Jazz at the Jackass Mail Run (Road to Tevis #91)

Jazz and I rode with the Jackass Mail Run Saturday. I’d been wanting to ride with them since I was a kid. (Read about my horse-related past in my About Me.) The Mail Run is a decades-old tradition in my home town of Springville, California. When I was a kid it was fantastic… The entire town had vendors and music and games (like that one where you dunk someone). And it had drunk people. Apparently peeing in unacceptable places. And its name…

(There are many pictures here. Don’t miss the slideshow! Feel free to download.)

Jump to:

Some Background on the Mail Run
The Jackass Mail Run 2023
Jazz at the Jackass mail run
The Accident
Lunch at Antler’s
Going home over the hills
Jazz’s tiredness after the Jackass Mail Run was not normal or experted
Why did Jazz get so sore?

Some background on the Jackass Mail Run

The Jackass Mail Run always happens the Saturday before the Springville Rodeo. There is a Jackass Mail Run committee who organizes it. There is a Wagon Master… yes, they drive a Connestoga (ish) wagon. Yes, there are jackasses, of various types. Some may pull wagons and carry humans. Yes, they actually DO carry the mail from Porterville, CA., to Spingville. You can buy a special stamp that will take the mail anywhere in the world. A lot of drinking goes on. A lot of firing guns goes on.

At one point, sometime around 1990, the forces of righteousness rose up and the main event (the vendors, the parties and the peeing presumably) was moved to the Rodeo grounds. That pretty much killed the Mail Run in town, because it was no longer along the main (and only) drag. But the Mail run itself continued.

The Jackass Mail Run in 2023

Yesterday was the 60th mail run. It started at Evans Feed in Porterville, traveled east out of town along Date/Springville Avenue with a few deviations, and then wound around to Success Market on Highway 190, where there was a long break.

Porterville Police Department and the California Highway Patrol provided an escort to keep us moving along in an organized bunch (vs. spread out over a mile) as much as possible to the right of the white line (i.e., not actually in the road). We were also followed by a trailer with four portapotties (more on that later). Whenever we’d get too strung out or occupy too much road, the CHP would blast a siren and use a loudspeaker to tell us to shape up.

After Success Market, the Mail Run follows HWY 190 past Success Lake to the Antler’s, a local dive bar with excellent beer on tap (thank gods). It’s only about 4.4 miles, but it’s the diciest part of the trail. There are sections with a narrow shoulder against steep embankments, there is a bridge over the lake, and there is a lot of traffic.

Riders come and go…

so it’s hard to tell how many actually rode. Some of the people who started at Evans had trailers waiting at Success Market. Others joined in east Porterville, before we had gone more than a few miles. Still more joined at the Antlers. Some people stopped at the Antlers. (Maybe even more than had planned–it was a good lunch!)

A long lunch stop

The Mail Run breaks for over an hour at Antler’s. There was a barbecue ($15), live music by local artist Patti Torrey and her band, water for the horses, and the bar, for those of us who really needed a drink and had failed to bring alcohol with us.

Above: Lunch break at the Antlers included Patti Torrey and band and one of my favorite beers on draft (Elysian Space Dust).

From the Antler’s to the Springville Rodeo Grounds, where everyone but the officials must stop, is only about 5.5 miles along Hwy 190. It’s a nice ride with beautiful views of the Sierra Nevada. Of course, we stopped a lot, including a longer halt at the Springville Dump (now transfer station), around the halfway point.

The Mail run officials continue up the road to Springville, where they deliver the mail to the Post office. After a shoot out on Main street. Because Jazz and I rode home through neighboring cattle ranches, we missed that part!

Above: Shoot out in Springville between Bandits and Good guys. (Photos downloaded from the Jackasses Mail Run Facebook page.)

Read press coverage of the event in the Porterville Recorder: A reckoning: Bandits thwarted, mail delivered in the Jackass Mail Run.

Jazz at the Jackass Mail Run

Jazz was a very good boy for saddling up and waiting around the 45 minutes or so before the Mail Run got moving. It was all new, but (so?) he was not nervous. Despite a chicken flying out of a horse trailer, lose horses, horses acting up, a pony and trailers coming and going. Then we started moving, and he thought it was a race… with guns.

Every time the Jackass Mail Run starts moving, the Mail Run Committee fire guns (blanks). First the men at the front fire a few rounds. Then the men at the back do it. People also fire several rounds every time it makes a scheduled stop (e.g., Success Market and lunch at the Antler’s but not for every potty break). The first time he heard the guns at the start, Jazz was surprised and jumped, but he quickly got used to the sound.

Unfortunately, he also quickly figured out that when we were stopped and guns fired, we were going to Get Moving Again… And he’d want to go fast.

Jazz started out eager and jigging and within a few miles was explosive

It took about two minutes after we filed out onto the road for Jazz to get very worked up. At that point we were jogging at about 5 mph. That was neither walk nor trot for Jazz, so we jigged. Pretty soon everybody slowed to a walk. Jazz jigged. Jazz sweated. He tossed his head. At first, he thought it was like most endurance rides. I make him go slow for a while, then we trot.

In the last few endurance rides, I started after everyone else, so Jazz didn’t get worked up at the start. At Fire Mountain, I had started with everyone else, and Jazz had gotten into a state similar to how he was at the Mail Run. After trying as hard as he could to go back to the trailer (jigging, head tossing, trying to turn around, not wanting to go forward), Jazz then began getting quite naughty indeed. Head tossing, cantering sideways… I made him march on ahead. He settled down when he realized we weren’t going back.

On Saturday, I couldn’t move ahead. They wouldn’t let me, and besides, part of the reason I was there was to teach Jazz that we go slow sometimes. And I don’t think he wanted to go back. He had watched my brother drive the trailer away. He just wanted to go fast and not in a group of 100 turtling horses.

The first 5-6 miles

Jazz was increasingly explosive and very very naughty. He began shaking; he does that when he’s fed up, starting at his nose and ending at his tail. He ran sideways, backwards, and did decent levades, all within the little space I insisted he stay in. (I never try to make a horse hold still, I just redirect the energy.)

My mashed foot and the caballero

I had been stupid and put his split-ear headstall on without tightening it, and he managed to flip it off his ears. Normally I could have pulled it pack on from the saddle, but he was running sideways. I jumped off. Jazz was still dancing, head as high as it goes (and he’s 15.2) and there were horses all around. Jazz bumped into a mailbox and then leapt straight into me, smashing my right instep with one forefoot. At this point a tall cowboy got off and helped me get the headstall over his ears. He swore at Jazz in Spanish, cursing Jazz, his dam, and his breeding. I couldn’t have been more in agreement.

My foot hurt like hell, but I decided to try to lead Jazz for a bit. Maybe he would calm down. He was at this point shaking and sweating buckets.

Bad mistake. Jazz is not safe from the ground (which I knew… I would never have dismounted if the crown piece hadn’t flipped over his ears). I lasted less than a mile before I took advantage of a potty break to get back in the saddle.

The potty breaks

Long before we got to Success Market (which is less than six miles from Evans), we had made several pit stops. That’s what happens when men start drinking early… they start peeing. Unfortunately, we had to wait for them to pee. Then of course they could pee again at Success Market. Our stop there took a long time, and sadly there was no water for horses. Now, six easy miles shouldn’t make a horse thirsty. Six miles of hysteria had made Jazz sweat buckets, and he was thirsty. I had brought a collapsible bucket (completion award at some previous ride), and there was a hose. However, Jazz wouldn’t drink. I hosed him down and he did become calmer.

Success Market to Antlers; Lake Success and the accident

Jazz’s best behavior was between Success Market and Antler’s. Most of the time, he walked, at least up till the bridge across the part of Lake Success where the south fork of the Tule River comes in. At that point he began jigging off and on, partly because we slowed down. Before then he was quite well-behaved, especially considering the traffic. We had semis and jangly trailers pass, and even a helicopter fly by low enough to be noted by the horses. The highway patrol kept up the noisy admonitions to stay out of the road. And we had sirens.

The Accident

Some sirens were from the ambulance that came to pick up a man who had fallen down an embankment with his horse. Unfortunately (or perhaps fortunately), my GoPro was not on at the time, but I was only about three horses behind when it happened. I was only that far because I held Jazz back when I noticed the horse in question begin to act up.

We were riding up the long slope that leads to Success Dam. A good portion of it (in fact, much of 190 along the lake) has a very steep hill on the southeast side. The shoulder itself is not wide; no more than two horses can go side-by-side comfortably without crossing the white line. And then the land rises abruptly. This man’s horse–I believe it was a Friesian–was quite trained, but it started getting antsy and dancing around. Somehow, it decided to bolt up the embankment.

Now, I am used to very steep hills. (Read my post about riding in steep scary terrain of these foothills.) My horses are used to very steep hills. But I am not sure either of them could have made it to the top (maybe 45′). Fortunately, they’ve got enough experience to know better than to go up it. With a hill that steep, a horse cannot turn safely around. The only thing to do is to ride as hard as you can up and pray. If the ground had been soft, a very athletic horse could conceivably spin 180 degrees, and slide down. I’ve slid down slopes that steep, in deep dirt. As it was…

The rider probably assumed the horse was too smart to try to go up that hill. He might have thought to use the hill to stop the horse. Instead, it bolted up about 20 feet. Who knows what the man was thinking at that point. It looked like he tried to turn. In any case, the horse did try to turn, scrambled a moment, slid down about 5′, then pushed off the hill in a backwards leap. Both horse and rider crashed to the asphalt a few feet from the berm. I don’t believe the horse fell on the rider, but falling 15′ onto asphalt is still a Bad Thing.

Aftermath

The horse got up and trotted off up the road. The rider couldn’t move. We all halted for a moment. Someone got off to block sun, fan, etc. Obviously not a good idea to move him. People dialed 911. Then we rode on to make space. Jazz behaved calmly the entire time. Apparently for Jazz, seeing a horse and rider fall 15′ off a hill and smack into hard ground is less disturbing than going slow. (It was very disturbing for me!)

We’d only ridden a few minutes when we heard the sirens approaching. As of writing this, I have not heard anything about the man. I will update it if I do.

Arriving at Antler’s, finally

Amazingly enough, we had yet another potty break less than a mile from Antler’s. Poor Jazz was no doubt thirsty and hot. He began to get worked up again. As we approached the bar, people started shooting again. Now, Jazz barely noticed gun shots by this time. What he did noticed was the way everyone urged their horses towards food and water. Most horses started dancing, and Jazz put on a good show as we rode in. If my GoPro battery had not died, I would have recorded it.

Lunch at Antler’s

I rode straight up to the water, but Jazz dipped his nose in, took one swallow, and refused to touch it again. The trough was big and blue. Worse, it had two American flags flapping by it, and the band playing right behind the flags. I was delighted to see the band. I’ve known Patti Torrey, the lead singer, for decades. They are great (listen to some of these videos for an idea). Jazz would get used to them.

Jazz’s break

In fact, Jazz got very used to the band. I couldn’t find anywhere else with space to tie Jazz where he wouldn’t be within a few feet of another horse, so I left him next to the band. The water trough would keep others away. I scooped water into my collapsible bucket and left it at Jazz’s feet. I had brought a baggie of Ultium and alfalfa pellets, which Jazz ate (about 1.5 lbs). But he didn’t drink more than a swallow. I splashed water on him and loosened the cinch and let him be.

Above: Jazz hung out by the band during our lunch break. In the first photo I caught someone petting him!

My lunch break

I headed straight for the bar. Thank goodness, they had not one but two beers I like on tap, Sierra Nevada’s Hazy Little Thing and Elysian Space Dust. I opted for Space Dust because, yep, higher alcohol content. (After all, I hadn’t been downing tequila since 8!) I also used the bathroom–so much better than a portapotty! An old friend, Jim, was there, which was nice. I don’t know if I could have survived the Mail Run if I hadn’t grown up there and known (more or less) what to expect… and it sure helped to run into people I knew at Antler’s after putting up with psycho-horse.

I had a delicious lunch. Outside the bar they were barbecuing all sorts of good things. I got a second beer to wash down the food, and Jim and I sat outside in the shade until they gave the five minute call.

Above: Slideshow with many pictures from right before we left Antler’s. Feel free to download!

I should have waited, because it took far longer than five minutes for everyone to get moving!

The final stretch to the Rodeo grounds

Jazz had calmed down by the time I got back in the saddle, and he was actually really good for the first half of the ride to the Rodeo Grounds.

Above: A video capturing Jazz’s best moments, and a chat with my childhood friend, Twyla. We went to Springville School together. Twyla’s husband was Wagon Master this year. This video shows our departure from Antlers and the ride to the Tule River Indian Reservation’s gas station.

I took a lot of video footage. Here is an 8-minute clip of the portion of the road just past Eagle Feather: Post Antler’s Amble down Highway 190. As you can see, Jazz was fairly relaxed at first. If we had just ridden straight though those last five miles, he would have been fine. But we stopped, of course, multiple times. You can view footage of the last pit stop, by the golf course, here. Each stop made Jazz get worked up again. By the time we got to the Rodeo Grounds, he was dancing about impatiently again. But as soon as we headed away from the crowd, he put his head down and walked calmly. Thank gods.

Going home over the hills another 11 miles

As you can see at the end of the above video, Jazz and I headed straight home. Some friends’ driveway is just beyond the rodeo grounds. We rode up it and onto their property. Once we got there, Jazz felt comfortable. There is a pond just inside their gate; Jazz almost dived into it. He drank and drank and drank. I stopped counting at 100 swallows. Then I got in the saddle and we headed home.

Jazz and I have ridden the trail home many many times. He knows every inch of it. We might not always go exactly the same way, but it’s all familiar. I let him choose his pace, which in retrospect probably wasn’t a good idea. After walking for about a mile, Jazz chose to lope up a hill. It wasn’t particularly steep, and he’s done it dozens of times. But he hadn’t done it after dancing around all morning. He slowed down as we neared the top (unusual). Then we walked to the next hill (stopping to drink deeply at every bit of water). That next hill is very steep, 1/4 mile of 20% grade. Jazz stopped many times.

Above: After the first steep climb, Jazz was clearly much more tired than he should have been.

I let him; I always let my horses stop on hills. I would have hopped off to lead him, but I could barely walk. On the next big hill (you can watch Jazz and I ride up it a few weeks ago in this video, where Jazz bolts at the end), I did get off. Jazz stopped and wouldn’t move. It was on the steepest part. I led him up about 100′. Or rather, he pulled me up (he was much less tired without me in the saddle). Too bad he doesn’t tail yet!

After that climb, I got back on and we walked almost the entire way home. On a few gradual downhill slopes we trotted, because it was getting late. Jazz stopped to drink at every single opportunity. I’d guess he drank 10 gallons over the 10.5 miles cross country. We arrived home at 7:30 pm, nearly 12 hours after I first mounted in Porterville.

Jazz’s tiredness after the Jackass Mail Run was not normal or expected

Jazz was much more tired than he should have been. He looked the picture of abject tiredness as I untacked. Except for when I hosed him down (he’s never too tired to bear that indignity without trying to escape), he appeared exhausted. Still, he drank yet again when I turned him loose, and immediately stuck his nose in his mash. If he hadn’t, I would have called the vet–Jazz always eats. As it was, I left him in a corral rather than turning him out to pasture. I wanted to monitor food and water intake.

I had chosen to ride home because I did not want to wait for the shoot out to finish before driving home… and it should not have been a challenge! Not more than 16 miles (and only around 600′ total elevation gain) with the Mail Run. The 11 miles home included about 2,500′ total elevation gain, but we do that and more all the time. Just ten days before we had done 3,747′ total elevation gain in 20 miles and less than six hours. At the Western Mojave xp ride, Jazz completed the 50 mile ride with over 4,300′ total elevation gain in 7 hours… and was first place and best condition.

Of course, he had not danced and jigged and exercised muscles he doesn’t need to trot fast or walk relaxed. He had drunk well all day. At the Mail Run, he refused to drink. I had not elyted because I did not think it necessary.

More important, he had not gotten emotionally worked up at Western Mojave. And he never gets worked up on our training rides.

The next morning

Jazz had eaten his feed and drunk another 2-3 gallons by 6:30 the next morning. However, he hadn’t eaten much alfalfa (yes all the Bermuda). He was clearly uncomfortable, and he had tell-tale patches of sweat on his hind quarters. Those patches of sweat and his miserable demeanor told me Jazz had tied up. It probably had not been a good idea to leave him in a pen where he wouldn’t move all night either.

Luckily, he ate his feed, drank more water, and when I let him on grass, he immediately started eating. I gave him banamine and wished I hadn’t missed the window when a few jugs of liquids would have done some good. (Later I talked to the vet to make sure it wouldn’t be better to take him in. I was taking Fantazia in to be bred anyway, and I didn’t want to do that then have to take Jazz a few hours later!) But his heart rate was hovering around 40 (high for Jazz but normal). His legs were clean. His back was not sore. I gave him a good currying, and he enjoyed all of it.

By the time I left with Fantazia, Jazz was feeling good enough to trot around after the trailer as we pulled out. By the time I got back with the empty trailer, he was feeling good enough to run around neighing mournfully when he realized Fantazia wasn’t in it.

Poor Jazz. He had quite the weekend.

As for me, I could barely walk Saturday evening. I alternated ice and heat on my foot, and went to bed early. By morning I had a huge bruise but my foot doesn’t seem to be broken. I also have more blisters than I’ve ever gotten in an endurance ride! So much for an easy slow ride. That was the hardest day of riding Jazz and I have evern gone through… and that includes the crazy stormy Fire Mountain ride in January!

Why did Jazz get so sore?

I believe this was a very mild tying up, and I have my theories. First, horses are much more likely to tie up when they get emotional. Seen it many times at the track. Second, he didn’t drink enough and he sweat like crazy. 16 miles of no water would be nothing if he hadn’t been worked up. Fantazia regularly goes over 20 miles without drinking at rides, and Jazz himself tends to wait at least 15 miles before drinking.

The only other time I was worried about Jazz’s water intake was Fire Mountain. There, the first time he peed he had very clear urine. The second time, at the Trona Pinnacles, his urine was still yellow, but far darker than I liked. The same thing happened at the Mail Run. His second pee, at Antler’s, was bright yellow.

At Fire Mountain Jazz was also more tired than he should have been. I suspected then he might have mildly tied up (where tying up is very sore muscles). At Fire Mountain, he also got very emotional at the start.

In any case, I’ll be monitoring his blood work closely. And, yes, Jazz needs more exposure. He needs more Mail Runs. He needs to realize that sometimes we’re going to walk all day. Or jog. And stop for frequent breaks. And he’s not going to get to trot fast or gallop down the trail. Last Saturday the only time we went fast at all was the lope up that one hill. It was a slow lope, but it was a steep hill (short, and not as steep as the later ones, but still took effort). So I believe he will not remember going anything but slow all day. As long as he doesn’t associate the sore muscles with the slow walk on the Jackass Mail Run, he might have taken the lesson I hoped for from the excursion.