Stories from the Farm

My son and I went on a big roadtrip this last weekend to deliver 6 lambs to a farm in California.  This is the first leg of a big journey for these little lambs.  They are leaving later this week and going all the way to Maryland.  The haulers are showing thier sheep at the Maryland Sheep & Wool Festival and agreed to haul our lambs.  From the show, they will be picked up by their new owners and go to New York, New Jersey, Rhode Island, Pennsylvania, and Minnesota.  We left Friday morning and made a quick stop at the vet’s office to get health papers and then we were on our way.  I can’t imagine what the lambs were thinking…one minute they were in the pasture and the next they are in the back of the truck headed down the road.

Here is Thea checking out the scenery, they were very cute in the back of the truck.  They were a big hit at the farm store where we stopped to deliver one of the lamb’s.  I had to politely ask everyone to step away from the truck so we could make it to California before dark 😉  I love how the Jacob sheep are such a conversation starter.

Our destination Friday night was Joan’s at Mud Ranch.  She lives in a breathtaking part of Northern California…however the road to get there is a little crazy.  My son has now dubbed it ‘U Turn’ Road.

  
This is an example of the corners.  Yes, that is a 20 mph sign with a ‘U Turn’ on it and the road does indeed make a lot of U Turns.  The last time I visited Joan, I told my friend that I was traveling with, that I would not be coming back 😉  Visiting with Joan and her family is definitely worth the drive though.  Her mom made the trip a little sweeter by making her delicious Carne Asada – thanks Diane!

We woke up Saturday morning to RAIN!  We live in a very soggy part of the Northwest (especially this year) and I was hoping to escape it in California, but it wasn’t to be.  So, we put on our mud boots and rain jackets and went out to see the sheep.

It was fun seeing some of the familiar faces…

Lilly, with her adorable ewe lambs.

One of my favorite girls, Paisley, with her handsome ram lamb.

He was born on St. Patrick’s Day and Joan very appropriately named him Patrick.  If he keeps maturing the way we hope he does, he will be joining our flock in June.

We climbed up the hill and enjoyed the view.  We also spooked a few of the local deer – they are everywhere!!!

My son had a lot of fun playing with Joan’s daughter.  They are a couple of characters and were in constant motion, but I was able to get one good picture of them…

both smiling and looking at the camera.

Their buddy is Hank…

An honest to goodness farm collie.  Such a sweet boy – an excellent babysitter, guard dog, companion, and always watchful.

After our little hike, we headed to the barn to sort through the fleeces that were sheared last week.  There were a lot of fleeces!

It was fun to go through them and there were some real beauties in the pile!

It continued to rain until we left Sunday morning, we did find the sun further south on our way to drop off the lambs.

 It was a beautiful drive and I love this part of California.  We dropped the lambs off and headed home.  The total drive time on Sunday was 12 hours!  My son was a real trooper.

This is one of the many stops we made on the way home, a rest stop in the Shasta area.

It was very nice to be home and I will be happy when the lambs have reached their final destinations.