You don’t need to be able to rope to work on a guest ranch and you don’t need to be a bronc rider or Ray hunt either. Calm and quiet seat, a watchful observant eye, understanding of animals and people. You are basically just going along for the dude ride only you have to do all the saddles and be a pickup man if things go south. Yeah I was talking about tying down a pack, it is a good thing to know even if you just practice on the picnic table until you are actually tying on a load of sleeping bags or elk. Haha I really think you would love to just take a trip and get the experience if you can swing it. Let me look up the outfit that has the cancellations…
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It’s mills wilderness adventures, find their Facebook page
You may need to have some first aide training, to work on a guest ranch as a wrangler, working with the public on dude horses. Or at least at a “good” guest ranch. Not if you are just a “trail sweeper” following the rides picking up the dropped articles of clothing/cameras/etc that the dudes drop. Search “Echo Valley Ranch” in British Columbia. Don’t know if they are looking for staff at the moment, but sometimes they are. Search “Big Bar Guest Ranch”, also in BC. They ARE looking for staff, still, a friend of mine just landed a job there recently, and they need more workers- dunno if anything they have available might suit you. Like most jobs, people work their way up the pecking order at these sorts of ranches- “trail boss” or “head wrangler” is a higher level job for someone who has been with the organization for a while, not for a newcomer usually.
Your own saddle would be at your own discretion- the saddle you own may not fit the horse you are going to be riding. These ranches have a selection of saddles in stock. If you need your own saddle, used saddles are pretty easy to find.
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First aide training not a issue. Been through CPR and more for more than 30yrs. All excellent suggestions and observations. Thank you all for the input. I’ve even asked some guest ranches about carrying a handgun, some said absolutely and others encourage it.
My advice is to not sell your house. I don’t know how things work over there but maybe rent it out through a real estate agent.
I did kind of what you are wanting to do. We were paid. You take out experienced rides as well as beginners. I was given a horse to ride. I used their dressage saddles. I had my own saddles as well. The guests were in Australian stock saddles. In my case we were being paid to become Instructors, so we were also giving and receiving lessons in dressage and jumping.
I lasted 2 or so years.
I was on an Arab mare I had taken out of the herd. We were taking an experienced ride up a long, windy, sandy, quarry road.
We started to gallop and the manager called out STOP. I stopped. It took me a couple of metres to stop but I managed it. I looked around to see what was wrong and he galloped past.
I just dropped the rein and said beat him Girl and she did. She galloped her heart out and we beat him to the top.
I did not feed a thing. I did not feel any adrenaline or any speed. Nothing. It was not exciting. Nothing.
It took me 8 months befire I even noticed scenery again.
What excites me now is dressage.
Look at Ranchworldads dot com. There are some dude ranch positions listed. I really doubt you’d need your own equipment - you ride their horses with their gear.
Here’s one from just a few days ago, for a place in central Texas:
Second the vote for ranch world ads.
Also, if you want a handmade saddle, check out Haslam Saddlery, and ask if he has any used ones for sale.
Check out rodnikkel dot com website for information on how western saddles are built, so you also learn what production saddles are likely missing – especially for riding all day.
One point they make is modern horses are a lot bigger than they used to be, so I would go with a 4.25 handhold on a 93 bar wade.
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Ranch World Ads
McCall makes a decent production saddle. @Aces & Eights knows her stuff. She’s a great resource!
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