Lee the Horselogger is not your typical kind of guy. He is perfectly content traveling in his wagon which is equipped with a wood burning stove, generator, along with other supplies and stocked with enough beet pulp to feed his team of five Suffolk Punche horses for a month.
His journey began August of 2006 in East Glacier, Mont. Since that time he claims he has done thousands of interviews, met at least a million people and is doing something most people only dream of — traveling around the country.
At a pace of 3 miles per hour he has traveled to Portland, Ore., Eugene, Ore., Seattle, Wash., Denver and Fowler, and will continue east.
He hopes to arrive in La Junta by Friday, but his ultimate destination is Massachusetts where he has a small job as a horse logger.
Horse logging is a dying art, and, according to Lee, there are only 200 horse loggers in the United States. Horse loggers do what modern day skidsters do only in a “green” way.
His team of horses — Tom, the lead horse, is 19 years old, Dink (Tom’s partner) is 10, Fey is 8, Fred 11 and Alice is 7 — pull 15,000 pounds, creating a big appetite.
“My team can eat up to 250 pounds of hay a day, that’s why I feed them beet pulp,” Lee said. “Fifty pounds of beet pulp is a lot more affordable.”
When asked if there are any memorable experiences during his travels he said, “Having met so many people along the way, and countless interviews, I really don’t have any specific moments that seem extremely memorable. There have been so many good things along the way, the negative things I just forget about.”
Does he miss the modern conveniences of life?
“I have never owned a television set and have never paid an electric bill. I have a cell phone only because a friend of mine pays for it. She wants to make sure I’m okay. I use it to catch up on news and as a tool to communicate,” Lee said.
When he stops, he finds a place where there are conveniences such as a laundromat, restaurants and a level place for his wagon and team. His travel expenses are paid for by donations. Just as he pulled into the parking lot of the Tamarack Grill in Fowler, there was someone waiting with a bale of hay for the horses.
