The night before we set off we realised we needed more horses so while Juan went to town to collect Bert, we went to get six other horses that were out resting in another huge paddock. Herding horses is very different to herding cattle or sheep and while six were fine and didn’t give us much trouble, once they got with the other 15 or so they all had a different agenda and gave us the run around. Trying to bring in 22 horses that have other ideas is incredibly frustrating so we herded those that we could into a smaller paddock and left the others for the morning.
It was a misty start and we were learning about packing horses as we went….. something that became rather evident only 2km into the trek!
We took 15 horses in total and I’d chosen to ride Kaiser and have Linyera as my packhorse. Euan had chosen Babieka to ride and Gatiada (on the right in the photo) as a pack horse – both sensible choices as it turned out.
Most of us were leading a horse but only about 100m from the yards someone’s bag slipped around… this was to become a common occurrence over the course of the day!
About 5km down the road we realised we were missing a few people and horses so stopped to wait and adjust the loads.
As it turned out, three of the pack horses had been turned loose and were being herded along the road but one of the bags had slipped around on one of the horses and had moved right back to its flanks prompting a mini rodeo, with the horse going absolutely nuts, bucking, kicking and galloping around until the bag broke free. While this was going on, Mick’s horse had also gone a bit nuts and reared backwards and then fallen over sideways with Mick still aboard and he’d banged his head on a rock. No real injuries aside from a large lump on Mick’s head, a sore knee where the horse had landed on it and the pack horse had a few scrapes. The main casualty was the luggage…. we lost all our coffee and sugar (it was spread all over the road), a few vegetables had been squashed and a carton of tomato juice had split and gone all through Tory’s luggage. Alison, Euan and I, nattering away up front, were oblivious to all this hoo-hah going on behind. Mick gave up on trying to pack a second horse and just carried the bag himself.
We stopped off at a school and all piled into the single classroom to say hello to the teacher and kids.
Photo: Juan Manuel Luque
The kids all wear a uniform over their day-to-day clothes and Juan told us that it was to ensure that, at school, there was no way of telling the background the children came from by their clothes.
Photo: Alison Duffy
While we were inside, the horses grazed and, I have to admit, I was slightly nervous that they’d all head for home (only about 10km away) and I reckon the pack horses were seriously considering it after the earlier crisis (a word often used by Juan when describing groups on horses and, after hearing some of the stories, its use is fully justified!!).
This is Sol, Juan’s God daughter and niece on Falada. Sol is 15, a real character and was great fun to have with us.
Photo: Juan Manuel Luque
Alison with Bayo and a few of the pack horses. The countryside changed dramatically in the first few hours and as we got higher, the grass got thinner and was replaced by scrubby bushes and rocks.
Photo: Juan Manuel Luque
This is the first gaucho bar we passed but it was closed unfortunately.
Photo: Juan Manuel Luque
It was super hot and our lunch stop was most welcome. We unpacked and unsaddled the horses headed for a pool of water (where there were leeches as it turned out) and we headed for the trees where there were small insects that crawled over us with purpose or so it seemed. They looked like lice but had wings and did not seem to want to bite but still, they seemed to crawl with creepy intent and didn't squash easily. They creeped Alison and I right out so we spent most of the time trying to squash them and get them off us but no one else seemed particularly perturbed.
Judging from the smile, Euan had either enjoyed lunch or was pleased with the horses!
Gatiarda had proven to be a really good pack horse
Photo: Juan Manuel Luque
and, when the bags had slid around under her belly had swung her ears back and forth and stopped dead. A very sensible horse but I did think it helped that we were leading both our packhorses. I was more comfortable, at that stage feeling that we had more control although I was to be proved wrong the following day!
Photo: Juan Manuel Luque
Linyera had also proven to be a good choice and happily stuck with Kaiser and I without veering off to follow every other horses tail that passed us. It meant I could hold the lead rope under my leg and have my hands free.
Photo: Alison Duffy
We passed many gauchos, some herding stock and others just on their way somewhere. This is Juan talking to one of the gauchos we met en route.
Photo: Alison Duffy
We stopped at a gaucho bar mid afternoon, tied the horses to the fence and had a beer. I don’t think a beer has ever tasted so good as the day had got hotter and hotter as it went on. Euan and I were lagging behind as the two bags strapped to Gatiarda just kept slipping round. The main cause was that the girth was just too big for Gatiarda and couldn’t be tightened enough.
Photo: Juan Manuel Luque
We camped that night by a small stream on the edge of a forest and the sun had already gone down by the time we got there. All the horse gear was hung on the fence and the horses loosely hobbled so they wouldn’t wander (or so we thought). Marleen cooked us an excellent meal over a fire and we settled in for the night.
More mist in the morning and only six horses were to be found. Late the night before they’d started to go walkabout, and hobbles had been redone and one of the wanderers was tied to the fence but it hadn’t been enough to keep them all around. I’d heard horses hooves that morning and wished I’d got up as Bert said we were visited by a herd of wild horses who had come thundering over to see us.
He was gone for a while and Sol kept lookout until she saw them coming down the road.
Everyone who had two horses had switched, riding the one that was a pack horse the day before and both Euan and I found out that the horses we had were definitely suited for particular tasks. Babieca was great to ride but awful as a pack horse and he described Gatiarda, while still very pretty, as an ‘airhead’. He said that, when he was walking giving her a break, they had come across a stallion on the other side of the fence they were walking along. He said prior to that, Gatiarda was happily following right behind him but when they came across the stallion, her head suddenly appeared at his shoulder, putting Euan between her and the stallion and shielding the stallion from her view.
Meanwhile Babieca wasn’t well suited as a pack horse and, when the bags invariably slipped around, she went ballistic, set Gatiarda off as well and there was no way Euan could control both and had to let Babieca go. I was behind and Babieca came roaring towards me, bucking and kicking all over the show. She didn’t stop until the rope broke and she had got rid of the bags, dented the pot and fry pan way out of shape, smashed the cucumbers, apples, sweet potato and scattered stuff everywhere. Unfortunately the last thing going through my mind when there is a horse giving an impromptu rodeo performance is to whip out my camera and take photos. All energy and focus went on trying to calm the horse down enough to catch it and hopefully minimise damage. We always caught the horse but unfortunately damage wasn’t always avoided. I should however, have taken photos of our gear after the event – the ripped bags, smashed veges and pots dinged and dented. Live horsepower does scary damage when let loose.
Euan got so fed up with retying the bags all the time and after the last incident, decided to carry his bag himself and leave Babieca unloaded.
While my luggage had stayed put, Kaiser wasn’t a patch on Linyera as a pack horse. He solidly followed every tail that passed him and there were many as he was the most sluggish pack horse around. I thought he’d be rather silly and scatty but he was completely the opposite and needed constant encouragement and motivation to keep up!
We were out of water so stopped at another bar (too early for beer apparently dammit)
to check maps, get water and buy some coffee and sugar.
Our lunch stop was by a river so after we’d dealt with the horses
Photo: Juan Manuel Luque
we bathed in the river, then lunch then a siesta (this is Bert, dead to the world)
Photo: Juan Manuel Luque
before packing up, loading up and getting on our way again.
Photo: Juan Manuel Luque
Bert looked like a cross between a hippie and an Arab, a result of having lost his hat (he left it on a fence post somewhere along the way) and wrapping his t-shirt around his head and wearing socks and sandals after being his riding boots had caused blisters. He made us laugh, what with looking like that but also going up to the wrong horse and saying “hey Tara, ready to go?” or something along those lines. I’d have to tell him “Bert, you’ve got the wrong horse” only for him to say “are you sure?”.
Photo: Juan Manuel Luque
Bert looked absolutely classic on a horse and completely the opposite of the other gauchos we passed
Photo: Juan Manuel Luque
(not that Euan and I were doing any better in our matching Namibia quad biking t-shirts….. a grave error on our part!).
Photo: Alison Duffy
We were all hanging out for a bar that afternoon but we didn’t come across one at all much to everyone’s bitter disappointment.….. I think it was the only thing keeping Euan going but he had worked out a way of drinking water without having to unpack it from the horse…
We camped by another river but on a busier road this time so we had a few vehicles pass us and a few stopped to ask directions. It wasn’t until later that we realised we’d covered the road sign with saddle blankets…. Whoops!
Photo: Alison Duffy
Alison and I snuck a sneaky photo in before unsaddling
and setting up camp.
This time the horses seemed content to graze around the camp rather than wander off
although they weren’t even given the chance as, after dinner, Juan decided they would all be tied to the fence. All was well for a few hours until a few of them got tangled and then all we heard was the awful twanging of wires and the nervous snorting of Kaiser. We untangled those that had got their legs wound up but Kaiser, spooky at the best of times, had his front leg well and truly caught. There wasn’t a lot I could do as the tension on the rope was too much and he reared up, lunged forward and stuck his front leg (still wound in the rope) through the fence. Great. Just great. One big solid spooked horse in the dark. I managed to get the rope off him but he had to get himself out of the fence himself. He reared up again and went backwards and nearly got his leg out but the soft bulbous part of his hoof stuck on the wire and he just continued to pull and he came so close to ripping it off but, with another big twang, the wire gave a little and his hoof came free. Juan, who just calmly takes things as they come, walked past and said “all under control?”.... thankfully I could answer "yes".
I didn’t sleep much as every time one of the horses got a fright and pulled back, the fence went twang twang twang and all I could hear was the stomping of horses’ hooves as they nervously shuffled around. I know I wasn’t the only one who didn’t sleep well and I suspect the horses didn’t sleep much either (some were still dozing just before we set off) but at least we still had 15 horses with us in the morning!
Euans telling Gatiarda (who isn’t listening) where to put her head…
We set off the next morning later than we’d have liked to and, for the first time, I’d stopped leading the pack horse with my gear. I gave up on Kaiser as he was just so slow and also had a swollen tendon, a result of the fence tangle or the hobbling, so I suspected he wouldn’t be up to any antics anyhow.
I seemed spent a lot of time like this, turning round to talk or watch what was going on behind me
Photo: Alison Duffy
It might sound silly to mention the rocks but when you’re on a horse time goes slowly and you notice a whole lot more about the landscape around you. I noticed that the rocks were unusual and, where they’d shattered, there were crystals and interesting layers. There were quite a few rocks like this that were strewn along the roadside, really pretty.
We had a few more incidents of bags swinging round and horses going nuts but Mick was now a gun on the knots and the incidents were getting fewer and further between. We were nearly there but a few map stops were necessary (this is Alison, Juan and Bert).
and of course water stops for the horses.
On the third day we made it to Laureles
Photo: Alison Duffy
and rode into town just before lunchtime.
Photo: Juan Manuel Luque
We stopped off in the local pub for a celebratory drink (Bert had resorted to carrying his own gear too..)
before taking a group photograph (L to R is Marleen, Tory, Euan, Kate, Sol, Juan, Alison, Mick and Bert)
Photo: Alison Duffy
This gaucho had been passing by while we were in the pub and within about 10 minutes Juan had negotiated for him to take the horses back to the estancia. It was a good lesson for us in how things are done here – I don’t think Juan knew this chap but a deal was done on the spot and the horses would overnight at this chaps sisters place just up the road. The gaucho would herd the horses back in about two days, spending overnight at someone’s place on the way. Apparently its customary to have gauchos and whatever animals they are herding to stay overnight and no one ever refuses.
A few of us rode with the horses back to this gauchos sisters place
Photo: Alison Duffy
where they were let loose in a paddock for the night and immediately clustered around the water hole.
The gear (and us) was loaded unceremoniously into the truck (Suzanne had come to meet us and pick us up) and we drove back to pick up the others who were left behind in Laureles.
I don’t quite know how we got 12 people plus all our gear in the saddlebags, nine saddles and other assorted gear for 15 horses into this small truck that officially seats six people... but we did! Micks on the ropes again...
and we drove some 30km to a posada near the small city of Tranqueras where we were spent the night. Unfortunately Sol had to go back to school so wasn’t able to spend the night at the posada with us and I don’t think she was very happy about it either as her usually bright face held no trace of a smile
Photo: Alison Duffy
and we dropped her off on the main road to catch a bus back to Tacuarembó.
Photo: Juan Manuel Luque
What we did over the last three days was right up my alley and I would have happily turned around and done it again straight away. In fact, I was a bit disappointed to hear that the gaucho was taking the horses back as originally Juan was going to take them back and Euan and I were going to join him. Just quietly though, I wasn’t sure that Euan would have wanted to turn around and do the whole ride again backwards…. Me on the other hand, well, I was already there!!
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