Vacation 2008 - The last days

Day 4

There is a risk scheduling Disneyland on the first two days of a week long vacation. What do you do to follow that? Since we weren’t getting on a plane to fly to Disneyworld, anything else was going to be a let down right? I mean, it would take trained miniature animals, hand feeding a camel, exotic cross-breeds, children of moviestars riding million dollar horses at a beautiful ranch regularly featured in TV commercials. Now that I think about it, even that wouldn’t be enough unless you also threw in the opportunity to see family you don’t see as often as you would like. Now if you could find a place where you could get all that, then maybe, just maybe you would have yourself a decent follow up to toxic watermelon gas and Jedi training.

Fortunately for us, there was just such a place only a few miles from where we were staying in Thousand Oaks. No, it’s not the Neverland Ranch (yikes), but rather the ranch where my Wonderful Aunt Sis (“WAS”) works along with my cousin Mark and his family (also wonderful to be sure, but the official “wonderful” title is now reserved exclusively for my WAS). Just a few minutes outside of a major LA suburb, just past a golf club where some golfer named Tiger holds a tournament is a beautiful horse ranch run by my cousin with the help of my WAS. The ranch is primarily for a large stable of world class competitive jumping horses and has some of the best facilities in the world. To put it in perspective, to say that the main barn was nicer than any house I have lived in would be like saying Lebron James is a better basketball player than any 6 year old I’ve ever coached.

This is the ranch where Budweiser films its Superbowl ads every year and if it is good enough for that beer hocking Dalmatian it is good enough for me. We also met Tom Selleck’s daughter (not her dad to my wife’s chagrin) while she was riding a rather pricey equine. Anyway, it is a beautiful place with a large pond/lake, gorgeous fields for the horses, amazing buildings and….drum roll please….trained miniature animals.

What do you get for the man who can afford anything he wants? Well, miniature horses, cows and sheep of course. But every billionaire has those things so to make it better you should hire an animal trainer then get some other odd animals and put on shows for school children. No matter how many times I say or write about this it still sounds really strange, but strange in a fun, good kind of way.

Basically, the ranch has several miniature horses, some full sized pigs (including Helen who is right around a thousand pounds), some miniature sheep, some goats, some alpaca and one very large camel. Oh, and I almost forgot, the Zedonk! Where does a Zedonk come from you may ask? Well you see when a daddy Zebra loves a mommy donkey very much and they get married and they decide they want to have a baby the daddy approaches the…..ok, that’s enough…I had you worried there for a second didn’t I? But the Zedonk is a zebra/donkey cross that comes out a grey and black striped donkey like creature that is just downright cool.
My WAS and cousin toured us around the ranch and the boys were in vacation heaven all over again. They were fascinated by the Zedonk and got to feed carrots to the various animals. The highlights of the feeding were:

1. The camel was awesome. Very friendly and rather than snatch the carrot away with its teeth it would extend its huge mick jagger like lips and basically wrap them around your hand and come away with the carrot. If that sounds a little yucky it is, but mostly it is very, very cool. Unless you are around camels everyday and then maybe this would just be very cool. I loved the camel. Oh and I know what you’re thinking and the answer is: one hump.

2. The boys were fascinated by WAS’ admonition not to let Helen the giant pig take the carrot out of your hand because she might just take your whole hand off. This led to the following exchange:

G1: What? The pig can eat my hand? She would eat my whole hand? Would she want to? Do pigs eat people?

Me: Well, if you think about it that would only be fair considering the bacon and pork chops and what not, but they don’t go seeking people to devour unless their covered in mushrooms.

G2: Why would a pig eat me? Are they bad?

Me: No they’re quite yummy.

G2: Don’t eat Helen Dad.

Me: Son, Helen out weighs me by 800 pounds, she has nothing to worry about. Just keep your hand away from her mouth.

3. While feeding the alpaca we noticed that they sheer them for their coat but leave their (fur? Hair?) long on the top of their head so it covers their eyes. Apparently, alpacas prefer to look as much as possible like a teenage boy from 1978 or 2006.

After we fed the various animals we retired to the small ring they had constructed to put on shows with the trained animals. They have a very nice animal trainer on staff and they regularly put on shows for school children on the best field trip in the history of field trips.

Billy: Hey Tommy where are you going on your filed trip this year?

Tommy: We’re going to the Dole plant to see how they can pineapple, how about you?

Billy: We’re going to a Billionaire’s ranch to watch a show put on by trained miniature animals, get a free disposable camera to take pictures and a cool hat with the ranch’s logo on it, then we’ll get to play on huge fields of the last grass in LA that isn’t used for a golf course or cemetery. But I guess that pineapple thing sounds pretty cool too.

Tommy: I hate you Billy. I hate you. Waaaaaaaaaa.

At least, that’s how I picture conversations taking place between school children all over the city. Except that if that were happening today their names would be Jack and Ethan or Cody or Jake or something like that.

But one of the very cool things they do on this ranch (the owner is a very generous guy), is they bring out kids from the inner city who have likely never seen an animal other than rodents or grass or air without smog and let them have a day frolicking with Zedonks in actual nature. The guy who owns this place deserves major credit….as do my WAS and cousin for making it all happen.

Anyway, the show featured the following and I’m not making any of this up:

1. Spartacus the miniature horse picked up a slightly flat miniature basketball and on command raised up on his hind legs and dropped in a miniature basketball hoop. He even had a good bank shot. That said, he couldn’t dribble at all.

2. A every well behaved goat balanced on top of a small bucket before running around the ring jumping over miniature (3 feet high or so) horse jumps. The goat’s agent confirmed an impressive 38 inch standing vertical.

3. A large pig (not Helen large, but still big) pushed a ball into bowling pins on command. The pig’s demonstration was cut short because it was league night at the local alley and he had to get down there.

4. A miniature cow turned circles before taking a bow for the audience.
Neither the boys nor their parents could have been more impressed or delighted. Truth be told, I enjoyed the ranch more than Disneyland, but that could have just been because I got to see my WAS.

After the ranch we just hung out and rested up a bit and enjoyed the sun.

Day 4 was an unmitigated success.

Day 5 we just hung out with our friends, saw our first apartment in LA, saw WAS again and relaxed in the sunshine. Very nice.

Day 6 we went to Church with my life long buddy Jeff and his wife Tara and their son D. Jeff and Tara lead worship with a praise team at their great church which was very familiar to my lovely wife and me. The church service was genuine and moving and very enjoyable. And I even got to see my old buddy Scott Lambert. That was followed by a very fun day in the park and dinner with friends. Tough to top that.

Day 7 we returned home which meant the unbridled joy of another airplane ride. Props again to my lovely wife for finding us flights that didn’t require us to rush around getting ready early in the morning. We returned home to find it, thankfully, just as we left it. We were tired and some were a bit under the weather, but overall it was an extremely good vacation. Praise God.

Ok, now I have to find something else to blog about. Fortunately, I only have about 10,000 more ideas. If I only had the time……

Have a good weekend.