Leaving family and really good friends behind in Idaho was searingly painful. But to age gracefully, we just did not want to do it shoveling and plowing snow, living through cloudy days and smoke-smoggered skies from fires in surrounding states and Canada.
Hubby Bill’s hobby has been growing hot, hot peppers and turning them into masterpieces of jelly, hot sauce and pickled peppers. He developed friends who also appreciated burning out their taste buds with super spicey foods. (Personally, I never tried them). But growing peppers was problematical with the short growing season. Clearly time to move.

How to move goats and a livestock guardian dog across the US. There are haulers that will do that for a large fee. Researching this option indicated there are horror stories of animals dying of heat and dehydration with the wrong company. The decision was made to purchase a new but not abused 2-horse trailer, put a hitch on my SUV and haul them that way. Bad timing. This was Fall of 2021. Covid was ramping up and trailers of any sort were not available in Idaho or Washington – new or used. The few that we did locate needed a major rebuild job. We eventually found a used cargo trailer with windows for ventilation. It was in really good shape for a very reasonable price. Two of the goats weighed in at about 260 lbs each, one at 185 and the little one at 65. This trailer would suffice for a short time. We also had a small RV for us to stay in that Bill would pull with the truck. All we needed now were places to camp. Not every campground would appreciate goats sampling the local foliage and a large dog patrolling around.

People travel across the country with livestock all the time for shows and competitions. Research turned up several networks of horse motels around the world. Defining our parameters, we decided that since we had no experience traveling with livestock, we would be wise to stick close to interstates all the way. This left out our usual selections of camping in remote campsites in state or national parks. These were all too far from the road and emergency help if we needed it. Hours were spent looking at each facility, its nearness to an interstate and its distance from the last facility. That is what selected our route. No short cuts on state road. Less direct and several hundred miles more than we would have liked.

The plan was to spend 5-6 hours (and no more) on the road each day. Reservations were made at horse motels that we thought were about that far from each other. What we failed to calculate into our plan was the speed limit in each state. Montana’s limit was 75-80 mph, and the hours of travel were calculated on that speed. Most people were traveling 5-10 mph over that limit. We were tooling along at a sedate 55-65 mph hauling animals and an RV with frequent stops. Each day turned out to be much longer than anticipated.

Before leaving Coeur d’Alene, we spent a month taking goats for at first short and then longer and longer rides in the trailer and did the same with the Great Pyrenees/Anatolian. Our first “trip” was to our good friend and neighbor’s house because he had a circle drive, and I would not have to back up the trailer. He patiently gave me lessons on how to haul, how to set the brake, and how to back up (did not master that one, sorry Dave!). Our Idaho vet (a fantastic vet and wonderful person) loaded us up with every imaginable medication that could possibly be needed on this trip. For rumen support, we gave thiamine shots to the goats every day. But we had a large toolbox with meds for pain, sedation, antibiotics, etc that we never had to use.

And then it was time to go. My son set up a wifi camera in the trailer so I could watch the goats throughout the trip on my iPad and see how they were doing. Furniture, clothes and barn equipment were packed and shipped to Halls. Our itinerary was set. First stop was a little farm outside of Ramsey MT, then Rapid City SD, Mitchell SD, Des Moines IA, Pontoon Beach IL, Lexington KY, and Luttrell TN!