(Note: Images of the new boys will be added a.s.a.p.)
Right after the holidays we made a trip to Ohio. Before Thanksgiving I had purchased a young male alpaca with the hopes of adding him to our herd sire row. I am always on the look out for up and coming males that can add to my breeding program and when I saw Asteroid's Kryptonite listing from Starling Farm, he immediately caught my eye. After looking at his fiber samples, and pedigree I made the decision to purchase him.
We planned our trip right after Christmas as our window of opportunity to travel was very limited. Chris has a very aggressive travel schedule and we are also expecting our first grand daughter the beginning of February. With our fingers crossed we decided to leave on Dec. 27, 08. I have to say we couldn't of picked a better weekend weather wise, it was clear and mild. It was almost hard to believe that the week prior, New York and Ohio had a snow storm each that dropped 12 inches. Fate was on our side!
On the way we also made a stop at Spirit Wind Alpaca Farm and had a wonderful visit with Karen and Jerry. If time had not been pressing us I could of stayed for hours talking alpacas and fiber. We finished the rest of our journey that day arriving in Ohio at 7:00 pm and the temperature was 67 degrees (unheard of for the time of year).
The plan was to pick up Kryptonite at 8:00 the following morning. We were also transporting another alpaca "Just Sam" for Cyndee Thompson in New Hampshire. Just prior to arriving at the farm my nerves started racing and I began questioning my decision. I asked myself, Were my expectations too high? and Was I going to be disappointed? Having never seen the animal first hand, there is always that gut feeling that you missed something in the photos and fiber samples. It would have been very disappointing to travel all that distance to be let down, but I have to say all those questions quickly disappeared the minute I laid eyes on him. It was love at first sight and he was more than I expected him to be. It was so great to meet his owner in person, Jackie Kraft. We had talked so many times through email or on the phone and now I had the opportunity to meet her in person and put a face with the name and voice.
We loaded up the "boys" and had a brief visit before packing up ourselves and heading back towards home. We had one more stop to make and that was at Humalot Alpaca Farm. Brenda and Jim were only an hour away from Jackie Craft and I didn't want to miss the chance to meet them and some of their alpacas. I had called her the day before and told her we would be in the area and if possible to stop in. Being a holiday weekend you just never know what peoples plans are. They warmly welcomed us with a tour of their farm and alpacas, finished off with a great cup of coffee. We enjoyed our visit so much and their alpacas we bought one more. Humalot Black Tiger. Tiger is just over a year old, is true black, with a fine, yet dense beautifully crimped fiber which is very hard to find in black so I'm happy to add him to our herd sire lineup. In this one trip across half the country and back we managed to add some great genetics to our existing herd and are excited about future breedings.
The trip was so much fun but a little too rushed for my liking. We left here on my birthday, Sat. morning at 4:30am, stopped at three alpaca farms, spanning over 1400 miles and still managed to arrive at our farm by 10pm Sunday. Birthday's don't get much better than that!!! I wonder how I can top it next year.
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