Photo courtesy of KD Guest Ranch
Home Away from Home on the Range
A look at Ohio’s dude ranches
Take a break from congested rush hour drives to exchange your factory-made steed for a living and breathing one.
If you don’t have such a steed, then feel free to rent one.
Guest ranches, also known as dude ranches, are known quantities: spots where visitors can ride horses and participate in activities that may evoke a feeling of the old West. But it’s not just the West that hosts them; there are a handful right here in Ohio.
KD Guest Ranch
When Dave and Kari Burkey opened KD Guest Ranch eight years ago, they based it off a variety of western guest ranches, including several on which Dave worked as an intern.
“You feel like you’re part of the family, not just renting a horse for an hour,” says Burkey. “It’s a different way of looking at life and people.”
KD is located in Adamsville, northeast of Zanesville, and can host 15 guests.
Burkey says the cowboy mentality of greater connectedness to horses is key to the way KD is run. For instance, one of the primary guest activities is team penning, a timed game in which groups of three riders on horses attempt to bring three calves out of a larger group of animals and bring them into a small pen.
Other activities for KD guests include horseback riding on trails in the areas around the ranch and taking a drive through the Wilds, a 10,000-acre nature reserve for exotic animals that is owned by the Columbus Zoo and Aquarium.
Meals for KD guests range from hash browns, eggs, bacon and sausage for breakfast to ribeye steaks or chicken parmesan for dinner.
“I cannot think of a single week that we have not sold a cookbook after our friends have eaten here,” says Burkey.
In Operation: April-October for guests; cabins may be rented by hunters October-January
Prices: $195 per adult per day from mid-April to Memorial Day and from Labor Day through October; $995 per adult for four days and four nights from June to Labor Day.
Available Horse Riding Land: Approx. 900 acres
www.kdguestranch.com
Photo courtesy of Smoke Rise Ranch Resort
Home Away from Home on the Range
Smoke Rise Ranch Resort
The Smoke Rise Ranch Resort is a working cattle and horse ranch that has been welcoming guests for about 30 years.
It’s located in Wayne National Forest in Glouster, in southeast Ohio. Including its sizable volume of camping space, Smoke Rise can host more than 1,000 guests.
“We create ranch horses, and they’ve got to be ‘bomb-proof,’ to put it in one way,” says Jeff Niese, who has owned the ranch with his wife, Annette, since last January.
One of the reasons the ranch “bomb-proofs” its horses is an event that takes place three times each year: “The Great Train Robbery,” in which about 40 riders from Smoke Rise stop the train on the Hocking Valley Scenic Railway, then “rob” it at gunpoint.
The guns are revolvers loaded with blanks, and the purloined money is of the Monopoly variety.
Among the more frequent guest activities at the ranch are cattle sorting and penning, and horseback riding on trails around the ranch.
People staying at the Smoke Rise can bring their own horses, and a variety of other activities, including archery, are available periodically.
In Operation: Year-round.
Prices: Lodging rates for two adults and two children range from $20 per night for simple camping to $175 per night for their largest furnished cabin. There are additional fees for renting horses and housing horses on the ranch.
Available Horse Riding Land: Approx. 2,000 acres owned and leased by the ranch, plus access to approx. 30,000 acres in the surrounding national forest.
www.smokeriseranch.com
Photo courtesy of Spotted Horse Ranch
Home Away from Home on the Range
Spotted Horse Ranch
Spotted Horse Ranch is a smaller affair: a working ranch with roughly 500 animals on site, from cows and pigs to water buffalo and fallow deer.
Spotted Horse is located in Laurelville in the southern part of the state. It has 15 campsites but can host parties of 200 people for larger events such as weddings.
“The goal was not to be the biggest place out here,” says owner Matt Solt. “The goal was to make it more relaxing,”
Guest activities on the ranch are largely limited to horseback riding, and Solt says that this would probably not be continued if not for the Appaloosa horses that are bred and raised on the ranch.
Appaloosas are known to generally be an intelligent breed, and the stallion at this ranch is the son of three-time world champion halter horse Classy Andrew.
In Operation: Year-round.
Prices: $50 per day for a cabin, $35 and up per night for camping for four. There are additional fees for horseback riding.
Available Horse Riding Land: Approx. 500 acres.
www.thespottedhorseranch.com
Francis Pellicciaro is a contributing writer. Feedback welcome at gbishop@cityscenemediagroup.com.
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