Here’s a ride from 2008 recorded in my journal, when I moved a couple of my horses back to the mountains in Malibu — off Decker and Encinal Canyon Rd. — near pristine Charmlee Park.
Since it’s a hundred miles from my now-Frazier-Park-home, I’d work all day shoeing and trimming horse’s hooves nearby in Malibu, then camp outside my corral for a night or two, getting in a ride when I could — many in the dark of night.
My journal records peaceful nights, spent outside my horses’ large pasture-style hilltop corral:
Twilight at ZachaRosa Ranch
The sky hangs orange, thick, against the distant Boney Ridge. Smoke from a host of Northern California fires influences the air even here in Malibu.
I sit in my car and type. Young Sycamore trees silhouette the skyline. Crickets croon in rolling unison.
It’s warm. We’ve had a heat wave up in our mountains, and it’s cooler here by the beach. I just brought the horses back (to this ranch) to get in a few Malibu summer rides.
I hear the sounds of horses munching, walking, whinnying — and response. One-two-three-four-five whinny’s in succession, from far away, to right next to me.
It makes me smile. I feel at home.
Mentor in Malibu
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Yet the night of this writing, I was apparently in some kind of mental funk.
Much of what we do with our horses is by discipline and years of logged muscle memory.
More often than not, especially as we get older, we horse enthusiasts require more discipline to accomplish the physically challenging task of mounting up, and going for a ride — especially wilderness rides! Especially at NIGHT!!! (See my post Why Ride?)
Looking back on it now, I’m amazed at my endeavor. Working all day physically, shoeing and trimming horse hooves in the hundred degree heat, and then trusting myself and my horses to head out into the darkness, into the Malibu mountain vastness, on our own . . . and feel at home . . . quite a feat!
At the time in my mid-fifties, no less!
(I also see telltale signs of hypoglycemia that night — low blood sugar — and dehydration from the day’s work, which must have added to my mental funk.)
I had to make myself rally to get out my horses that night — in the fading day’s twilight. Saddle up and climb on one horse (Mentor), leading (ponying) the other horse (Fauna), unsaddled, into the wildness, into the growing darkness . . .
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Riding into the Exotic
Sometimes the mind is a grist mill, crushing sheaves of chaff. Stuck, like a record, in a skip, in a rut. And this night is one.
The night is hot, dripping. I’m thinking 80 degrees. A clouded colorful sunset all that’s left of the hundred-degree August day.
Under the Eucalyptus trees, I stage a ridge-side picnic in the day’s final muted rays, straddling my three-legged stool, chomping my much-needed meal, forgetting the heavy work of the day.
I go about like a robot. Lifeless. Waiting for the inspiration to hit. I certainly don’t feel like riding tonight.
These are the rides I make myself muster — on horseback, into the darkness, into the trails — to ease my harried mind.
It worked, it seems, as I slept quietly afterwards, and felt blessed relief.
But the ride itself was labored.
This time riding Mentor, ponying Fauna, my mind grinds on. Down the trail on the first steep hillside, across the paved road, around the gate and up the loosely turned tractor path.
Looking out, dripping, waiting in vain for cool air to hit, we dither on. The lights of Trancas muted, in half-fog. Palos Verdes blotted out, as it been has all summer long.
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There is a turning point in every ride, when exhaustion gives way to magic, when the mundane gives way to the exotic. Oftentimes it feels like it will never get here. Yet on each ride, no matter how difficult, I’ve come to know — I’ll find it.
On this ride, after entering Malibu’s Charmlee Park in the darkening twilight, it arrives when we turn toward the lay-line on the white sandy soil, glowing bright in the growing darkness.
It always seems to take a good 45 minutes to get into that flowing state — perhaps a magic number of sorts. Like some mathematical formula: pi [exotic zone] = 45-minute-riding-time.
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Upon entering this exotic zone, the wheels of my mental mill finally subside.
Now, instead of hearing my own inner angst, I begin to turn outward, upward, into the rhythm of the ride.
The stars begin to sparkle. The treeline touches a place in my soul. The horizon opens up. And I become transported into the sublime.
Riding the same ride, again and again, may seem similar, but never the same.
The night, the clarity of the stars, the twinkling quality (or not) of the lights. The horses mood. The trail combinations. Close encounters with coyotes or not — all make for a new and unique ride.
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Tonight I decide to twist things up. Whatever I usually do, I’ll do differently.
It works.
Coming into the lookout from the wetlands offers smells and views I rarely get from the other direction.
Each way I look, each turn of the trail, offers new vistas of the cloud cover, new reflections on the meadow, new silhouettes of the lone standing oak. And with each turn, I feel a new sense of relief.
This tree not an oak, but a favorite tree up Mt. Pinos
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The meadow smells sweet tonight. Ripe. Sun-bleached. It shines bright under the starry canopy above, distinct from the dark tree-lined horizon.
Amazingly, eyes adjust to the darkness. We see and perceive just fine.
Like the cowboys of old, my horses and I feel nurtured and safe under the magical light of the stars.
The rhythm of hoofbeats soothes my soul. We are as much a part of this place as the animals who inhabit it.
Fauna tugs at the rope, reaching for a bite of tasty brush.
Mentor walks animated beneath me, without complaint. What a willing partner my good horse is!
Mentor spends his days standing in his pasture swishing flies, staring off, first one direction, then the next, moseying toward the water trough.
He has no idea what random day or hour I’ll drive up, hailing him with my familiar whistle. (I raised him from birth! It’s an intimate, life-long relationship.)
Mentor whinnies, ears pricked, at my call. I spend a few minutes fussing over him. I lead him out and saddle him. Bridle him. Mount upon his back, and nudge him on.
Without hesitation, he complies. Happily, eagerly. He carries me into my fantasy, whether directly out onto the trail or loaded into the trailer to haul to who-knows-where for who-knows-how-long.
Wonderful willing steed and companion!
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All in all, we ride for close to two hours. Happy. Content. We lose track of time and angst and worry.
Now we’re heading homeward. Uphill. Mentor puffs the still warm air. Fauna follows contentedly.
Looking back, I fixate on the skyline. In my mind I take a photo of the glowing night scene.
Unsaddling, in the darkness, I’m at ease now. The ride has worked its magic. Once again.
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How great to find my long-ago notes and story I previously wrote about this one-out-of-hundreds of my rides.
Night rides are very challenging, as they require an extrasensory awareness of horse, trails, footing, foliage (which can poke and rip and tear skin and clothing alike!), lurking predators, and so much more.
See my post, Adventurer of the Night, for another one of my nighttime rides.
DawnHoof
Other Charmlee Notes (from my 2009 journal)
I awoke with sense of travel, of wonder. How horses are the key that unlock another dimension for us. Like riding Starboy with Holly and Bari one week ago, at Charmlee Park, in Malibu.
I remember Holly asking me, as we saw each other at work one day, “What do you mean when you say that ‘Starboy’s a perfect horse?'” She just cannot understand. “What makes Starboy so special?”
(Starboy is Mentor’s offspring, along with his full sister, Angel.)
So when the day arrives and we meet at up the canyon at ZachaRosa Ranch — this, an afternoon daylight ride — I realize that I shall put her on Starboy. I need to be on Fae, and Bari is good on Angel. And I need to make sure nothing happens to Holly, to keep her very safe. (She hadn’t ridden since her teen years.)
So I “pony” her, leading Starboy on a safety rope, just in case — she, to my left, on little Arab-cross Starboy, I on big wonderful Shire-cross Fae — Bari and Angel tagging along. And after a while I realize that Holly actually can ride.
Ah Ha!
Thirty years melt away, and Holly’s in the saddle, riding again! Once inside Charmlee Park, I free her from the rope, and Holly and Starboy are on their own.
And she gets it!
With giggles and teenage enthusiasm of old, she sits his cadenced jog. “Oh, I see what you mean! Starboy is perfect!” Holly proclaims.
With a slight tilt of her seat she wills Starboy onward and he responds, ever reaching, ever pushing forward, carrying her into the Malibu end-of-day light.
And now into the sunset with pale golden hues.
And now deep twilight on the vast Pacific Horizon, against the gnarled silhouette of the Boney Ridge.
And now the moon, nearly full, casting shadows toward the west, illuminates the meadow, the hillock, our path.
The ride, like the horse, contains perfection. And Holly giggles—sixteen again—rising and ebbing with her mount, like a wave.
Above the beach here in Malibu.
How awesome is that!!!
Read more about Starboy here, here, here.
Read about my magical Malibu childhood here.
Of note: the Malibu ranch I once lived on with my horses, milk goats, and my girls when they were young, was bought by Country Singer Dwight Yoakam, who became my landlord back then — late ’80s-early ’90s.
Here is the property now with a great video of the Boney Ridge and surroundings. Dwight named this twelve acre Yerba Buena Canyon ranch the “Boney Pony” and owned it for several years. It seems it’s now a health/yoga retreat.
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Copyright 2008, 2009, 2024 Dawn Jenkins
Photo credits: Dawn Jenkins
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