Western / Reining in Colorado

Colorado gives a horse a lot of country to work with: the Front Range foothills, the high parks and river valleys of the Western Slope, the shortgrass prairie running east toward Kansas. Trails thread through national forests, BLM land, and state parks by the mile, and the towns in between have kept a working horse culture alive: brand inspections, hay fields, arenas at the county fairgrounds. You can ride here at 5,000 feet or at timberline, and the two feel like different states.

Guest ranches anchor the summer trade, especially around Steamboat Springs, Aspen, and the San Juans. A typical week means mornings in the saddle through alpine meadows or along rivers like the Arkansas or the Colorado, afternoons back at the lodge. Day operations fill in everywhere else: hourly and half-day rides out of stables near the red rock around Grand Junction, or under the ponderosa outside Colorado Springs. Most keep a string quiet enough for first-timers and a few horses with more go for riders who ask.