Our family is very excited to be celebrating 50 years of great ranch vacations in 2015.  We are so grateful that my grandmother, Helen Rankin, had the forethought to open her doors to guests in 1965.  My grandfather, Leroy, had passed away just 11 years earlier.  She was busy running our cattle ranch and raising three children (Julia, Patty, and Bill), but she saw an opportunity to diversify the ranch and did so against the advice of many friends and neighbors.  We are so happy that she did.

Each winter our family sits down to plan for the upcoming guest season, but it has been a bit different this year.  The conversation always leads to stories from the past 50 years of guests, employees, and family members that all make up our bigger “ranch family”.  Each generation has their own collection of priceless memories.  We want to thank you for these memories.  Our ranch family has brought so much joy to our lives and we hope that the ranch has touched your lives in some small way as well.

We are looking forward to our 50^th guest ranch season which will begin on March 27^th.  We will be having some special activities throughout the season and hope that you will plan to join us.  Whether it will be your first ranch experience or your annual visit, the beauty of Walker Basin will be waiting to welcome you.  Our good friend and retired film maker, Chuck Barbee, made this short video for us to try to capture the essence of the ranch.  It is hard to convey 152 years of cattle ranching history and 50 years of great ranch vacations in just 4 minutes, but we think he did a great job.  We hope you enjoy it!