The Value of Good Trails for Horses in the 21st Century
By Adda Quinn

NOTE: this article was used with local land managers mentioned to try to get better and more year round trails.

You never know when a visitor is going to arrive on horseback and you're going to need good trails for him.

We got a phone call on December 23, 2002 from a Jim McDermott who runs the Marin Stables in Fairfax. We didn't know Jim, but he introduced himself and said that he had a guest at his stable for the past month named "Doc" Mishler. Seems that "Doc" had ridden with his dog Czar Bear, saddle horse Chief Spirit and a pregnant pack mare from Choteau, Montana, up near the Canadian Border over a five month stretch of time since June 16, 2002. Jim had spent the past month fattening up "Doc's" two Tennessee Walking Horses from their recent extended sojourn, but now Doc was interested in continuing his journey south to Mexico, then east to Texas. Jim was going to bring them all across the Golden Gate Bridge on Friday December 27 and wanted to know if we could help "Doc" continue his odyssey through San Mateo County.

Given the stormy season, our thoughts instantly turned to the old California State Hiking and Riding Trail, de Anza Trail, the Sawyer Camp Trail, and the Crystal Springs Trail. We drove up north to check out where Jim could drop his entourage from a three-horse rig. Best bet turned out to be about half mile south of San Bruno Ave on Skyline Blvd/35. We made arrangements to meet there at 10:30am on Friday.

Braving blustery weather, the rig arrived on time and we met our new friends Jim and "Doc". The horses were all packed and saddled ready to go. We loaded the Czar Bear into our Subaru despite his whining, since dogs were not allowed on these trails. "Doc" took off at a blistering pace, with pack horse in tow.

We met him two hours later at the South end of the Sawyer Camp Trail, returning the Czar Bear to him for the next leg of the trip to Canada Rd. This leg of the trip was pretty dicey since the route is nearly all paved, with paved shoulders that are quite narrow in too many places. It would have been wonderful to have had access to the trail San Mateo County Park and Recreation is planning to connect between the Crystal Springs dam and 92 in mid 2003. But you work with what you have at the moment. Once on Canada Road, the Czar Bear was back in the car and "Doc" completed the rest of the trip to our barn on the fabulous County Crystal Springs Trail.

We found out a bit more about our visitor over dinner that night. "Doc" is a PhD in Psychology. While he did some teaching at Western Michigan University in Kalamazoo, he had a rather checkered prior life in insurance sales and running a bail bond company which his kids have now taken over. He told us that he was only married once, but has 10 kids by several different ladies. But then, he also told us that Czar Bear's mommy was a chihuahua and daddy a bear. So you sort of had to take things with a grain of salt. "Doc" survived a bout with cancer a couple of years back that became a life altering experience. He attributed his survival to a newly found faith in religion. He figured he had quite a bit to atone for from his past, so he sold everything but what he has with him today and began a pilgrimage to witness for his faith and collect money for a charity based in Marin County called Bread for the Journey (www.breadforthejourney.org see their web page on Doc). His original concept was to ride from Choteau to Marin, where he presented Bread for the Journey with a donation of $3000 he had collected along the way. But once in Marin, he decided to continue his sojourn south and east where he hopes to end up at the Bush Ranch in Crawford Texas to speak to the President about the need to eliminate hunger in children, the cause for which he rides.

We arose the next morning and headed back to the barn. Rain was forecast and looked likely at any moment. We saddled up and rode from Canada Road to Runnymede and up Raimundo into Huddart Park. "Doc" was overcome by the beauty of West Union Creek and the Redwoods. Because of seasonal closures, we were limited to the roads to get up to Skyline Blvd. which we reached at noon just when the next storm cycle broke on us. I sent "Doc" down the Purisima Canyon Road in a blinding rain with a note in his pocket for some potential people he might be able to stay with over on the Coastside. He was determined to ride his horse to church the next day. Since "Doc" only rides about 10 miles per day, perhaps some of you saw him on his journey through San Mateo County.

I headed back via Skyline Trail to Archery Road, encountering downed electrical wires and trees. My 12 year old Missouri Fox Trotter gelding, Twentieth Century Fox (aka Cocoa), was none too happy about being left alone in the wilderness and rained on so fiercely to boot. But, he made up for it by putting his finest flat foot walk into gear. It had taken us two hours to get up to Skyline, but only took an hour and quarter to get back to the barn. He was flying! We were both sopping wet by the time we hit the barn and I drove home. "Doc" called once he got settled on the other side of the hill about one mile south of the Purisima OSP. We drove the Czar Bear over the hill to him and bid vaya con dios.

This will be an event long remembered for a number of reasons. "Doc" was one of those true original characters you come across only occasionally in life. It was a wonderful experience of Western Hospitality to see total strangers brought together to create a network to assist a fellow animal lover to continue his journey. We were able to assure that he saw some of the most beautiful parts of San Mateo County along the watershed, through Huddart and Purisima. We are truly fortunate to have the legacy of the wonderful trail system left to us by riders who went before. We are thankful to the San Mateo County Park and Recreation Department and the Midpeninsula Regional Open Space Districts for keeping routes open to equestrians, particularly in winter, that enable journeys such as this to occur.

We also may be remembering "Doc's" horse Chief Spirit for some time to come. Seems as how Chief Spirit was a stallion. During the night he jumped several fences and covered two mares at the barn, one of them mine!