Girlfriend Getaways at The Hideout Lodge & Guest Ranch
At The Hideout we don’t typically organize a “women’s” or “girlfriend’s” week. We find that when women visit The Hideout, many of them are already coming with a girlfriend, a group of friends or riding partners the ride with at their local barn.
They organize their trip to indulge in a fun-filled week together. Many of our repeat guests, girlfriends, sisters, friends, etc. visit in May or September because school is in session and The Hideout caters to more adult activities. And many return bringing more friends. When you visit The Hideout, let us know what you would like to do and if it is possible, we will make it happen. At The Hideout strong females are in lead positions.
City Girl to Cowgirl
Marijn, one of the owners heads the barn, wrangler, and horse program. She is very decisive, kind, honest, transparent but a straightshooter. Marijn is one of our popular cowgirls. She moved over with her husband and kids from Belgium to Wyoming in 2006. Now accomplished rider and equestrian in her mid-50’s, Marijn presents the Monday morning riding orientation, she hosts, hires the barn crew and meets every evening personally with all guests individually during cocktail hour, to discuss the day and sign up guests for the next day’s riding program.
Coming a long way
15 years ago, when Marijn joined The Hideout, she was a complete novice rider and city girl. She even feared horses. Overcoming her fear, spending days, months and years in the saddle while studying horsemanship and attending clinics, she earned her stripes as a cowgirl. Today she holds a Level 4 Parelli in Horsemanship, gives clinics together with our horse trainer, leads cattle work, and loves playing at Liberty with her horses. During the season Marijn spends between five and eight hours in the saddle riding several days a week together with the guests, wranglers and cowboys. She drives trucks pulling our horse trailers on steep mountain trails, trains her own horses, etc. She is also a great person to talk with to learn about groundwork with horses and Playing at Liberty. Like most of our wranglers and staff, Marijn has an outgoing, straightforward personality which many women relate very well to and trust. What women also like about Marijn is that she has not forgotten where she comes from in terms of riding and can relate to our novice riders. She will always tell you that she does not have any special skills or talents with horses, but that she just worked very hard, long hours to get where she is today.
The Wranglers
Hideout Wranglers need to be accomplished equestrians, by preference in both English and Western. This in addition to having great peoples skills, keep guests safe and entertained. They need to be hard working, going the extra length and deeply care about your vacation experience.
Aside of our horse trainer and farrier, most of our wranglers are female. Our wranglers need both equestrian and peoples skills. Most of them are mature, independent fun and friendly well-traveled individuals
Our Mares
On the contrary to most guest ranch remuda’s we have many great mares in our herd of guest horses. Our horses are part of our crew, and we need to hire the best crew possible.This means we don’t only buy geldings.
People say that cowboys rule The West. At The Hideout our Cowgirls rule the roost. Come ride with us and enjoy meeting the ladies who live and work at The Hideout.
