Wild Goat Ridge Farmstay

13/11/2024

25/03/2024

With the traumatic end to this year’s Married At First Sight I thought we should keep the ‘love’ for Jack going….😂😂

18/03/2024

For those of you local to Gulgong you might have heard about Mia’s Journey and this brave young woman and her family

If you can donate anything to help with their medical expenses here is the link

Wishing you strength and good health Mia

It is heartbreaking to even write this but unfortunately Mia needs our help again. 12 months ag… Amy Lee needs your support for Mia's Journey Continues......

01/03/2024

It’s the best time of the year!!
Forget Xmas, your birthday, exotic holidays….

The Footy is back! 🏉
And the NRL is kicking off in Las Vegas of all places 🥳

Hoo Haa!

So here is our Top 8 prediction - What’s yours?

Brisbane
Penrith
Roosters
Cronulla
Souths
Melbourne
NZ
Newcastle

23/02/2024

Ann turned vet for the day yesterday to help ‘Kevin’ one of our sheep.🐑

Funniest thing I’ve seen all week😂

29/01/2024

Wild Goat Ridge organised a Mudgee Wine Region tour for 4 of us and what a great day.
Thank you to Psychicx Sista, our Tarot Reading driver 🔮😃
And also 4 wonderful Mudgee wineries including Lazy Oak Vineyard, Bunnamagoo Estate Wines, lunch at Vinifera Wines, ending with Gin and Schnaps at Baker Williams Distillery 🍷🍷
Thanks for a great day Julie, David and Ann

21/12/2023

Had a phone call from a Wine Sales company in South Australia today trying to sell wine before Xmas. 📞

As our Farmstay Wild Goat Ridge is in the Mudgee wine region I wasn’t interested.🐑🐓🐐

However, the sales person still asked, after I declined his sales pitch,
“Okay, thanks, but are we still going to slip one in though before Xmas?”

I nearly spat into my Mudgee Merlot😂😂😂

So here is a question for you.

What is the worst line you have ever had from a person trying to sell you something?

Have a great Xmas and outstanding 2024

28/10/2023

Currently mountaineering in Nepal and while these might not be the Wild Goats seen wandering through Cooks Gap, the one with a milk crate on its head doesn’t look happy!🐐🐐

29/05/2023

Back to the Mountains #9: Into Thin Air.
In the best selling book ‘Into Thin Air’ by Jon Krakauer he defines the challenges of being at Altitude.

At ground/sea level our ‘relative oxygen level’ is 100%.
At 6 kilometres above the earth it’s 47%, over half the typical amount of oxygen we naturally breathe in.

Any sudden energetic effort, like jumping over a stream or clambering over a large boulder results in our heart rate soaring and us doubled over gasping for air.

Long term and you get headaches, nausea, loss of appetite, dehydration, and worse…..

Despite this, today was the day we’d been waiting 4 years for as we started our attempt to summit our 1st 6,000metre peak, Acotango.

The alarm woke us at 1am as we slept in a mud brick and thatched roof room, fully clothed under 5 heavy llama wool blankets.

Then after a 2 hour drive along hazardous mountain tracks at 4am we started our ascent, the first few hours up through dry, volcanic shale and dirt that looked like porridge oats, Ann roped up to Juan, myself roped to Cato.

It was still pitch black with only the stars above and the narrow beam of our head torches showing us the way as we inched our way up one step at a time.

At around 5.45am the peripheral glow of light started to appear behind a far off horizon and very slowly the day woke up, stretching its long amber arms across the valley we’d left behind.

The sun’s brilliant cyclops eye finally peered across at us at 06.55, projecting its warming rays in our direction to warm and reenergise us.

4 hours after we’d started we hit the snow-line and stopped to snack and fit our crampons, vicious looking metal skeletons with 10 iron spikes that strap to the underside of our snow boots, giving us traction and preventing us slipping or falling on the treacherous ice and snow.

With the air getting thinner with each step, at around 5,900m the mountain threw another test at us and veered sharply upwards, along a narrow ridge with a steep drop into Bolivia on our left and Chile on our right.

Ann calmly fought her demons drawing from the memory of her brother John and family friend Claire, both inspiring her even though they have passed.

Up to now I’d been climbing well and relishing the challenge but then suddenly, with no warning, the altitude hit me and every step became a trial, fighting to gain a lung full of thin air and repel any fatigue, the latter slowly gaining the upper hand.

We knew were over 6,000m but didn’t stop as we fought the last 52 metres, finally making it to the summit at 10.10am on May 19th, 2023, an unimportant date to most but of huge significance to Ann and I.

There was no euphoric celebration or feeling of success; just exhaustion and relief that we’d achieved our goal, together.

Plus a sense of caution that we didn’t to lose our footing and take the quick way back down….

A time to refuel and also marvel at the spectacular 360 summit views.

It’s a fact that 80% of mountaineering accidents happen descending not ascending and having spent over 90 minutes at this altitude, as ‘The Rabbit’ (Ann) took off down with Juan, I started to feel really tired and light headed, each downward step a struggle.

At one stage a slight uphill slope left me breathless and bent over as my wife buggered off and left me behind!😳

Then, after a brief stop to take off our crampons and grab a mouth-full of chocolate (and coca leaves, purely for energy and ‘medicinal purposes’) we followed the rough track back down, regularly slipping and losing our foothold on the volcanic sand and rocks like skiers on an icy black run.

Until finally after 9 hours, totally depleted and worn out we made it to the vehicle and our lift back to La Paz for a warm shower and long exhausted sleep.

What a great day to be alive and Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night.

PS: Thank you to everyone who follows Wild Goat Ridge and has read and/or commented on our updates as we really do appreciate it and we are happy you enjoy them.

15/05/2023

Wondering if we can smuggle one of these llamas back from Machu Picchu to Wild Goat Ridge in our packs?

They are huge compared to our 2 alpacas Ken and Keith!

17/04/2023

Most of us heard the devasting news about the murder of paramedic Steven Tougher last week.
If anybody wants to donate to help support his young family here is the GoFundMe link.

Rest in Peace Steven and Thank You to you and your colleagues for your service

If you are wishing to make a tax deductible donation, please follow the link to … Adam McKaig needs your support for Support for Madison and her family

14/04/2023

Before and After: We finally got the outside and roof repainted, from 1970s diarrhea brown to shining white (When I say we, Ann did most of the hard work😂)👩‍🎨👩‍🎨

11/03/2023

My favourite video of the week
❤️👩‍🌾🐑

07/03/2023

Our new driveway is done!
Thank you Alan Marriott at A&M Excavations👍

02/03/2023

Okay, so as you know, today is one of, if not THE best days of the year.

Forget Xmas, birthdays and public holidays…….

The NRL kicks off again tonight

Hoo Haa!🥳🥳

So here is my forecast for the league table at the end of the season

Top 8:
Cowboys
Cronulla
Roosters
Panthers
Souths
Melbourne
Parramatta
Brisbane
9-17:
Gold Coast
Manly
Bulldogs
Tigers
Warriors
Dolphins
Canberra
Newcastle
St George Illawarra

26/02/2023

The Wild Goats are back from their ‘summer holidays’.
Haven’t seen them for a few months as they followed the water holes and cooler regions