Ready to rock?

It's what my manager says when we have to start a new re-ration: afterwards everybody moves as fast as possible bagging food, weighing boxes and making sure they don't weigh more than 25 pounds because they have to be carried on board of a horse (well of more than one horse) which needs to be balanced. Actually yesterday I spoke to a woman who came and picked up a re-ration of about 12 boxes. Ashley said she had to drive about 3 hours to reach her ranch and then to ride one day and a half to arrive at the "field".
Speaking about horses yesterday I rode one for the 1st time! "Miss Cavallo is gonna be a horse lady!" I was told: it was so exciting also because I was in a ranch in the middle of an amazing landscape. Marianne, a nice and friendly colleague of mine gave Erin (another beautiful girl working with me) and me a lesson. I started trot along but it was very hard also because I had the impression to slide down as I jumped a lot up and down up and down. It was amazing! Marianne invited us for dinner but Erin and I had other plans: we got home and had my first in Lander made-pizza! It was very good even if there's space for improvement (as always:))

A couple of words about my last week-end: I was camping in the Snowy Range with Walter (journalist), Adam (weather expert on Wyoming tv), May(anchorwoman of the same tv), Dustin and Joe. In the campground the only toilet was a WC connected directly with the ground and we washed ourselves along the river. Trash containers were blocked with carbines because of bears coming down and looking for food. For the same reason we had to put our food in the cars away from our tents since bears can smell food from a distance of 20 miles and once they do, they become very aggressive. My fellow travellers had always a big knife or an axe with them to guard us from a possible attack. (N.B. these bears are not the grizzly ones=> a knife wouldn't work with them). We cooked our dinner(sausages, hamburger, chicken, peppers, tomatoes, snacks) and breakfast (coffee, eggs, sausages, avocado, tortilla) on the fire. People were definitely the icing on the cake. Well... on top of that was the glacier. We didn't expect to find so much snow on our path. This made our hiking a little bit uncomfortable since we got quite soon wet feet + pants. This also because it happened to slide or to sink in the snow. It was very funny, though. During the day it was pretty hot but at night the temperature went down to 32 F = 0 C!!! Thanks to the winter sleeping bag I could sleep good, though.

Besides that, I've seen a typical "farwest" restaurant, had an ice cream in St. Daniel being the first Italian there and dressed up to take part in the Summer Solstice Party with cool people in a campground near Lander. Every day is a special one.

I'm looking forward to the Independence Day next July 4th since a lot of events are gonna take place in the town such as rodeos.

I'm -8 hours ahead of Italian/German time so I shall say "have a great day guys!"

Antonella

Welcome!

This blog was created exclusively for Antonella's friends in order to keep them always informed about what happens and overall where in the world!
I'll write in English as I hope this blog's gonna be visited by all of my friends.
I'm currently in Wyoming (USA) which is one of the most authentic places where you can find Indian reservations as well as "Old west" stuff. On top of that there is so much nature to be explored and experienced! Climbing, hiking, horse riding are the activities on which I decided to stay till now.
I work for NOLS (National Outdoor Leadership School) as assistant of the rations manager. Essentially, we issue food rations for students and instructors leaving for oudoor courses. Behind outdoor and environmental skills NOLS' mission is about leadership. That's why the courses are very demanding in terms of phisical activities but also of living conditions. The students do not get any toilet paper, just get a small soap which has to be used during an average period of 30 days. Food rations are to be determined very strictly as students won't be bringing too heavy packs while hiking. We are also responsible for re-rations which are prepared and shipped through horse-packing.
Everything's totally new for me. The team (about 8 people) which I work with is awesome. They are always good-humoured and generally have a positive attitude towards life.
The whole company pays much attention to human resources and self satisfaction of employees as I can see. (They don't accept any overtime for example).
Every once and a while I'll try to add pictures and comments. Have fun, take care!

Antonella