots and prevent soreness. Here are my favorite poses for riders of any discipline (not just Western).

* * * * *

WARRIOR I | Also known as VIRABHADRASANA I, this pose helps increase the range of motion in the hip joints, particularly by stretching out the muscles in the front of the hip. Unlocking this area can also help with correct leg position on horseback; the stretch to the back of the legs can help lengthen the leg down the horse’s body. The upper body gets a revitalizing reach upward to align the spine and cultivate awareness of how the upper body lines up over the hips.

HOW | Stand tall with your feet together. Step your right foot back behind you about 4 feet, turning the back heel down and angling the toes forward about 45 degrees. Put your hands on your hips and draw your right hip forward and your left hip back; think of squaring the hips forward. Feel the stretch through the front of the right hip and the left calf as you push down through your back heel. The back leg is energized and straight while the front knee bends. Keep your navel drawing in toward your spine as you lift your arms overhead; you may bring the palms to touch, or imagine you are holding a ball between your hands. Either way, keep the fingertips reaching high as your hips drop down. Think about creating space between your vertebrae as the crown of your head lengthens up as well. If you would like to challenge your balance, take your gaze up toward your hands. Hold for 5 deep breaths and repeat on the other side.

* * * * *

WARRIOR II | VIRABHADRASANA II brings more opening to the hips as they open out (vs. squared forward as in Warrior I). This pose also hits the inner groin and thigh, encouraging them to release and widen more easily on the horse. The arms are strengthened in this pose, and reaching them away from one another actively provides a gorgeous stretch across the front of the chest.

HOW | Stand tall with your feet together. Step your right foot back behind you about 4 feet, turning the back heel down and angling the toes forward about 45 degrees. Bend your front knee to come into a lunge position, taking care not to let the knee come out over the toes; if this happens, you need to widen your stance. Keep the back leg straight and strong. Take your arms out to the sides at shoulder height; think about reaching the fingertips away from one another and keeping strong energy flowing through the arms while you reach. Make sure your shoulders relax down the back (vs. tensing them up toward the ears). Gaze softly out over your front fingertips. Let the hips be heavy and continue to let them drop down until your front thigh is parallel to the ground. Hold for 5 deep breaths and repeat on the other side.

* * * * *

SADDLE TWIST | Twisting on horseback immediately aligns the spine and opens the chest while providing a lateral stretch. Plus it feels really darn good.

HOW | Take your right hand behind you to the back of the saddle or directly on the horse’s croup (top of the hindquarters). Place your left hand on the right side of the saddle or the horse’s withers (where the neck and the back join) use this hand to gently push off the outside of the saddle/withers while lifting your chest up and drawing your right shoulder back. Think about turning your collarbones toward your horse’s rear. Let the crown of your head lift up toward the sky. Hold for 5 deep breaths, twisting a little deeper if possible on every exhale, and lengthening the spine more on every inhale. Repeat on the other side.

* * * * *

SADDLE CAMEL | USTRASANA, or the camel, is a lovely heart-opening back bend. Heart-opening poses encourage emotional release, and help a rider be sensitive to her emotional state so she can connect with her horse. Camel pose counters rounded shoulders and addresses poor posture while increasing spinal flexibility.

HOW | Place your hands behind you on the edge of the saddle or on your horse. Establish your seat and feel your seat bones connect to your horse, making sure your hips and legs are relaxed and open. Gently begin to push off your fingertips to lift your chest toward the sky. Feel the arch in your mid and upper back. You can gently release your head back or, if that bothers your neck, look straight up. Use each inhale to expand the chest and lift the heart. Stay here for 5 deep breaths, and use your hands for support as you carefully roll up one vertebra at a time until you are upright.

* * * * *

HIP OPENER | BADDHA KONASANA, or bound angle pose, is a pose I think about a lot while on horseback. The same opening of the hips allows the heels to drop down in the stirrups and facilitates using your inner leg muscles to direct the horse. Open hips are beneficial for a lot more than horseback riding – how about just releasing tension? The first place we normally think of as holding tension is the neck and shoulder area; but the hips also collect a great deal of our stress so working to open them is a worthy cause. It’s a lovely beginning hip opener for everyone.

HOW | Sit down on a lightly padded surface (such as a yoga mat or soft ground) and reach back to take your butt cheeks out and back so you feel the sit bones at the bottom of your pelvis connect to the floor. Bring the soles of your feet together, about 4-6 inches from the hips (the more open your hips and knees are, the closer your feet will come in). If your knees are not dropping very far, you can place blocks or blankets under them for support. Interlace your fingers underneath your feet, taking care not to pull the toes up. Keep a light and relaxed grip. Now tune into your posture; draw your navel in toward your spine to activate your core and straighten your back. Relax your shoulders and lift your chin slightly. You may remain here, or begin to slowly and gently come forward with your upper body, keeping a straight back and directing your chin toward the floor in front of you. Think about lengthening your spine – stop coming forward when your back starts to round. Hold for 25 slow, deep breaths. Before getting up, straighten your legs out in front of you for a moment.”

Namaste, Margaret
Photos © 2008 Larry Stanley

A Benefit Rock Concert at Bishop Sullivan Catholic High School

One of the best things about living here and offering horseback tours is the amazing people that join us on the rides.

Last summer Trey and Carrie joined us for the day off their cruiseship. As a director in a school back in Virginia he was instrumental in co-ordinating a benefit concert to help buy school supplies and uniforms for the kids out here in Escamequita and Las Parcelas.

It’s perfect timing to receive these funds as the Christmas/Summer break is just ending and new uniforms are in order.

With many thanks to Trey Clarkson, Director Barry Robinson Theater and Fine Arts Center and the great people at Bishop Sullivan Catholic High School.

Check out these great pics of the performers. We look forward to sharing the photos of the students and their new uniforms in return. Muchisima Gracias.

Playing for Nicaragua

Mr. and Mrs. Clarkson on the beach in Nicaragua

Olive Ridley Turtle... and Pam

A major highlight for me was the morning we were on the road by 3:30 a.m. to go to Playa La Flor which is a refuge for the Olive Ridley turtles.  We arrived by 4:00 a.m. following an ‘ass jarring’ ride in their pick up truck in complete darkness and paid the $8 per person fee at the ranger station that was full of Nicaraguans soldiers sleeping.  Most people arrive in the late evening to see the turtles … I don’t think early morning visits are common … but it was well worth it and highly recommend this time of day to see this incredible site.

We followed the path to the beach with our flashlights and immediately almost walk on top of a huge turtle laying her eggs!  Over to the left are three soldiers with their guns who are there to protect the turtle eggs from locals who sell them for 70 cents a dozen.  There are 10 or more soldiers patrolling the beach with guns and flashlights along with some rangers who are monitoring the turtles’ journey.  They have a particularly special role at dawn.

A beach full of Turtle Tracks

As we are standing there trying to adjust our eyes something hard and heavy is bumping up again my lower leg!  I can’t see a thing and I jump back rather startled.  With the flashlight we realize it is one of the Ridley turtles.  Your kidding me right … the turtles attack people?! The soldiers and Jeremy are laughing at this point because I am clearly a newbie.
The turtles are coming and going en mass and on a mission to dig holes, lay eggs and get the hell out of there as fast as they can … well as fast a 100 pound turtle can move with large flippers made for the ocean!  This turtle that bumped into me is on her own journey and I just happen to be in her path.  They pretty much ignore you unless you put your flashlight right on them which we are told not to do … especially on their faces … so from that point on we try to limit the use of the flashlights … but it is pretty friggn’ dark out … cloud cover and no moonlight but we do our best.  These turtles are everywhere.

Jamie and a bucket full of babies

We spent the next three hours enjoying this incredible site of these huge turtles on this beautiful Nicaraguan beach in various stages of their amazing journey.
That night some 1,000 turtles made it to this beach to lay their 100 or so eggs. Over a five month period 180,000 make their way to this beach (where they were born) to lay eggs.  The season is from July to December and peaks in August and September.  There are five to seven huge waves (no pun intended) of these turtles coming onto the beach.  Some nights over 10,000 arrive to dig their holes, lay their eggs (it is like they are in a trance), bury the eggs and then pat down the sand with the weight of their body which gives a whole new meaning to a body slam!  Whomp, whomp. You can hear this thumping noise as you walk along in the darkness.  It is like there is a dance club in the distance with the bass beat pumping.
We walked along the beach slowly enjoying this incredible site with the soft pounding of the surf and the whomp, whomp noise as our backdrop.  Around 5 a.m. or so the morning light begins ever so slightly in the distance which illuminates the turtles coming and going along this 1 km long beach.  It actually looks like a bunch of little tanks in motion.  When you approach them they will stop for a moment or two to take a look at you and make sure you are not a threat.  They have huge black eyes and you definitely know when they are looking right at you.
We were able to spend time with one of the rangers who shared some interesting information with us.  Jeremy was able to translate which was great.  This fellow, a Nicaraguan, has been working on this beach for 13 years and just in that time the number of Ridley turtles have gone from 35,000 in one year coming to the beach to lay eggs to over 180,000 in a year.  The turtles make this journey when they are 13 years old or older so after many years of protecting the nests they are seeing the results.  With a research team, they have marked off 100 meters sections off the beach to calculate how many turtles lay eggs in each section each night. There are two sections of this beach that are particularly busy.  There are so many nests that sadly we saw eggs being dug up by other turtles as they dug their own nest holes.  If 180,000 turtles come to beach year to lay 100 eggs each, that is a heck of a lot of eggs in a small space.  He also shared that 72% of the eggs hatch and of those 7% survive to be adults turtles.

The eggs incubate for 60 days therefore at dawn the ones that hatched that night attempt to make their way to the ocean.  At one point I was walking along slowly and almost stepped on one of the little guys.  I stopped and looked around and another three were making their way to the ocean.  The ranger handed us a basket to collect as many as we can find.  The more dawn progressed, the more baby turtles we would see.  The ranger had about 50 in his basket which he will keep until nightfall where he will release them under the safety of darkness.

Vultures at Dawn

These little guys have to get going because the vultures are coming in at dawn to pick them apart … along with the eggs that are dug up by the other turtles.  It is a daily feast for these birds which are only about 18 inches in height but determined to get their meal … you know, like a vulture.  Interestingly it is a seagull type bird that eats the highest amount of baby turtles making their way to the ocean and in the shallow water.

The ranger told us the process for the turtle to come out of the ocean, walk the 75 meters from the ocean to where they lay their eggs, make their nest, lay their eggs is between 45 minutes to an hour.  He has a little bit of time to figure this out!

So, all and all, a very cool experience.  I definitely recommend going in the early morning to see the transformation of the beach from darkness to dawn.  Thank you Blue, aka Heather, for sharing yet another special day in your life.  Love you man!

Dad and the kids in Rivas, Nicaragua

Horses continue to be an important part of life for the locals living out their days in rural Nicaragua. It’s the rainy season here now. And truly our first ‘real’ one with heavy mud, rivers bursting their banks and flowing too fast to pass on foot. It reminded me of the role horses play on this muddy stage as they can still make their way.
Most of the back roads follow the ever-changing river bed or are no longer impassable by truck – so it’s no surprise that horses are the transport of choice. Horses are a tool of the trade for those wanting to get their rice or beans to the market as well. But now instead of loading up the sacks and riding all the way to town (10+ km and 2 hours) they tie up their beasts to the rails and catch the bus to town. It might take just as long to make the trip to town by bus… but we know for sure the horses prefer waiting for their masters to come back from town then to make the journey themselves.
Horses and their contribution to life here is most definitely one of the attractions we had to this community in SW Nicaragua. And still is.

So, them both still having their testicles, or “huevos” as they are locally known, we set about to castrate them old school style except that we used a crimper rather than a scalpel, mainly because it was the rainy season and we were concerned that the incision would have a tough time healing with all the rain and moisture.  Also, with the crimping method they are able to work after a month vs three months to heal an incision.  Anyway, after they were all healed up we put them in the string along with the other 8 and got them working.  The smaller one, Apache, never did come to the realization that he no longer had his manhood and continually wanted to get confrontational with the other horses while enroute to and from the beach.  This belligerent attitude was no problem for me, or any of my ranch hands, but did prove to become quite tedious for guests with little or no riding experience.  The larger one, Santana, became very mellow but developed a tendency to “crow-hop” when on trails where some stick or bush would inadvertently brush against his hind-quarters.  Perhaps this was a reaction to being a coach horse and having his backside whacked too much during his years in Masaya.  Anyway, it soon became evident that this pair wasn’t really suited to trail rides with riders that had little experience and so I decided to sell them and look for some more mellow trail horses.  I put the word out in the community that they were for sale, but had little or no interest.  Meanwhile they weren’t working but were still eating their share of hay and portions of pellets (kind of like leaving your car running while you’re not using it), and I was getting desperate to get rid of them.

So I had an idea – as I was sure to lose a bundle by selling them anyway – I decided to donate them to two local churches (one to Las Parcelas and one to Las Delicias), so they could raffle the horses to raise money for church improvements.  I talked to the two Pastors to see if they were interested and they were thrilled with the idea.  We agreed that to keep it affordable for the congregations they would sell 200 tickets at 30 Cordobas (about $1.50), each, thereby raising 6,000 Cordobas for their respective churches, and somebody would walk away with a good horse for 30 Cordobas!

Both horses are currently living in their new homes and both churches are currently enjoying the fruits of an injection of funds for improvements…and though I miss them, I am currently enjoying no longer feeding them – and I wish them a long and healthy life.

They were in a large Saba tree near the river which from what I gather have a new leaf this time of year of particular interest to the monkeys.. and thus the territorial calls.

I love living with monkeys!
Blue

Video recorded September 14, 2011

A large Boa Constrictor was part of our 2nd intermission show for Hockey Night in el Campo.

Vancouver Canuck fever had reached Rancho Chilamate. Our hometown hockey team is kicking some serious butt and the energy made it all way here to rural Nicargua. Jamie and I call it Hockey Night in El Campo and last night was game 3 of the Western Conference Final against the San Jose Sharks.

A few days earlier our internet crapped out just as the game was starting and we missed the whole thing – only to wake up the next morning and still not know who won as the internet was still out.

But tonight we settled in again to listen… yes, listen – not watch. Our internet is not strong enough for ‘streaming’ but we thankfully found a great local Vancouver radio station, Team Radio 1040, which provides a great uninterrupted feed. And that Shorty can sure call a game. He definitely creates the picture we don’t have:)

It was a tough game with a 3-0 score after the 2nd period for the Sharks. Bummer.

We had turned up the computer speakers to add to the atmosphere of the game so it was no surprise we didn’t hear the panic calls from the chickens in the coop. Cesar, our guard  this evening, just called on the radio to say he found and killed an intruder in the barn. An intruder?? He was about 6 feet tall… I mean long. It was a Boa Constrictor.

Do we want to see it? Heck ya.. and some photos too! Cesar had found it wrapped around one of our chickens doing it’s constricting thing. A Boa? I just had the revelation of the feathered ones we throw around our necks – never put the two together until I was drawn to placing it around my neck. The snake was incredibly heavy for its size and one could easily imagine the strength it possessed. Weirdly the snake left no smell on our hands. It made me think that I should know more about these amazing creatures. What a great 2nd intermission show!

And so back to the game on the ice. Canucks rallied but lost. Hockey may be part of our Canadian culture, but down here in Nicaragua – the only thing on ice tonight is a big snake that should make the dinner menu tomorrow.