Like Riding a mountain goat...

We especially love  the winter riding in the red rocks of the SouthWest.  Here are a few short clips from the past couple of weeks that show how sure footed the mules can be in technical, extreme terrain.  Notice how easy they make it look.




The clip above fails to show the pool of water down below the rider's right side (as seen in clip three and four).




My young son and his young john mule, Senator, making the climb out of this canyon look easy.  The horse with us wouldn't go down into this spot, and, most likely, have make it back out if it had tried.




Notice that when the mule is down in the water, the shelf it stepped off is taller than the mule.  Not shown here, but my son decided to take his mule along the serrated edge seen on the right--as shown by the rider in clip one who crossed this obstacle going up the canyon instead of down.  The next clip shows a horse trying to go around this obstacle to the left.




This rider decided to try and lead his horse around the water obstacle.   The horse may have been fine going into the water--the rider is quite seasoned.  But a mule would have either REFUSED to take the same path this horse took, or it would have done it without a wreck.

As traumatic as it appears, the horse was not harmed and was back up in this canyon a week later.