Quote Originally Posted by Krazykarl View Post
Lost river,

That looks like familiar terrain. I spent 7 years in Burns, Oregon area.

Karl
Karl,

Geographically speaking I hunt similar terrain. Southern Idaho, and Northern Nevada. Also spend a bunch of time in central ID where I have a cabin in the heart of Elmer Keith country.

That said, I used to stomp around eastern Oregon a fair bit. I rode roughstock through college (bucking horses) and met my wife at the Big Loop in Jordan Valley. We spent years going to Cattleman's Associations dances and Grange Hall dances back in the day, in places like the ghost town of Silver City and Oreana, in Owyhee County.


If you are not familiar with the Big Loop, the main event is the roping of wild mustangs. Cowboys have to build a 20 foot loop to rope the wild horses with. It could get pretty sporty when a mustang, who had never felt a rope, and had had minimal contact with humans all of the sudden got roped. Quite often they got the better of the cowboys, which was entertaining too.




BTW,it takes years to master that kind of roping.

I never was a roper. Strictly a bronc rider.


In the early 90s it was still a pretty small gathering primarily of ranch hands and families and hands. Cowboys often would sell their leather goods they spent the winter making, at the rodeo. Eventually commercial vendors moved in and a bit of the "ranch/buckaroo rodeo" flavor was lost, but it was still a good time.

Very much a night and day difference from today's commercial rodeos.

A completely different culture, for sure.