In June of 2023, Holden, Hayden, and I flew from Kailua Kona, nine hours to Atlanta Georgia.  From there we went our separate ways. A week later we met back up in Perry Georgia at the Georgia State Fairgrounds. The fairgrounds were loaded with thousands of rodeo kids from all over the United States and three other countries; Mexico, Australia, and Canada. We filled the campgrounds like a packed can of sardines, kids were camping in horse trailers or RVs.  The smell of greasy carnival food filled the air. There were at least 12 stands with fried greasy food like corn dogs, fries, funnel cakes, and any carnival food really. It was so hard to resist the fried foods.

This is when the fun began. Every family got a golf cart. Some were red, white and blue. Most families decorated the carts with items from home. I put a Hawaii license plate, on ours along with shark floaties, pineapples, and a sign that said #TeamHawaii! 

Nationals were about a week and a half long.  I was told that it would be sunny, miserable, and hot. However, there were tornado and thunderstorm warnings. That week was hot and sticky like a southern summer a few of the days but the week was mostly rainy and thundery. About midweek, the chaos began. Kids were driving through puddles, doing donuts on the wet grass, and racing golf carts by the ponds. There’s a video from a few years ago of kids driving their golf carts into a pond.

One morning, it was super busy with everyone going to feed their horses on their golf carts. At the four-way stop, three kids came flying into the intersection without stopping and they all crashed into each other. The kids who were competing and owned the carts almost all got disqualified from the rodeo. Two of the golf carts were totally wrecked, the other just dented and scratched. 

 On the two hot days, the states were at war. Walmart was sold out of water balloons and water guns; the rodeo kids bought them all. I saw a kid in his cowboy attire for the rodeo performance that day get drenched while going to get his horse ready.  He was so furious and mad. That day I had a six-seater and it was filled with Uncle Rob, Jeremiah, Hayden, Holden, and I. So pretty much all of my friends from Hawaii. Some kid from New Mexico shot Uncle Rob in the face with water, WHILE HE WAS DRIVING! He was furious. We swerved to get away from it while Uncle Rob cleared his face to see. We rushed back to the camper, filled up balloons and guns, and went straight back. Team Washington had a whole blow-up pool filled with balloons. We got drenched. 

Later that afternoon, Holden, my roping partner, and I were up in the rodeo performance so we had to end the water balloon wars and go get ready. Holden missed but we had a good time. The next day there was a fishing tournament at the HUGE pond by the entrance. It was miserably hot in the morning and we sat by the pond while Jeremiah tried to win the tournament. He didn’t catch anything for two hours so I walked back to the RV where the A/C was waiting for me. I fell asleep for a bit until knock-knock, it was Holden. “Help me beam these kids parked across from us!” We won that fight, they weren’t too happy. Some little boy took Holden’s water gun but it was okay because it only shot up to two feet and was from the Dollar Tree store.

Every morning we were up at five am, cleaned horse stalls, and did it again at night. Imagine about 1,000 kids with one to five horses each! There were tons of horses. That night Holden and I went to rope at a jackpot. A jackpot is a rodeo version of, for example, a soccer scrimmage but a rodeo. It was about nine p.m. when I did my breakaway run. Which is the rodeo event where you rope a calf and the rope breaks off of your saddle. We finished the breakaway at about 11 o’clock p.m. Then we had team roping. Which didn’t start till 12 am! I honestly don’t remember much that morning but I remember Holden and I walking back to the barn at three am. We set the horses for the night and went straight to bed. I don’t think we even showered. At night while trying to go to sleep, all you could hear were kids screaming with joy, laughing, and the sound of a golf cart flying by. 

Later that week, we had to start to pack up. It was very sad watching the trailers of fun start to roll out. If there’s anything I learned, it was to not trust the little boys – they had water balloons in their pants, in bags, and buckets! I would take the back roads to and from my RV when going places where I wouldn’t want to get wet. All in all, I had a great time at nationals and I hope to make it again this year.