A Guide School Student's Journal
DAY 11 - Thursday
Got to sleep a few minutes longer, but still had to get up and wrangle this morning.
Started off learning the history, uses and parts of a sawbuck saddle, then launched right
into sawbuck packing. We mainly worked with panniers and the single (one man) diamond
hitch. After everyone pretty well got the hang of it, we did more review on mantying and
Decker packing, then took another 5-hour ride, taking turns leading 3 loaded pack animals.
We had a few rodeos and a good education - a pretty good day in itself, but we weren't
done yet.
At 9:00 p.m. we wrangled the stock in again for night-packing experience. Started
packing up at 9:30, but we weren't loaded and ready to head out until 10:30. About that
time it clouded over again. We packed in the rain this afternoon, but fortunately it only
drizzled tonight. The bad part is the cloud cover made it pitch dark. We definitely
learned what night packing is like - didn't get back till 3:00 a.m.! No one rolled any
saddles, but we had lots of too slow adjustments that kept us out a long time. Good
experience. We learned the importance of working quickly!