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Ashley Hayes ReportingIt's safe to say the majority of us are not going to make it to the North Pole this year. But if you are looking for a little adventure, a sleigh ride perhaps, there's a ranch in Cache Valley offering a unique experience just in time for the holidays.
These sleigh rides offer more than a mountain view.
At Hardware Ranch, Clydesdale horses pull sleighs through a meadow filled with elk, hundreds of them.
At the ranch they are saying if you can't make it to the North Pole to see Santa's reindeer, come see their cousins, the elk.
In Blacksmith Fork Canyon, the horses know the way.
Every year they carry sleighs through the white and drifted snow to offer a glimpse into Cache Valley's winter wonderland.
Marni Lee/ Asst. Manager, Hardware Ranch: "This is so much better than going to see Christmas lights."
Beginning each December, Hardware Ranch hosts hundreds of guests. Look closely and you can see them on the hill-- wild elk waiting for their breakfast invitation. The bell. The rev of a John Deere.
Darren Dubloois/ Biologist: "They know they can come grab a bite to eat, so they're coming pretty fast. They know the drill."
The drill... free food in exchange for providing the public with a unique wildlife encounter. Sleigh rides where you are so close...
"You're within arm's length of a seven point bull."
Managers say on a busy Saturday this sleigh could be full of 20 people. They run four of them at a time. They say sometimes the wait can get pretty lengthy, but then you really can't beat the view.
"You can look at them in the photographs, look at them on the tv, but to actually be out in a herd, to smell them, to hear them, to see them, it's something absolutely fabulous."
But come prepared. The cold stings the toes, and bites the nose.
"Wear good boots. Always want to have gloves and a hat, scarf, and the warmest coats and layers."
As over the ground we go.
The state owns Hardware Ranch and it is paid for not by the taxpayers, but through sportsman dollars.
The elk sanctuary is 1,000 of the 14-thousand acre ranch. Rides cost between 3 and 5 dollars a person.
