Weekly Recap – June 25th, 2023
Outer Banks – Corolla, North Carolina
Welcome to This Week on Tour, a regular post with quick updates about stories happening around the world of #GuideLife, what Iβm up to, and more importantly β how this week on tour went working with tourists.
#GuideLife
Iβm going to start uploading short YouTube videos in addition to adding to Instagram, Facebook, and TikTok. YouTube is better viewed horizontally versus Instagram and TikTok being better viewed vertically, so Iβll need to find an easy way to switch between views. I have two GoPros, so I need a rig that can hold both, one filming vertical and the other horizontal.
Getting film is second to my job – leading the tour. The last thing any of my guests want is a guide more focused on getting his own photos than leading the tour. Nonchalant and easy filming are priorities for me.
Our Corolla wild horse herd lost a horse last week. A female named Caroline, she died in a skirmish with a male, eventually breaking her neck. Life continues though, and not only did the Corolla Wild Horse Fund announce a new baby last week, but this week they announced ANOTHER new baby, as well as her momma being unknown to the herd as well! Our horses have thousands of acres to explore, many of which are incredibly challenging to access due to swamps, marsh, and mud flats, and because they are not tagged or chipped, itβs not far-fetched to have horses living in the sanctuary that we donβt know about. So to recap: the herd was at 99, dropped to 98 and back to 99 almost instantly, then jumped to 101 in a heartbeat! Wildlife, y’all.
We also have our first sea turtle nest in the wild horse sanctuary, and Cape Hatteras has a Kempβs Ridley nest and a Leatherback nest, too. The former is the most endangered turtle on the planet, and the latter the first nest recorded on Cape Hatteras in 11 years. Pretty neat.
Tours – A Little Too Close
Thursday: It was hot last week and this week its coldβ¦ sort of. Itβs been raining most of the week and Iβm only doing 6 tours instead of my usual 9 (I spent an extra day working in the office this week, so there’s no Thursday update). Rain can make guest satisfaction plummet, but we go rain or shine. Guide life doesnβt stop for the rain!
Friday: I did three tours (read what a normal day looks like). I could tell the morning tours had gotten wet, but the sun poked through periodically on my first tour. Though we could see rain around us, we stayed dry all through my second tour as well.
The third tour was a blast. I had a big and talkative family and we saw a bunch of horses, even some up close… But not quite a little too close. We did, however, get SOAKED as some rain came through, but rain canβt stop #GuideLife and it doesnβt stop the horses either! One cool takeaway from the day was seeing one of the new foals, Dove, nursing. That was a unique sight.
Saturday: Summer has finally arrived and it is HOT but manageable and nothing like August heat, so my 3 tours went well. The heat usually draws the horses onto the beach, so every tour saw 30 or more horses, most just lounging on the beach. We did get to see one of the foals, Drake, sleeping on the beach as well. In fact it was a great day for foals – we saw the three spring foals on each of my tours.
Now why is the inaugural This Week on Tour titled “A Little Too Close”? Because we had a skirmish between stallions happen right next to us. So close. A little too close. But I didnβt have many options. Sometimes wildlife puts you in an interesting situation and you have to respond.
(Want to see it for yourself? Find the video on my Instagram)
You are not allowed to intentionally be within 50 feet of our wild horses, and on tour I make sure to let my guests know that we never touch, pet, feed, ride, harass, or in any way alter our horses natural behavior. This last detail is important: ethical wildlife tours will never purposefully alter a wild animals behavior. That means no poking, baiting, feeding, or “messing with.”
The encounter happened fast. Scenario: Horses on the beach behind my Hummer, horses in front of me walking towards us. I never like to linger for long – I like to get in and out so as not to disturb the horses, so I started to move my Hummer away when it became apparent the horses walking were coming right at us. Sometimes the safest thing to do is nothing – stop, don’t make sudden moves, and let the horses move around you.
Suddenly the alpha stallion of the group moving took off aggressively towards the alpha of the other group and a fight was on!.. Sort of. A lot of chest puffing and hoofing at the ground and the skirmish ended. My guests and myself took a collective deep breath and continued on.
An encounter like that doesn’t happen every day.
Question of the Week
“Do the wild horses know not to swim out far enough to be eaten by sharks?”
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