It Is Not The Mountain We Conquer

    The Banff Mountain Film Festival rolled into town this past Monday and Tuesday night.  This is an annual international film competition which features short films and documentaries about mountain sports, culture and environment.  Each year we suck it up and stay out until eleven on a work night. 
     The sport films are extreme to say the least.  Base jumpers leap off cliffs and take flight wearing only a webbed squirrel suit.  People kayak off giant waterfalls while others climb mountains in Antarctica.  My favorite movie this year, was about a group of French guys that had paraglided three hours across a valley to a remote mountain range to ski/fly pristine snow slopes (you can see the movie trailer at Poor Man's Heli.)  Adrenaline held me on the edge of my seat in awe.  When it ended I walked to the car feeling very boring.
     I fed the horses a little late the following morning.  I had somehow managed to find an extra half hour to take Autumn for a quick ride. The birds sang to the morning as the sun's soft light slipped between the shadows of the ferns and trees.  I asked Autumn to head towards the entrance of the forest trails but she drifted up the hill.  I didn't argue.  In spring's blue air, we wandered through patches of lavender redwood sorrel, butter cups and magenta fringed English daisies.  Before we reached the heart shaped pond, Autumn tucked under the trees.  I had to lean across her neck and tuck my face into her mane to avoid the branches. She emerged on a rocky outcropping. 
     There we stood, in front of the world.

    Newborn pastures, cerulean mountains and ever greened trees

 found the looking glass pond catching the alabaster clouds that floated by...


How glorious a greeting the sun gives the mountains!
~John Muir

....Autumn gave this all to me.  
     We enjoyed it all until it was time to go.  Our options to descend from the out cropping were all pretty steep (steep for my taste).  Once again, Autumn took the reins and headed straight off the side.  The little voice in me said trust Autumn and give her her head.  That's what I did.  My 2,000 pound horse was like an extreme mountain billy goat, clinging on to nothing without sliding.  I nervously giggled all the way down, the not very impressive, five foot drop with adrenaline pumping through my veins. It wasn't a 9,000 foot peak in Antarctica we had just scaled down but it was our adventure and I won't forget it.

Autumn and I shadowing over our conquest

       
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Copyright (c) 2014 Jacksonhillhorseygirl.com April 16, 2014