First day of the Stampede

Friday, JULY 7: Oh YAWN! Up by 5am and on the bus by 6am. Our first stop is the big parade downtown. We had reserved bleacher seats in the shade...The parade was great! Nearly our whole group, all 90+, had on our matching denim Good Sam shirts. We got a lot of teasing over them..."r u all together?"..."did you all hit the same sale?"...We had lots of laughs!

I've never seen so many horses in every size, shape and color in all my life! And everyone either rode, led or was pulled by a horse. Well...there were some people in "horsepower".

Our side of the street won every contest against the north side of the street at yelling "YA-HOO" and "YEE-HAW".

Then it was off to the Stampede Grounds and my very first rodeo. It was a lot of fun. I was very impressed with the training not only the cowboys and cowgirls have, but all the animals involved are well trained. Even the little calves know just what is expected of them and which gate they need to leave the arena grounds from.

Here is a picture of the Grand Champion Hoop dancer. I can't figure out how he managed to do some of the figures we saw.