Cascade Vaulters

She is getting to be a bit of an old nag, and will probably need to retire from competitive vaulting soon. But Cali still has occasional days like this weekend when she really is the perfect vaulting horse.
Our strong, steady, willing and harmonious teammate.

The Cascade Vaulters are looking for a non-U.S., ideally foreign speaking, female vaulter who would like to do a cultural exchange and come live with one of our member family for the summer to practice English and volunteer with our vaulting club.

Our host family live on a small farm outside Seattle with 4 horses, 3 dogs etc. Preference is for someone with riding experience and someone who likes animals. Our host family will cover board and food and this person will help with family chores including horse care. Many opportunities to ride on trails near our host family's house and travel with them to vaulting events and endurance horse riding competitions in other states. Our host family of 4 has 2 daughters, one who is on the vaulting team. References required. Email Mari through our contact us page. Spanish speaking would be great as our host family's daughters are fluent in Spanish.

The Cascade Vaulters are hosting the "Vaulters of the Northwest Spring Fest" on May 2 & 3, 2009 at Trails End Arena in Olympia Washington. All Cascade Vaulter supporters and the general public are invited to come watch as participants from across Washington, Oregon, British Columbia and Alberta compete in vaulting events at all levels, from the ultra cute Mighty Munchkins (under 6) up to and including the Canadian Champions.

For more information visit our VoNW.org website.

We got between 2.5 and 3 inches of water in the front barn overnight. The water is receding and has drained back out of the barns. Hutch reports that conditions at the back barn / main arena and in his garage are the about the same. [All three slab floors are at the same elevation.]

More pictures from last night and this morning are on my flickr site.

As of 3:45 AM, Still holding steady at about an inch of water in the barn.

River down significantly upstream at Snoqualmie. Still at or near crest
downstream at Carnation.

Still raining.

There's about an inch of water in the front barn now, and there should be about the same in the back barn. But based on the upstream gauges, this should be about the worst of it.

FALL CITY, WA -- As of 9:30 PM PST tonight most pastures and driveways at the Northwest Natural Horsemanship center on Patterson Creek Farm, home of the Cascade Vaulters, are under water. At the river gage upstream from us the river has crested but the one down river hasn't yet. And it's still raining.

So far the barns and house are still dry, though the garage has a wet floor and our barn manager, Hutch, is maintaining a sand bag dike across his garage doors. The water is at the main door thresholds of our front barn, and should be at about the same level at the back barn. The arenas, including at least a portion of the main indoor arena are also likely flooded. Out outdoor hogs fuel vaulting ring is probably under 4 to feet of water.

Most of the horses, including our vaulting horse Cali, have been evacuated. And a big thanks to Holly Moffatt, who is one of our vaulter moms and one of our longeurs. She spent much of the day today evacuating horses to various nearby farms and is hosting several at her house, including Cali.

Also NWNHC staff and a number of volunteers moved all the equipment off the tack room and up into the semi-finished lofts. Hopefully this will prevent any equipment damage.

Much of our vaulting equipment, including our practice barrels and gymnastics mats normally live in the loft of the back barn so should be well above even the highest possible flood waters.

Since we're close to our current membership target with only one or two more open membership slots available, we have decided to postpone the "See & Try Vaulting" event that was scheduled for September 13.

If you're interested in trying out for one of our remaining 2008-2009 memberships, please fill out a request on our "Contact Us" page. Once we reach our membership target, we will continue to offer tryouts but will place perspective vaulters on a waiting list.

If you're just interested in finding out more about vaulting and would like an opportunity to watch some vaulting, We're happy to have a small number of spectators at our practices, though please contact us before coming to make sure that we will have something worth watching.

You can also see the Cascade Vaulters, along with a number of other area vaulting clubs, at two upcoming regional competitions. The first will be the EVA of BC's Provincial Vaulting Championships at Heritage Park in Chilliwack, BC September 20 & 21. The second will be the Harbor View Vaulter's OktoberFest at Donida Farm in Auburn, WA on October 4 & 5.

On Wednesday July 30, 2008 a television crew from King 5, a Seattle TV station, visited the Cascade Vaulters for a special “Evening Magazine” practice. In addition to our regular members, several vaulters from other local clubs also participated. These vaulters included members of the Warm Beach Vaulters from Stanwood, WA, the Mt. Rainier Vaulters from Buckley, WA and the Sky Mountain Vaulters from Snohomish, WA.
Andrea Brown, head coach of the Sky Mountain Vaulters also brought down their wonderful horse, Snowdancer to help our vaulting horse Cali carry all the extra vaulters.

The segment aired on Tuesday August 12, 2008. Here is a link to the "Gymnastics on Horseback" video on the King 5 TV website. [Registration may be requires for repeated viewing.]