Experience the Old West and try out team penning and cattle drives at
Montana’s Triple Creek Ranch!
A Montana hideaway in the Bitterroot Mountains, Triple Creek Ranch stays true to its Western roots and celebrates cowboy culture, with both cattle drives and team penning opportunities.
What’s in a cattle drive?
Cattle drives at Triple Creek Ranch are the real deal, not a spectator sport and they are the single most popular activity at Triple Creek Ranch. In fact, they often book up a year in advance on certain dates!
Guests learn firsthand from seasoned ranch hands how to move from 100 to 800 head of cattle, just as it’s been done in the West for more than a century. Triple Creek Ranch partners with the neighboring Sula Peak Cattle Ranch and Ehmann’s Ranch in support of their rotation grazing efforts, working with the cowboys and cowgirls to push cows from pasture to pasture.
These partner ranches are located in a scenic area called the French Basin, just a 30-minute drive away. It’s a hands-on activity for everyone, from tenderfoots who’ve just begun to ride, to those who are experienced horsemen.
Triple Creek Ranch wranglers have guests participate in a ranch trail ride prior to the cattle drive to assess riding level, and ensure that guests are matched with appropriate horses and tasks on the cattle drive. Guests take a break midday to enjoy a gourmet packed picnic lunch from the Triple Creek Ranch Kitchen in a serene valley where the only other sound may be the cows munching their own lunch.
Cattle Drives are planned from June through mid-October, on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. The cost is $200 per person.
Go team!
Team penning is a lively and interactive way for guests at Triple Creek Ranch to saddle up and enjoy a fast-paced competition on horseback. It’s a timed event, where a team of guests and cowhands separate individual calves from the herd, and move those calves to their separate pens.
The sport of team penning grew out of the daily ranch chores of sorting calves from their cows so they can be vaccinated, branded or otherwise treated, the type of work that ranch hands still must do all year round. Team penning turns work into a participatory sport, and allows cowboys and cowgirls to showcase their horsemanship. Teamwork is key and every level of rider is welcome to participate and have fun!
The cost is $150 per person.
World’s Best Hotel
While participating in a cattle drive or in a team penning, competition may get a little dusty, you won’t exactly be roughing it. Triple Creek Ranch, a luxurious adults-only Relais & Châteaux retreat, was voted the ‘World’s Best Hotel’ in the Travel and Leisure 2014 World’s Best Awards and named a ‘Forbes Travel Guide Four-Star Hotel’ in 2015.
Riders can look forward to Executive Chef Jacob Leatherman’s stellar cuisine and a wine list overseen by sommelier Jeremy White that has won 10 Wine Spectator Awards.
The accommodations are in 24 individual luxury cabins, with a private or nearby hot tub, sumptuous king bed and a wood-burning fireplace. All inclusive cabin rates start at $950 per couple, per night.
Triple Creek Ranch
Triple Creek Ranch is located in Darby, Montana, in the Bitterroot Range of the Rocky Mountains. An all-inclusive retreat for adults and children 16 years and older, the Ranch is a member of Relais & Châteaux and Virtuoso. Rates start at $950 per couple, per night, based on double occupancy and include a private log cabin, all meals, house wines, spirits and beers, and a range of outdoor activities including horseback riding, fly fishing, cooking classes, skijoring and more.
For more information and reservations, email info@triplecreekranch.com, call 800-654-2943, or visit www.triplecreekranch.com