What we've been up to- Rodeos, and Bull Riders!

Hi! Sami here- Since my time in Garryowen is sadly coming to a close soon, I thought I’d write something to update you guys on what we’ve been doing lately.

The 15^th of July was my birthday (yay me!) so Chris let us take off from the museum early to go to the Rodeo. Our new intern joined us maybe a day or so before, and Kiley was getting ready to head back home to grad school, so it was a fantastic event to celebrate all of these things in one fell swoop.

The Rodeo was in Sheridan, Wyoming, and it’s an adorable little town. We got there a few minutes into the Indian relay races- which were really neat to see. The riders rode a horse bareback around the entire arena, stopped in the middle, jumped off that horse, and onto another one, before running around the arena again. It was really neat to see- and I can’t even imagine the amount of skill it takes to not only ride bareback at the speeds they were going, but to jump off one horse and directly onto another with rapidity. We also got to watch bull ropers, a few bucking broncos, and some very amazing ladies ride.

All in all it was a very good night.

More recently, Rob, Aimee and I managed to go to Billings to see the Professional Bull Riders when they came through town. Since it was on a Friday night and started at 8:00 with general admission, Chris was awesome and watched the museum so we could leave to get up there around seven- which turned out to be a really great idea. I don’t know what I’d been expecting when we were heading up there- but once we made it through the ticket area (and got free flashlights!) we walked around the outer circle of the arena. There were so many vendors! Lots of raffles to sign up for, and free stuff promoting all of these western companies… it was pretty interesting to me.

Bull riders only ride for 8 seconds at a time, but a lot of the riders when we were they didn’t manage to hold on for the full 8. Watching it, it always seemed like a lot longer from when they left that gate to when they either fell off or the buzzer sounded. Of course, it must’ve been all that much crazier for those poor guys actually on the bulls!