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We went to the first rodeo of the season! It started at 8pm and it wasn’t very warm but it was great fun. The Rodeo is held every Thursday, Friday and Saturday night during June, July and August. Competitors’ points are added up over the whole summer and a season-winner for each event is declared at the end.

We saw the traditional bucking broncos and bucking bulls along with calf wrangling, steer wrangling, racing around barrels and a pairs event that saw one rider lassoing the front legs of a steer and the other the back. It was a really exciting event. Around 3 of the dozen competitors in the bucking bronco event stayed on long enough to score (8 seconds). Not one stayed on the bulls for long enough to score. Two of the young cow girls were absolutely amazing in the wrangling and barrel racing event beating a lot of experienced male counterparts. And the athletes (horses and bulls) were well trained to give maximum “bang per buck”.

We loved it: we loved whooping along with our American cousins and holding our breath when the bulls were released; we loved the kids’ calf scrambling event which Alex very nearly won; and we loved the small town, wild west atmosphere. This was a professionally run event, with very talented contenders but it was raw, rough and very real.

The kids wanted to go back the next night!

Sadly it was a bit dark for our camera and the photos don’t capture the Wild West spirit of the event.