Crossing America On Mustang : Grit, Faith, And 6,000 Miles

What does it take to ride from Utah to the Atlantic Ocean and back on two Mustangs—and finish with zero lameness? We sit down with Jake of Year of the Mustang for a raw, practical, and heartening look at a 6,000-mile journey powered by faith, preparation, and the sheer grit of two remarkable geldings. From setting a departure date years in advance to trimming pack weight down to the essentials, Jake shows how big goals get real when you put them on the calendar and break them into honest, testable steps.

We dig into the nuts and bolts that long riders and horse owners crave: how to plan routes around public lands, water, and grazing; why packing less can save your horses’ backs; and how Mustangs handle forage changes that would sideline many domestic horses. Jake shares how GPS kept navigation simple, how he shod his own horses on the road with borrowed forges, and why traffic management in the East demanded tough choices—like sending his mare home for safety. He also offers the “rule of tens” for conditioning: don’t attempt ten days if you haven’t nailed two, don’t reach for a month if you haven’t mastered a week.

The story unfolds further as we delve into Mustang genetics, adoption pathways, and the surprising range of types you’ll find across the West—including lines with draft heritage that can suit real work. There are vivid field notes too: a mountain lion standoff by a dark river, bighorn sheep, black bears, a tornado touchdown nearby, and that quiet moment of touching ocean water in New Jersey with the skyline on the horizon. Through it all, the Mustangs’ resilience stands out—healthy weight, strong feet, and steady minds under changing feed, weather, and terrain.

If you’re curious about long-distance horse travel, Mustang adoption, hoof care on the road, or how to turn a “someday” ride into a lived journey, you’ll find hard-won insights and encouragement here. Subscribe for more stories and practical takeaways, share this with a horse‑loving friend, and leave a review to help others find the show.

Subscribe to Jake on YouTube -  | www.youtube.com/@jakeharvath

FaceBook- https://www.facebook.com/p/Year-of-the-Mustang-100095731503504/

https://yearofthemustang.com/en-usd

Chapters

• 0:12 Holiday Welcome & Guest Intro
• 1:20 Jake’s Origins With Mustangs
• 3:11 The 6,000-Mile Vision Takes Shape
• 5:35 Route Planning & Public Lands Strategy
• 8:43 Packing Lessons & Shedding Weight
• 10:20 Feeding On The Road & Mustang Hardiness
• 12:54 Traffic, Safety, And Sending The Mare Home
• 15:09 Farrier Work And Shoeing Logistics
• 16:36 Touching The Atlantic In New Jersey
• 18:10 Advice For Aspiring Long Riders
• 19:40 Mustang Genetics, Types, And Uses
• 22:10 Trails, Weather, And Tornado Close Call
• 24:06 Wildlife Encounters And Mountain Lion Standoff
• 25:45 Favorite Landscapes And Appalachian Segments
• 27:21 Pace, Miles, And GPS Navigation
• 29:00 Health, Vet Checks, And Zero Lameness
• 31:10 Getting Into Mustangs & Where To Learn
• 33:06 Links, Support, And Closing Blessing

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:12

Welcome to Harvest Up with Hastraft Horses and Mules, where we talk all things related to these magnificent animals. Their history and uses training. We cover it all. Join us as we chat with experts and enthusiasts and fields. Explore the world of draft horses and fields. This podcast is for you. So harnessed up. Enjoy haste draft horses and mules for some lively discussions about these God-given creatures.

SPEAKER_02: 1:00

Hey folks, Stephen Haste here with Harnessed Up Podcast with Haste Draft Horses and Mules. How's everybody doing? This will be our Merry Christmas episode. Merry Christmas to all y'all out there. Thank you so much. And God bless each and every one of you, because without you, we wouldn't even have a reason to sit here and do this. So, guys, thank you from the bottom of our hearts, and God bless each and every one of you. Guys, I'm here with a fellow I've watched on YouTube for quite a long time now. He's got a story to tell, and it's a really interesting one, and I'm proud to have him on the podcast tonight. Mr. Jake with Year of the Mustang. How are you, Jake? I'm real good. Thank you so much, dude. That's good, man. Jake, you had a pretty exciting trip. How long? How many days did that take you? Oh, let's see.

SPEAKER_01: 1:41

The entirety of the Year of the Mustang journey was 14 months and 10 days. So that's that's a little over 400 in total.

SPEAKER_02: 1:50

You and your horses, that's it.

SPEAKER_01: 1:53

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02: 1:53

Where are you tell the folks where you're from and just a little about you and your background and how you got into horses and things?

SPEAKER_01: 2:00

Absolutely. So I am I'm from Heber City, Utah, and I I live there to this day. And I uh I wasn't born per se into a horse family or anything like that. I I was around neighbors and and and uh extended family that had them, and that was kind of where I got my beginnings. But I uh I started apprenticing to be a cult trainer when I was 14. That is where I I got around a lot of different trainers into uh a lot of different disciplines, and I got to be around a ton of different breeds, and that included Mustangs, and my very first personal horse was this little gray mare that was given to me, and she maybe had 30 days of work on her, and and uh luckily I had good coaches because that was kind of my trial by fire, but that's kind of my my start into it, and I basically had a a four-year education and and working with horses by the time I graduated high school and and that's what I was doing alongside starting to shoe horses as well.

SPEAKER_02: 2:55

Are you still shooing horses now too?

SPEAKER_01: 2:57

Yep, yep, I shoe horses now even.

SPEAKER_02: 3:00

Good deal. So you had how many mustangs was on the trip with you?

SPEAKER_01: 3:05

So I left on the trip. So this for context, this was September of 2023, and I left with three Mustangs, two gellings, and that one same mare I was telling you about. And uh we did about the first quarter of the trip with all three of them before came high time to send that old mare home, and then my other two gellings, they did the entirety of the trip, beginning to end.

SPEAKER_02: 3:26

You packed one and rode the other.

SPEAKER_01: 3:29

That's right, yeah. We were starting out in a string and then it was just the two ponying along, and and yeah, that's how we we did the entirety of the trip. Just riding one, leading the other.

SPEAKER_02: 3:39

I'd rotate them, they all packed, they all rode. What made you want to do this trip? Is there a certain reason why you done it?

SPEAKER_01: 3:46

Yeah, it wasn't necessarily just one thing, and it kind of evolved in nature over my growing up. The first initial idea, I was 16, and my friends and I, we just wanted to cross the state of Utah horseback, and we thought we'd take a summer and our horses and go do that. But that just never came about. We were kids, and I just never let it go. So I kept developing what was possible to do in the United States long-distance horseback, and I was thinking, you know, what about a trip around the West? What would it take to go all the way to the East Coast? And I was probably 19 when I had kind of the rough idea of what I ended up actually doing, which was going from my hometown in Utah all the way to the Atlantic Ocean, New Jersey, and back in a big loop, crossing through 25 states while doing it. So it was something, as far as what we actually did, it developed over time. And my wife was doing it, it turned it started out just as kind of a bucket list thing for me, uh, a little life experience. I thought I could see a lot, learn a lot, and have a good time while doing it. But it turned into this opportunity for me to share what I knew about wild horses, having at this point trained so many of them, and uh and get more people interested in adopting wild horses from the Bureau of Land Management, hence the name The Year of the Mustang came about. Exactly. So that's kind of how that all came about as far as the mission that we were out to accomplish.

SPEAKER_02: 5:06

What really gets me, you know, as a young kid or as any horse person or mule person, you sit and think about doing something like you done. You know, I sit and think about it. I've thought about crossing the country with horses and wagons a lot. But getting the guts, I guess you would call it guts, to actually do it like I'm gonna do this. You had to how long did it actually take you to come up with I'm gonna do this and actually leave?

SPEAKER_01: 5:35

Right. Well, it it came to a point where it had to be more than just a kid's dream, you know, and and the biggest element I think for s for tackling a goal like that is you gotta set the date. And I was probably I was 20 or 21 when I I think I was 21, when I was like, alright, September 2023, that's that's gonna be when I leave. So I had that much time to, you know, set my checkpoints, and and I only had I didn't only had my one personal horse at that point. I had two more horses to get, I had gear to obtain, I had all sorts of things to figure out to get myself organized in that rough less than three-year period to get everything together. But that was one of the biggest things was was saying this is when it's happening, and we have this long to get it done, and not just make it a thing of, oh, you know, someday we'll get around to it when it's convenient, because I knew, you know, I was twenty-three at the time, and that was perhaps the most convenient it was ever gonna be for me to do something like that.

SPEAKER_02: 6:37

Exactly, yeah. And this podcast is kind of interesting to me too, because I mean I love this kind of stuff, and hearing your story is just super interesting. I know I know it's gonna be to a lot of other people. When you was planning your route, how did you do that? Did you just look at a map and figure it out, or did you use online tools, or what did you do?

SPEAKER_01: 6:57

Yeah, it was a big mix of everything, and I knew it would evolve over the course of the trip. And I'm glad where I started out, I'm in a place where there's a lot of public land. Right? So I was able to kind of plan my trip for the most part around places where there was public land for us to camp on, which is pretty pretty prevalent. So it it was just a matter of finding resources like water and good enough feed while we were out there, which in in my home state is challenging. It was it was simple as far as finding the places goes. And that changes the more east you go in the continental U.S., the more private land becomes, and the less there is of that. Now, also as I went along, I was building up recognition. More and more people were following what I was doing, they were they were latching on to what I had set out to accomplish and and became a part of it. And along with that, I got better at networking and at meeting people, talking to people, and finding places and people with facilities for horses as I went along, just through you know, opening my mouth and and letting everyone know what our situation was. I'd have people pull over and say, Hey, do you need a place? I'd have people reach out and we had a whole email system going of people inviting us and and uh that was my dad's job. I I put him to work on that. I was like, I need you to go through all these contacts and see what'll work and what won't. And uh it was it was quite an interesting experiment in a sense as far as human kindness and and people's willingness to help out, but also yeah, spent a lot of time just camping on public land in almost every state as well.

SPEAKER_02: 8:31

That made you feel like a real cowboy kinda, I guess, didn't it? Yeah, for sure. Yeah, in all seasons. What did you take with you when you left? Like when you left home, did you have take a bunch of food or did you how did you go about doing all what was your plans for all that and how did it fall apart?

SPEAKER_01: 8:51

Yeah, I started out like anybody who does long trips. Ask anybody who does long riding trips, they'll tell you the same thing. I started out with way more than I ever needed, right? And everyone's the same. So I I was no different. I started out with with plenty of odds and ends in the mind of preparation, and as you go doing this sort of thing, you know, I you figure out what you do and don't need. I'd packed plenty, right? There's one thing to go and pack for one week or two weeks in the backcountry. It's a whole nother thing to live this way for for months and months and months. So it was figuring that aspect out. I started for with the food is a perfect example. I started out packing two weeks worth of food at a time, and then maybe a month in I cut down to ten days worth, and then I was packing a week's worth, and then by the time I was a quarter, over a quarter of the way through the trip, I maybe packed three days worth of food because I was just so in with so much help, I didn't even worry about it. I didn't think about it. I had I had people helping me out as I went along with food and whatnot for the most part, and I just had a little bit for the nights that I was by myself. So that's that's a good example of how you know I found ways to get rid of things, and that's all I was thinking about all the time. Over the course of that 14 months, how can I get rid of stuff? How can I get rid of stuff? Because everything is weighed on a horse's back, right? And you guys think about that, I'm sure, with a lot of the things you do, you know. How do we maximize or minimize? How do we consolidate, right? And yeah, it's it's part of it.

SPEAKER_02: 10:16

Did you pack hay with you any or grain, or what uh what about that for the horses?

SPEAKER_01: 10:20

I'd pack some high concentrated additive so I could mix it in with grain when I got into it, or I'd give it to them straight. They were burning so many calories they could take a lot. Occasionally I'd I'd have some someone drive the load ahead for me, and that just made me more efficient. And in that case, I could send a bag of grain with it. And uh very often I was picking up hay as I went along. A lot of people would give it to me. But no, when we were just out camping on the on the these Mustangs, they were doing really well at just making off of what we had, and sometimes that was dry weeds in the deserts of Utah and Colorado. And it was really just one of the impressive elements of this trip is how versatile these horses were in changing feed, going from hot alfalfa one night to to grass hay to being on the land and then back again, and then getting grain consistently and then not necessarily getting it consistently, and their ability to adapt to those dramatic changes that for most horses I do not recommend as a horse owner for for most of your domestic breeds. That was one remarkable thing about what my horses accomplished in this.

SPEAKER_02: 11:25

Yeah, and a Mustang, you know, wild Mustangs just out on the prairie or out in the desert, they live on what's there, you know, so they're kind of used to it, I guess. I guess God kind of made them for it, you know. He and He created them and made them to live off the land. That's what I tell a lot of people. You know, we sell draft horses and mules. I don't know if you watched our stuff or not, but um we don't feed any grain to any of our animals. None. Yeah. All I feed is alfalfa. Straight alfalfa. And a lot of people's like, why don't you grain your horses? I just tell them, God didn't make them to eat grain. Right. He made them to be grazers and eat grass, and that's kind of what we do. But that's the good thing about the Mustang, they're so tough and hardy, ain't they?

SPEAKER_01: 12:07

Yep, and I and I respect and appreciate that because in a general in your average working horse lifestyle, where they're not, you know, burning the kind of calories mine were going twenty-five miles a day five to six days a week. I don't bring horses either, right? I it's not.

SPEAKER_02: 12:24

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 12:25

It's something that is definitely over exaggerated, I think, in in the average American horse style, for sure.

SPEAKER_02: 12:32

I believe myself, now you may disagree, you may agree, but I believe a lot of that pelletized man-made junk is a lot of the problem to colic and a lot of the horse issues in the in the equine world today, really. For sure, no, it's definitely some people don't.

SPEAKER_01: 12:48

Yeah. As as a farrier, I see lots of problems related to it.

SPEAKER_02: 12:52

I'd say you do, yes, sir. One thing I want to know from you. You started out in the west and went all the way to Jersey. Was it a lot harder navigating and doing what you did when you got to the east? Like, say, did you go through Ohio, Pennsylvania, or where did you go through?

SPEAKER_01: 13:08

Yep, that's right. That was kind of our our return journey. Yeah, came into Pennsylvania from the south and then yeah, it was exiting all through the Midwest on the way back. But yeah, as to your question, that was one of the hidden kind of hidden blessings that that God didn't let me see until later on when I sent that little mare home, because that was a hard thing for me to do, but she'd just lost too much weight across Oklahoma getting into Arkansas, and it was just the right decision, and I found someone to do it. But after that happened, things just got busier and busier, more congested, our roads got tighter, you know, in places like where you live tight, windy roads through the back hills, and keeping three horses safe around traffic was just getting challenging all over the place, and that only increased as you get closer to the coast. So having two horses was I was thank goodness we sent a horse home because this would have been a nightmare trying to keep everyone safe. And and uh yeah, no, we definitely had had those challenges. I would say that was the biggest ongoing challenge of the trip was was navigating how to do things with traffic.

SPEAKER_02: 14:14

Yeah, I'd say, you know, we deal with it a lot here with driving horses on the road. A lot of people just don't respect it. In the state of Kentucky, though, I don't know a lot of people know this and a lot of people don't, but in the state of Kentucky, the horse has the right-of-way.

SPEAKER_01: 14:28

Right. Yeah. Yep, and that's most places. It's an interesting thing that today's generation is completely unaware of that in majority of states and places, you know, people can create legislations for certain parks and whatever, but on your general roadways, the legislation is so old that no one cares to go in and change it and never has gone about bothering to to try and fight against it because it's so be a litigation nightmare trying to to get the protections for horses out of there just because of how far back they go and and yeah, it's it's an interesting thing to look into for sure.

SPEAKER_02: 15:04

Did you pay stop and shoe your own horses on the way, or how'd you go about doing that?

SPEAKER_01: 15:09

Yeah, yep, we did. I'd set up with to borrow often equipment, forge and anvil if I could from from ferriers or whoever had one as time came to do them again. My first two sets I got about six weeks out of cross to the Rockies, and then I was getting more like seven or eight weeks out of the rest of 'em for the entire rest of the trip. So that was uh that was like nine sets in total by the time we were done.

SPEAKER_02: 15:34

What part of the coast did you go to?

SPEAKER_01: 15:36

So I hit the ocean in Middletown, New Jersey, so a pretty urban area.

SPEAKER_02: 15:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 15:43

The reason New Jersey was just because it was such a small state, I could add another state to the list without losing much time and still have my goal of hitting the ocean. And it was a lot of fun. It was it was really cool getting to hit that water, and there was New York City in the back and whatnot. Yeah, that was that's where our turnaround point was, was just at this one little little side beach out in Middletown, New Jersey.

SPEAKER_02: 16:10

Guys, everybody you gotta go check out his YouTube channel if you've not watched it yet. You're the Mustang. Go to YouTube, type in You're the Mustang, you'll find it. And you can see all this. He's talking about his journey and everything. It's really cool. I watched it while you was doing it. We kind of kept up with it too, so um that's pretty awesome. But check that out. So you have any advice for somebody wanting to do this? There may be somebody out there listening wanting to do the same thing you did.

SPEAKER_01: 16:37

Yeah, I mean I would have I would have so much, but as far as as far as practical things go, just one of the best things I've come up with is you know, don't it's the rule of tens, right? Don't don't attempt a ten mile trip if you can't go, you know, do a day or a couple hours or a one-day trip, right? Sorry, don't don't go do a a one-day trip if you can't do an hour and you're reading at home, you know. Don't go on a ten-day trip if you can't do a couple days, you know. Don't go and do a month trip if you can't do a week, right? And that's kind of the practical aspect. If you want to gauge where your horses are at and and see what they're really capable of, they're gonna let you know sooner than you think. Because my horses, my two gildings especially, because of how capable they were, they were capable for a long period of time. They just adjusted to that lifestyle, they got in shape to what we did, and doing it every day for that long a period of time, it's very possible they could have just kept doing it even after we were done, right?

SPEAKER_02: 17:43

You may not know him when you watch his YouTube. He got a pretty long beard during that.

SPEAKER_01: 17:49

Yeah, it's true.

SPEAKER_02: 17:51

I I actually watched you get it cut off on YouTube at the barber.

SPEAKER_01: 17:55

Yeah, there you go. That was a pretty didn't shave or cut the hair the entire time, and it was just another way I could show people the personal progression, I guess, over the course of the trip and just how long what we were doing actually was, and it was fun.

SPEAKER_02: 18:14

Have you adopted any more Mustangs since you got back?

SPEAKER_01: 18:17

I don't have any personally. I've helped a few people start some here locally, and I helped a girl do one for a competition here, get one going. And that was her first time doing it. It was super fun to s you know, watch other people have those first experiences I had, getting to go touch a wild horse that no one else has touched before. It's it's a special thing. So I've done some of that and it's been great.

SPEAKER_02: 18:43

Do you have plans to adopt more on your own?

SPEAKER_01: 18:46

Absolutely, yeah. Once I'm I'm in in need of another horse, yeah, that's exactly the way I'd go. Is take on the other.

SPEAKER_02: 18:54

My wife's a Mustang nut. She loves 'em. She sits on the couch a lot at night, flipping her phone around to me, look at this one, look at this one, look at this one. Very cool. It really is a special thing. It is. She shows me some though. You know, those mustangs, they're so different from where they're from. Like she looks at some out in Oregon that are so big boned and heavy, and then some are shorter and littler, and that's just the way it goes, I guess. But there's a huge difference in them. But us being draft horse people working horses and stuff, do you think a Mustang could be used for working like that? Do you see any potential in that? Absolutely.

SPEAKER_01: 19:32

Here's the thing, like what your wife is seeing. You're she's seeing kind of the difference in the history of the American West manifest in how these horses have developed. You had in Colorado in the silver mining days, they weren't, you know, feeding those draft horses, those Belgiums and whatnot, from the mines over winter. They'd just turn them loose. And a lot of them would go and just add their genetics to local populations or start new ones. And that's a story that's unfolded with lots of different breeds in. In every in every area across the western states. That's what makes up the Mustang. A lot of people think, oh, they've got all this Spanish blood in them. Majority of them have very little Spanish blood. You know, most of them it's less than three percent even of that those original Spanish horses. Yeah. You have mixes of of cow horses, thoroughbreds, you know, Arabia, everything you can think of. It's really interesting when you test their genetics. And some of them are majority draft horse. You know, or it's just about where you look and and I've seen Mustangs that are almost sixteen hands and just built, you know, like, holy cow, that's a Mustang. Exactly what you're talking about. And heck, my guy, Denver, he's a gotta have at least a little bit in him. I need to test their DNA, but I wouldn't be surprised at all. Just you could adopt some is what I'm saying, that would probably be inclined to do that sort of work. Absolutely. They've got the build for it and the bone and the feet, but even breeding them into it as well could get you some characteristics that would be really, really valuable, I think.

SPEAKER_02: 21:01

Have you ever worked a mustang in harness?

SPEAKER_01: 21:04

I haven't personally, yeah, I know. I haven't driven too much, only a little bit, but maybe something to start, you know. Hmm. That'd be cool to look into. Have you teach me a thing or two?

SPEAKER_02: 21:16

I could. We could tell we could show you now, that's for sure. Lord, I like a Mustang. I I don't have no experience with them. I mean, I never really seen one or was around one until she adopted one when we was together. And uh it's just something around here, there's not many of 'em, but in the last few years we got a expo center up here at Liberty, and they started having adoption there once a year. Right. And a lot of people are going up there and getting them now around here, and you see a few around now. I got a neighbor across the way over here from the barn. He drives only Mustangs, the Amish guy. And that's the only horse he drives. He's got four Mustangs, that's all he's got. Wow. One old Gray Mary's had for probably 15 years. And his kids drive her to school.

SPEAKER_00: 22:06

Very cool.

SPEAKER_02: 22:07

So there is a huge potential for Mustangs to be, I think, you know.

SPEAKER_01: 22:12

For sure. That's the one I recommend for most people. Like I spoke at Mustang Heritage Event in Lexington here back in June. And that's a super cool event. And a lot of these yearlings are you know, they've got a few horses obviously trained under saddle. That's what everyone wants is a horse they can ride right now that are trained phenomenally. And uh yeah, those go for higher prices, but a lot of these yearlings are just halter broken, you can pick up their feet and load them in a trailer. And uh, you know, people are walking out of there a couple hundred bucks for a horse that is already halter broke and will grow up with you a little bit, and that's the way to do it for most people, I'd say. Not everyone's got the education and and the confidence in horses to go out and adopt a four or five plus year old Mustang out of the pens because that's a whole nother type of horse training, absolutely. But I would point people to those sorts of auctions where trainers have already gotten them going and and it's it's economically completely viable and Yeah.

SPEAKER_02: 23:13

You should do the make stream Mustang Makeover Challenge.

SPEAKER_01: 23:16

Yeah, I've done similar. I've I've done several. That's how I got my third horse was it was the impact of the horse is is a similar Mustang kind of training event where you're taking those horses for a hundred days and I'm looking at 'em, I got a a little pile of tags of of Mustang tags of ones that I did for hundred day competitions over the years, and no yeah, I absolutely've enjoyed that.

SPEAKER_02: 23:42

Whenever you got to the coast, how long did you take a pretty long break, or did you just turn around and go straight back?

SPEAKER_01: 23:49

Yeah. I had two rest periods on the trip that were kind of planned extended rest periods. I did about two and a half weeks in Gravit, Arkansas, and then I did eleven days when I was at the coast, and I stayed at this hunter jumper barn out there, and yeah, kind of got everything together ready to turn around and and did some touring around, but yeah, got the horses a good break. But after that, we were so pressed for time to get back to Utah before winter hit. I did no official lengthy rest all the way from New Jersey to Utah, and from Illinois to Utah I did six days a week.

SPEAKER_02: 24:26

How many miles a day was you covering then?

SPEAKER_01: 24:29

Uh we were covering on average over the whole course of the trip about twenty miles a day. And in that last quarter, like Illinois to U like I was telling you, it was probably closer to twenty-four. We were moving. I guess you walk most of the time, but Yeah, it just depends on where we're at most of the time you're walking. Some days, yeah, it's just a walking day. But I'd get in spots where I could trot out in the fields out on the on the plains, and and we'd trot for a little while, get a few miles in under trot. But yeah, when you're leading a horse, you can only go so fast.

SPEAKER_02: 25:03

Did you use a GPS?

SPEAKER_01: 25:06

Yeah, yep, GPS tracked everything and down to the mile so we could have a record of what we did, but also, yeah, just so the navigation took care of itself and kept it pretty simple.

SPEAKER_02: 25:18

You didn't get lost any, did you? You didn't get lost any.

SPEAKER_01: 25:21

Yeah, well, because of GPS tracking everything, I always knew where I was per se, but no more lost than I already was going into new country every single single day, a new place, and uh trying to get to somewhere I'd never been before. But but yeah, no, gener I would say we never really got lost. You can still make mistakes and make wrong turns, of course.

SPEAKER_02: 25:41

What about wildlife? I know you you had to see wildlife, but was there anything that really stuck out to you?

SPEAKER_01: 25:47

Yeah, we we saw a little of everything, which was a super cool thing about the trip. I felt like we had a pretty well-rounded experience from, you know, bighorn sheep in New Mexico to black bear in Virginia and you know, all sorts of stuff. But I remember this is a good story. I was camped out on one of the biggest ranches in the country. It's the biggest ranch in New Mexico and Colorado. It spans both of them. And it was days to get across, and I was camped out on the Vermejo River, and it was our day off, it was Sunday, so I go and I'm washing my my dishes out by the river. It's not a very big river. More like probably what you guys in Kentucky would say is a crick, but I look across, it's dark at seven o'clock in November, and and these bright eyes catching my headlamp, and then this little young mountain lion sticks his head out of the grass across staring dead straight at me. And I'm thinking about my horses that are staked out in the meadow behind me. So I go skipping on some stones. I didn't have a gun or nothing on me. I had my knife, but I go skipping on some stones and I just start yelling and hollering and I go running at him and I run him up the hill and yeah, it was it was a funny deal. But we didn't sleep too well that night thinking about how close that lion was.

SPEAKER_02: 27:07

I'd say not, for sure. What was your favorite thing you seen, like part of the country you seen on the trip? What really stood out to you? Hmm.

SPEAKER_01: 27:17

Yeah. People ask me like what was your favorite state, and I don't really have one, but that's that's probably the closest thing I can get, is just the views in Colorado are hard to beat. I went through some beautiful mountains out there. But Virginia heck, Kentucky too. But but yeah, Virginia is beautiful in the south southern parts. Yeah. Some of the prettiest places I seen.

SPEAKER_02: 27:43

Did you ride the Appalachian Trail any?

SPEAKER_01: 27:46

I rode chunks of it, yeah. Plenty of it's not open, obviously, to stalk, but yeah, for the some of the chunks that were, yeah, I'd get on there a few times. It's not really built for animals, is the truth of it. A lot of it's, you know, just markers on tree. You've probably seen plenty of it, but yeah, so some of it's you know, rough stuff. But yeah, we did ride chunks of it in let's see, Virginia, Pennsylvania, West Virginia. Not West Virginia, yeah. Different spots.

SPEAKER_02: 28:19

You went south on on the way out, and then up and then more north.

SPEAKER_01: 28:24

That's right, yep. It was kind of a dip southeast, and then into the winter months I was going straight across from New Mexico all the way till I hit North Carolina essentially. And then I went straight up the Appalachians until I got into Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and then we had a more straight line back.

SPEAKER_02: 28:41

Did you run into any really bad weather? Did you get caught out in any tornadoes or anything?

SPEAKER_01: 28:46

Yeah, we wildest thing, I was in I was in Scott County, Tennessee, the only tornado we had nearby in March. They had a tornado touchdown just a couple miles away. Now I planned to stay over that day because it called for crazy high winds, and and uh then they had a tornado, yeah, touchdown in the county that day, and I was like, thank goodness we weren't out in the woods with trees falling down on us.

SPEAKER_02: 29:12

But yeah, we're that's that's ONADA.

SPEAKER_01: 29:16

Yeah, yeah, plays around Winfield and yeah.

SPEAKER_02: 29:19

That's just right down the road from us. Mm-hmm. Did you come through Liberty, Kentucky or Somerset?

SPEAKER_01: 29:25

I was close to Somerset at one point. I'm trying to remember and look back at the map over here. Yeah, no, I was kind of weaving back and forth at that point.

SPEAKER_02: 29:35

I wonder if you come through Seinfield or Liberty or Casa County or anywhere where we're where we're at. Maybe you did. I'm sure I was close by, if not, but wish we'd have knew, we'd have come seen you. Yeah. Absolutely. That would have been neat. Do you plan on doing this again or is it a one and done?

SPEAKER_01: 29:54

I don't know if I'll ever outdo myself like this again, but I'll always be packing and I'm sure I'll find something else to do that'll turn a few heads. But yeah, like I said, this is I picked the right time in my life to do this for sure, where I I could just up and leave for fourteen months with my horses and But you know, never say never, right?

SPEAKER_02: 30:14

Yeah, never say never. Do you have so you're doing ferro work now? Do you have plans to do more in the equ stay in the equine industry for a living?

SPEAKER_01: 30:23

Yeah, yeah, that's that's kind of my thing and I've done everything from like I said, train colts and and day work on ranches and and whatnot, so I'm sure I'll always I'll always be around and I'd love to get back to where I was training maybe a few more again, even to sell and get more Mustangs into homes that way. I could see myself doing a bit of that throughout the rest of my life and Yep, I'll always be shooing. I'm sure that's one of those things. Once you learn to shoe a horse, you you don't ever really stop until your body of horses you Well they say if you can shoe a horse you've always got a job. Right.

SPEAKER_02: 30:59

And we need them bad here. We're so short on farriers, man. Just short. Do you ever shot any draft horses?

SPEAKER_01: 31:06

Yeah, yep. I not as many as I used to. I've got I do have one Belgian mare on the books right now. And uh I got some Frisians I do.

SPEAKER_02: 31:15

Use stocks or not?

SPEAKER_01: 31:17

I don't, yeah, no, I'm out there traveling around.

SPEAKER_02: 31:21

Out in the middle of nowhere just helping yourself. Yeah, no, I'm trailering into private places and using what they got. That's good. Anything else you want to say to the guys or guys and gals out there?

SPEAKER_01: 31:36

Oh, just you know, let 'em know like these these Mustangs accomplish something that most people uh mo you know, majority of horses couldn't even get close to doing in a lot of senses. Uh it was six thousand miles in total over the course of fourteen months and ten days. So that was over three hundred different night stays. And like we already talked about the dramatic change in feed. Uh the two geldings who did the entirety of the trip maintained pretty healthy weight between over the entire course of the trip and and ended in completely healthy weight declared by a vet. And and uh it was never lame once. We didn't have a single lameness issue. We had bumps and cuts and scrapes here and there, obviously, but no one was ever lame to walk the entire time. And that was something I was super proud of those horses for was just how well they physically maintained themselves over the course of the trip. So just something to be said for these horses.

SPEAKER_02: 32:43

Did you have to stop at any vets along the way and get checkups or anything?

SPEAKER_01: 32:47

Yeah, yep, we kept them vaccinated, especially as we were staying with lots of different people. And yeah, yeah, we got 'em checked out twice. You we had one or two bumped their eyes on stuff and got 'em checked out for vets for that, but nothing that couldn't heal in a couple of days. Yeah, we definitely we had a few checkups here and there.

SPEAKER_02: 33:07

That's awesome. Somebody wanting to get into Mustangs. Do you have any words of wisdom for 'em out there?

SPEAKER_01: 33:14

You know, look into someone who's been around them and who's who's had some time, and if that's hard for you to find, there's definitely communities out there you could you could get connected with that could point you in the right direction. And and if you're someone who is still having trouble with that, you know, getting the education to train those horses, just you can find those horses that have already had a lot of miles put on them and and uh and invest in a horse that way, no different than you would in a trained domestic horse, right?

SPEAKER_02: 33:43

So Yeah, exactly.

SPEAKER_01: 33:44

Yeah, you just do your homework like you would buying any horse and make sure you dodge your I's and cross your T's when you're looking for the right one. But if you're looking into training, yeah, absolutely look for somebody who can kind of share their knowledge.

SPEAKER_02: 33:58

Tell them where to find you at all your socials and stuff.

SPEAKER_01: 34:01

Yeah, so you can find on YouTube, it's under Jake Harvath, as well as on TikTok, and then on Instagram and Facebook, it's Year of the Mustang. And we're putting out videos there on the main channel as well as stuff on the other platforms. But but YouTube is where I would put out a lot of educational stuff, informative stuff as far as as far as the trip and the sort of thing. So if people are interested in learning, you know, about the sort of things that I I do as far as packing goes, and on the trip, there's videos about that. You can go back as Steven said and watch the entirety of the trip. We did a video a week over the entire course. It's a great series. And yeah, if you want to support us, you can go to yearthemustang.com. There's different ways to do that there.

SPEAKER_02: 34:43

Guys, check him out. You'll you won't regret it. And um, Jake, thank you. I appreciate you. I really do absolutely for being on here with us. And uh guys, check us out too. Of course, you know uh our website, www.drafthorsesandmulesfor sale.com. We train and sell draft horses if you're new here. Also, our YouTube is under Haste Draft Horses and Mules. We're on Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, all across the board. So Merry Christmas to all y'all. Thank you, and Jake, thank you, and we'll see y'all soon. God bless you. See ya.

SPEAKER_00: 35:14

As another captivating episode of Harness Up with Haste Draft Horses and Mules draws to a close, we extend our sincere gratitude to our listeners for joining us on this enlightening journey. We hope today's discussions have deepened your appreciation and understanding of these magnificent creatures. Remember, the adventure continues beyond this podcast. Stay connected with us on social media and share your stories. For more information and to explore further, visit Draft Horses and MulesForSale.com. Thank you for being part of our community. Until next time, keep harnessing your curiosity and passion for these God given creatures. Farewell for now.