We had an incredible visit - amazing location, warm hospitality, luxurious accommodations... wow! my 12yr old daughter wrote an essay about our trip for the start of school and asked me to share.
During Covid my family went glamping at a wonderful campsite. Covid-19 has made life different. We canāt go outside without a mask, certain places are shut down and businesses are dying. I have been working pretty hard this past school year and into the summer and I havenāt had a chance to really enjoy my summer.
My mom and another family friend who is in our ābubbleā decided that we needed a break and that we should go out of the city. So my mom researched HipCamp, a website that helps you find camping sites, and she found Iron Gate Horse Sanctuary in California. Iron Gate Horse Sanctuary is a place where you can go āglampingā in a tent with a bed and also be near animals and get herbs and collect chicken eggs every morning. The owners of this place, Taryn and Claire, find animals that have been mistreated and make a better life for them. For example, they found a starved horse, took him in and are making a better life for him.
They have many animals considering that they have only been there for 4 and a half months. They have 14 horses, 7 chickens, 2 goats, 2 cows, 3 dogs, and even 2 geese on their property. Even though my mom didnāt see many reviews, she thought it would be a place we could go to and enjoy and give back to animals at the same time to help the ranch survive through Covid-19. The friendly couple who run the camp really love horses and started this ranch because itās always been their dream.
The amount of work that they have done in a few short months was amazing. They stuck poles into rocky terrain so that they could make an electric fence to protect their animals, and even made a rock-lined path up to the huge, beautiful glamping tent. One project that they havenāt completed yet is putting in a well. But the thing is, nobody will come out to put in the well because the ranch is too far out of the way and thereās a pandemic! The well is super important so that the horses and other animals can have clean drinking water and the owners donāt have to hike 20 minutes to get water for their animals.
A well is also critical in case of fire. If there was a fire the animals might not be able to move fast enough and could die in the fire. A day after we left there was a fire and they said if it got too close (luckily it didn't) they would have to evacuate all the animals and the road to the ranch is really rocky so it would be hard. So I decided to use my own 100 dollars I had earned to donate to them and to help them build a well to fight the fire.
This was such a hard time for all of them and I really wish that I could help more and that's why I sent money to help them and I really wanted to help them and it was really important to me and I just thought that they needed it more than I did to buy new clothes so I thought that I would just donate it to them so that they can help feed more horses and get a well. Our visit there was really good. They made sure we were all comfortable, if we needed anything we could just ask them and the animals were super happy and nice to us.
Response from Host
Nov 2020
We truly enjoyed having you stay with us! Because of supporters like you, we now have the well. We look forward to seeing you back on the ranch with us and again, thank you so much.