One Horse Open Sleigh

i am sad to report that there are no reindeer in jackson.  but nontheless, i went on my sleigh ride yesterday outside of jackson, wyoming.  it was at the national elk reserve.  the sleigh holds 18 people (though i think that you would be really squished with  18 people) but our group was only my family of 8 and a couple from denver.  it was pulled by a pair of horses called lady and the tramp.  as it has been every day except the day before yesterday, it was snowing and a toasty 2 or 3 degrees.  the ride was about an hour and with a wind chill of 10-15 degrees, well, let’s just say 18 people might have been nice for the body warmth.  i was actually surprised that they provided a few blankets but, with all of the snow and wind, there was no point.  it was cold and there was nothing you could do about it but deal.

when my brother and i went in to buy the tickets one of the drivers said that the cows were getting a little close to the path that the sleigh takes.  i said (out loud), there are cows?  everyone behind the counter looked at me like i had three heads.  then they quickly realized that i was not from around here (and apparently stupid) and said (very condescendingly), the females are called cows and the males are called bulls.  oh right, everyone knows that!  not those kind of cows, but cows.  well, the path that the sleight takes does not go near the cows, it only goes near the elk because they are the ones with the big antlers and apparently everyone wants to see those, plus the baby ones are with the mamas and they don’t like company because they are still skitish. 

i learned something on our little sleigh ride.  elk (and who knows perhaps other deer like animals too) shed their antlers every fall.  apparently they just fall off.  i don’t understand it but they said it happens.  and then they start growing back at the rate of an inch a day! and by the middle of winter they are huge again so that by spring when hunting season starts they are prime for the taking and then in the fall, they shed them again.  who would have thought?  then it’s a tradition for people to go out and collect the shed antlers (yuk), but apparently it’s a big thing around here for people to go out and collect them and at the elk reserve they collect thousands of pounds of them and sell them.  the boy scounts go out and collect them as a fundraiser and they raise thousands of dollars for themselves and the rest of the money goes to the reserve.  what a strange tradition.  but i stand corrected about the whole animals dying for the antler decoration thing – but i hold my position on the weird and creepiness of it.

anyway, the elk have just started migrating to the reserve for the winter.  but in late january or early february there will be thousands of them.  the sleigh pulls up about 20 feet away from them and they have been doing this for so long that the elk are not the least bit frightened of the sleigh.  it was actually kind of cool.  then we drove around to the other side of jackson to look at a flock of big horned sheep that have also migrated to the reserve.  they are a lot more skitish, but still pretty cool.  all in all, another very interesting adventure.