PART I ... THE BIG IDEA

The following post was originally posted to the Camel Dairy Diary at cameldairy.blogspot.com. As the idea to cross the desert drinking camel's milk grows, it is taking on a life of it's own and so now has it's own blog. The first two entries are posts from the Dairy Diary.



Gil is full of big ideas. And I love him for that. If it wasn't for Gil and his big ideas, we wouldn't be a CAMEL DAIRY! We wouldn't have this ranch and our lives would not be as interesting and rich as they are.

But this idea is VERY BIG. He mentions it every once in a while, kind of like ... wouldn't it be neat? But then reality crashes in and we are busy doing so many things... until it drifts in again... wouldn't it be neat.

Years before we ever squeezed out our first drop of camel milk from our first milking camel, Latifa, Gil was intrigued by the idea of Bedouins crossing the Desert, surviving months at a time with nothing to eat but milk from the caravan's camels. Now that we are milking camels regularly, think Gil's big idea spends a lot more time in the front of his mind.

As we add more and more milking camels to our herd, Gil revisits the idea from time to time. "We could do this," he'll say. "We can make a desert trek right here in the U.S. for two months and bring Goldie and Tula with their babies for milk, and ride the geldings like Boo-boo, Camelot, Jamal... are are a lot of great candidates. He talks about having a camel outfitted w/ solar power and web-up links to bring the world along on the adventure. He talks about visiting schools and historical sites along the way. He usually loses me more than a bit when he mentions things like Bedouins washing their hair in camel urine and burning the dung for campfires.

The last time Gil uttered the words, "wouldn't that be neat" was this past October, '09 while we were driving to Ridgcrest California with the Wild West Turkey Stampede to perform at the Desert Empire Fair.

Winding our way through gorgeous, endless desert, Gil gazed out the window for a long time before turning to me and saying once again, "we could do this... we could really do this."
And as I looked out the window across the quiet desert, I have to say for the first time, I also thought; wouldn't that be neat. We could do this. We have the camels now and it would be an amazing adventure.

Time to start planning...
This is going to be neat.....