Remember, I'm the ultimate Disney fan. We still book rooms at WDW. And cruises are our second vacation choice. I'm a beach girl.
The dude ranch was something I always wanted to try and I was so glad. I obviously know Disney service and it's the one thing that I was sure I'd miss at the dude ranch. They exceeded our expectations. I'm sure other dude ranches aren't the same as far as service. I've since talked to a few people that have gone to dude ranches and they were amazed when I told them of our experience at Elk Mountain. It was amazing.
Jeanne has absolutely no horse experience and other people there our week also were total novices. After the first day, if you find the longer trail rides are too long for your comfort level, then you just tell them and they will make other arrangements for you. One day, just me and a wrangler headed out alone for a shorter ride. The children's program is amazing. Or if you have a child that is old enough to go on the long rides, you don't have to put them in the children's program. You get one horse that they match to your personalty and that horse is yours all week. If you don't like the horse, however, they will switch it out immediately. They assign the horses to you after spending the first night just getting to know you. There is a wonderful horse orientation the first morning that even experienced riders will find enjoyable. The terrain you ride on is rough. You need cowboy boots and good strong jeans. But if you just want to do other things and not ride, they have activities other than riding almost every day.
If anybody is considering a vacation out of the ordinary, you should push yourself to do it before you are too old to really enjoy it. I wish Jeanne and I had done it years ago and she said she will definitely take Lily there for a mother/daughter vacation.
And everybody at the ranch EXCEPT Jeanne and I got high altitude sickness for at least one day and they pretty much lost that day. My family doctor went to a dude ranch high in the mountains and told me what we needed to do. She gave me a prescription for medicine that I took once a day for a week before flying to the ranch and every day while at the ranch. Jeanne wrote down the information and asked her doctor about it and got the same prescription. While we were there, everybody was asking why we were fine. It was the prescription. There are side effects but they are easy ones. Your feet the first week fall asleep off and on and the second week in the mornings your hands do the same thing. The real strange one was carbonated drinks. Anything carbonated tastes flat and has a metal taste - YUCK! Stick with lemonaide and water. One guy there our week was an iron man racer and he was down for a whole day --- headaches and upset stomach. The ranch has an elevation of 9600 and you ride up to 11000. The price of the white water rafting day long trip is included in the price for the week at the ranch. I didn't go because the water was rough (May and June) and I was afraid I'd mess up my lower back. Jeanne had an absolute ball and she was in a raft with ten year olds that loved it. If we had gone in July or August I probably would have tried it.