Through the Woods

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Spike and Ike snort and stomp around the bend, charging toward a sliver of sunlight that warms the blood like a gulp of whiskey.

They nudge and nip at one another playfully, their feet burrowing into the snow with the weight of a couple dozen bowling balls, the bells hung around their thick necks chattering like anxious schoolchildren.

Clop, crunch, jingle. Clop, crunch, jingle.

It’s the sounds of the season on the frosty slopes of Mount Charleston.

It’s a bit past noon on a recent Monday, the stout, welcoming aroma of burning wood and evergreen hangs in the air, and Spike and Ike are tugging an onerous load up the mountain side at a 25 degree angle, though they show few signs of strain.

The two Belgian draft horses pull a bright red sleigh up the trails that surround Cathedral Rock, a jagged peak that looms over the area like a schoolyard bully.

A small community of snowmen populates the area, some of whom have lost crucial body parts to the sun or wayward sledders, as the hills are alive with families frolicking in all that white stuff that’s largely foreign to Las Vegas, yet only a 45-minute drive away.

“Those are Budweiser horses!” a dad exclaims as Spike and Ike trot by, their coats damp with sweat.

“No, they bring Miller Lite,” their driver, John Mayne, shoots back with a chuckle, his frame shrouded in a red flannel work shirt.

It’s quite a ride: bumpy and breathtaking, scenic as a Norman Rockwell painting come to life.

With a local landscape dominated by the desert and acres of neon, a sleigh ride at the Mount Charleston Lodge is a welcome holiday retreat, a way to escape the bustling shopping malls and breathe in some mountain air so crisp, it stings the lungs a bit upon first gasp.

For Robert Humphries, owner of Las Vegas Carriage, which puts on the sleigh rides, it’s a family thing.

“I grew up on sleighs,” says Humphries, who was raised on a ranch in Wyoming. “We fed cattle with sleighs, fed all our livestock with a team of horses.

“I had never actually taken a commercial sleigh ride,” he adds, recalling the start of the Mount Charleston rides, which date back to the early ’80s. “I got the idea in the summertime, and when they told me how much snow they got there, I said, ‘This would be the ideal place.’ ”

That it is, with winding trails lined by dense patches of thick forest, with 10-story trees looming over the land like nature’s skyscrapers.

It’s a departure for the horses as well, who work in a variety of locations, from Springs Preserve to downtown Las Vegas, where they give carriage rides around the city.

“You adapt your horse to whatever it’s pulling,” Humphries explains. “You have to feed them all they can eat, and if the horse is fed all he can eat and the horses are bred for that kind of work, they can do it excellently. We have a lot of different horses that we use up there, and they all work real good.”

On this day, Spike and Ike seem to be enjoying themselves as much as their passengers, frolicking in the snow, with Ike fond of sliding down the hillside on the way back, letting the earth glide beneath his hooves.

“Easy boys,” Mayne instructs as they come to a stop near the lodge after a 20 minute ride, which offers a bit of a glimpse into the past.

With Las Vegas posited on constant rebirth, of the old continually being torn down in favor of the new, the excursion is a deliberately slow ride in a town firmly entrenched in the fast lane.

“One of our sleighs is an original sleigh that was built back in the early 1900s for the purpose of transportation — it wasn’t built for recreation, it was strictly to get to and from town, the doctor, school,” Humphries says, reflecting on all the history associated with his sleigh rides. “The best way I can describe it, it’s like taking a trip back in time a hundred years.”

Contact reporter Jason Bracelin at jbracelin@reviewjournal.com or (702) 383-0476.