re: Vacation at a Dude Ranch?

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Wondering if anyone has taken a vacation to a dude ranch and if they recommend it as a family vacation?

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I ain't takin' off work to go work for some cow poke for free and wind up smelling like horse arse and dewormer.


Ah, on second thought, I probably would.

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Wondering if anyone has taken a vacation to a dude ranch and if they recommend it as a family vacation?

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We went on two of them and they were great. Laramie River Ranch had a great horse program and you had the river to fly fish in. The ranches can differ in what they offer, but you can expect decent accommodations, good food, and plenty of activities for the kids. You can do as much or as little as you want. I would recommend it.

I had little interest in riding horses at first and intended to spend my days fly fishing. But by the end of the week, I had become proficient at it and was enjoying it. The highlight of the Laramie River Ranch week was an all-day ride through country that gave no indication of what century you were in.

We also drove out there and that allowed us to see things like Mt Rushmore and the Black Hills, Scott's Bluff, the Great Plains, Little Big Horn, and lots of other things my girls had never seen before.

We have a few around here - Lone Mountain Ranch, 320 Guest Ranch, and Rainbow Ranch Lodge. There's one a good bit a ways further north called Ranch at Rock Creek, but that is thousands of dollars a night. Never stayed at any of them, but I've done some day pack trips and sleigh rides, and it's all cool as shite. Definitely recommend for a family.

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One of them got roped into a trip out to Yellowstone and the surrounding parks, which in and of itself is fantastic, but she insisted on spending thousands to stay at one of those ranches that is more upscale resort and spa than it is a true ranch. They had outdoor campfire upscale meals and shite prepared for them lol

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That sounds fun af.

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I ain't takin' off work to go work for some cow poke for free

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It's not free, you actually get to pay a handsome fee to work at the ranch.

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Exactly. Always a good chuckle when we have people out for their first time to work cattle. At least they don’t pay to come out to our place.

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Funny story. My California BIL showed up for the first time and took the truck out to “check out some cows”. He called freaking out because he was “surrounded”. Then he started honking and they got really worked up and started rocking the truck and banging him around. He was in the feed truck and my hand always used the horn to get them heading towards the feed. Dude was legit terrified and had to compose himself and really took a few minutes get it wrapped around his head that he could just drive and they would move.

I’ve made a bit of a useful hand out of him since. He’s hoed 6 snakes since then.

Following. My husband and I are doing a kid free Exuma trip in July. Not to be outdone, Mee Maww and Pee Paww would like to take the grand daughters to a dude ranch while we are gone. I have a family member who did the C lazy U ranch near Granby, CO, but it's $$$$$.

I looked into it. It’s WAAAAAY overpriced. We ended up renting a huge lodge to ourselves from airbnb on 100 acres and did all the stuff a la carte(horseback riding, rafting, etc) and paid half the price