She is still doing her stompy feet below as we head off, hates the splint boots on her hind legs but she has nicked her left inner fetlock enough times for me to need to be preventative at this point. The Haf splint boots I have are in terrible condition after light use and they’re too big for her skinny lil legs. Think I’ll get some short fetlock boots since I only need to protect that specific spot and she seems annoyed by the tall splints.

 See ya in a few hours!

I rode out from the base of the dam, looped around to Sycamore Hill from the railroad track side, climbed the Hill, and looped back around to the trailer area, but was only at about 6.5 miles so crossed the road and climbed partway up the dam before crossing back over the road and sneaking down the bike trails back to the truck and trailer. I walked the downhill bike trail on foot and it was longer than I remembered, but good to stretch my legs. Loose gravel on top of pavement is officially the crappiest footing ever! Slippy slidey, break your necky! I would NOT ride down it.

Beautiful morning alone on the trails:

Climbing Sycamore Hill:

View from the top of the Sycamore Hill:

And back down we go, past the horse eating rocks:

Sneaking across a parking lot to the bike trails…coz a bright white horse with it’s tail to the sky crossing an empty parking lot doesn’t stand out AT ALL..

2 fat noggins in one picture! yes!

Just enough water and mucky moments in the trail to make hooves and boots totally filthy. One of my fronts popped off on an uphill power move and when I remounted after cramming it back on my (metal) right ankle rolled pretty good, like the worst I’ve done since I broke it 2 1/2 years ago. It started to sing immediately but not too too badly and what was I going to do about it anyway, so I rode on. I felt it a bit on the long walk down the hill back to the rig and when I got home I strapped one of Desire’s ice boots on my leg for a while and am wearing my ankle brace now. It’s sore. My right knee is starting to ache too, I think I tweaked it a little. I’ve worked 40 miles with 4 different horses in the last 5 days, I won’t be slowed down! Got to be careful though. Big plans for Hat Creek in a couple of weeks and all that..

Mucky toes:

Sweaty stinky mare:

And I DO mean stinky. She got sprayed by a skunk! Or rolled in grass that was sprayed, or something! Her head smells the worst. I’ve been thinking it for the last few days but also wondering if it was just lingering in the air around her pasture when I go out there. But my husband smelled it on her head today!  My girl dog eats feces like candies and my girl horse gets sprayed by a skunk..stinky, gross chicks!

I scrubbed Desire with Cowboy Magic shampoo and blued her mane when we got home, even let the hose pour over her head and scrubbed her face as well as she would tolerate. Surpisingly she does like having the hose up between her ears with the water flowing over her face. I would have thought she would HATE it, but you just never know and I tried it the other day with good results.

A little cleaner…

My unicorn glowing out in the farthest field, there’s an evil mini lurking in the shadows behind the stump, too:

Joey training session in a couple of hours..it’s HOT today, the first real day of hiding inside with the swamp coolers blasting during the hottest hours..guess it’s just about summer, really!

Just love this pic!

 Wide open spaces for trotting and cantering:

 Pose-off! Yeah, not bad

Spotty butt! Went through 4 or 5 gates and between J and I we managed to open and close just about all of them from horseback:

Here J comes, trot trotting on her mare! Her mare was great and kept calm when we trotted away/out of sight.

 Ahh, somce cool greenery and shade near a pond, ready for a break:

 Lunch stop! Complete with picnic tables:

 Hey there we are! Feeling chipper after some snacks in the shade:

Surefooted pair making their way carefully along:

Chief has such cool markings! I could look at pictures of him all day

 Can you spot the trail obstacle? I didn’t at first and I was about 10′ away!

Good Chiefy drinking. He drank 4 times in 10 miles!

Chief says NO and I say GO up that hill..

..And up we went!

Cruising on Chief:

 Riding the nice road back to the trailers:

Recruited some passing hikers to get us both in a photo, and it’s in focus! Score!

Oh yeah, wading, wading in the water!

Chiefy drinking again, like a star:

Just two cool cats cooling off:

Someone else was enjoying the water this afternoon, too:

See the trailer in the distance? The horses did!

Mare says “Hoo yeah, trailer in sight! Pep in my step!”

 Chief after 10 miles, still eating as usual:

 We un-tacked and took them back down to the first water crossing to cool down:

I couldn’t resist the water so waded in and scrubbed their sweaty saddle marks:

The mare wasn’t sure about this random person in the water scrubbing her, but decided it was kosher enough to stand for!

Working on deciphering her brand..so far we are reading CA, 1998, and 2110?5 Can’t tell the second to last mark on registration #…Anyone good reading these? I know it’s darn hard from the picture but give it a shot!

Another awesome ride with a good friend and fun horses! Another session with Joey and the trainer scheduled for tomorrow afternoon, looking forward to it.

Ooops, some horsey pictures slipped in. I resurrected this fly mask yesterday during the tack room restoration. It was housing a giant, incredibly nasty looking spider. After flicking it onto the ground with a stick and power washing it, it was once again functional, and though purchased for a tiny 13 hand Quarter Pony 2 years ago, it fit Mr. Blaze passably well:

This year’s pumpkin starts. We also have the sister plant to a 1200 lber from last year (not ours)…we’ll see how big we can get one this year!

It was a beautiful evening on the ranch. I love warm evenings with a light breeze. My husband and I threw the ball for the persistent wiener dog, the big dogs wrestled, the cats stalked each other round and round, and Georgia browsed for unsavory things to eat. I do love my life!

I like this once coz you can actually see a little of one of my forearm tattoos! That one says, “No hour of life is wasted that is spent in the saddle,” a quote that I love, attributed to Mr. Winston Churchill.

Desire really dogged it on the ride out, she *almost* had me fooled into thinking she wasn’t feeling too sprightly, but I know the ways of tricksy mares and barn sour buttheads, so I pushed her into a few working trots and otherwise we maintained a brisk walk up the 3 miles to the top of the ridge.

Cruising the mile of pavement before the steep climb…

Top of the ridge:

When we did our stop, flex both directions, and turn for home, Desire suddenly turned in PerkyPants and was all ready to barrel back down the hill she had protested all the way up minutes before. We did 5 or 6 or 8 or 10 of the trot attempt, rein back, back her uphill, go forward and repeat and repeat..sometimes she is a bit of knucklehead. Still, part of me was glad to see she was indeed feeling hale and healthy after her big chiro adjustment and getting back to work under saddle in the last few days.

Sheza protested mightily when we left since we rode up the road past her pasture, and she was waiting at the fence line when we returned:

I scrubbed Desire with warm water and my beloved gel scrubbed mitt, covered her in fly spray, resurrected her fly mask from last year, gobbed Trail-Rites Magical Ointment on the gnat bites on her belly, sprayed Vetericyn in her hooves, and then let her have a bite of grass in recompense for all the above mentioned torture:

This is how I mow my front lawn…

My Garmin Forerunner 305 mysteriously died, by the way..worked for my hike with Joey on Saturday and now just won’t turn on or charge. I’ve been pretty brutal to it, used it hard for 2 years. Don’t know how long they’re supposed to last but oh well..that model is discontinued now but I did find one with the heart monitor set up too for a decent deal so I snapped it up. I really like that particular model so was glad to find it despite the discontinued status!

Riding Chief again this week in the Wheatland area and meeting N for a lake ride as well. Training session with Joey again Thursday and and and!

A arrived around 11:30 and we pale folk sun-screened up and went to catch our steeds. I wanted to work Blaze a little in the round pen first to make sure he was feeling good and moving well since his chiropractic adjustment on Monday. He lunged nicely, aside from a few testy moments (I swear Blaze only gets testy with me in the arena or round pen), and I tacked him up and put A on him for a few goes around the round pen to figure out the controls and settle in a little. She has ridden him one other time just in the arena and was ready to see a little countryside.

Test ride:

Figuring out the Controls:

I worked Desire in the round pen to make sure she was fine after her rather drastic adjustment and I must say that working her in that little pen is like trying to test drive a Ferrari on a Go-Kart track. Yeah, it might be doable, but the corners are a little tight and it would go nicer traveling at higher speeds in open spaces for longer distances. Still she moved out well so I swapped the Specialized over to her fitting set up, tied on a lead rope just in case, grabbed the camera, and we headed out on the dirt road for a short trail ride.

 Crossing the bridge:

Viewing the world from between Miss D’s ears again!

Love this pic!

Keeping up that good posture:

Blaze tested her a little and does walk MUCH slower than Desire in general, but painfully slowly if you don’t boss him a bit. After a mile or so I put the lead rope on him so I could control his speed and she could just relax and get used to the feel of being in the saddle. Things went smoother then and it was a nice mellow ride, perfect for Blaze and Desire to stretch their muscles after their adjustments but not strenuous.

Sweet Blaze:

A’s husband had gone off fishing with mine, so after riding we drove down and met them for a good dinner at the local brewery. A great way to spend a Sunday!

Don’t worry, I hiked with him, and we returned together. I needed some horse therapy this afternoon and decided a good brisk walk would do me good. Joey needs to get out and see the world in any way he can and it’s boring to be alone walking sometimes, so I haltered him and brought him along.

Ready for action, though the weather and horse look somewhat ambivalent..

He started out pretty excited about things, of course Sheza screaming at us as we walked past her fence line up the road didn’t help. Nor did the three new horses in the field across the road, who cantered up out of the bushes and about gave him a heart attack, then trotted along side us through the crunchy woods. I sang a little tune and breathed and kept him moving forward and as soon as we got away from the pasture lines he settled. A neighbor stopped to ask if I was from the horse rescue at the end of the road (UGH, NO I am not), and Joey whinnied and got anxious when we stopped so I wished her a nice day and kept moving.

Who, what, where?

It was slow progress, walking a few steps, stopping to stare at something or have a bite of grass, and a few more steps. Once he seemed settled and was getting greedy in the grass alongside the road I upped the pace a bit and we climbed a pretty steep short hill.

Always ready to eat anything:

He walked along behind or next to me on a loose lead, and stood quietly as cars passed us at various speeds. Sometimes he walked with his nose to the ground like a blood hound and he tried to eat everything. He didn’t pursue the big intact prickly green pine cones very far but did try to eat a smushed one, grazed greedily whether the grass was red, brown, or green, and pooped and pooped. Good signs for an endurance prospect, yes?

After the hill climb and another descent, we climbed a longer, steeper hill that had us both breathing pretty good. As we crested it and came out into the open again we saw it. A field of incredibly weird looking black things. Joey saw it first:

Holy Crapsilon, what are those things?!

The offending creatures:

He stood absolutely stock still in that alerted pose for probably a minute and a half, didn’t blink or move a muscle just STARED. Finally he lowered his head, sucked in a breath, and blew a loud, obnoxious snort. He that a couple more times, licked and chewed, and was ready to walk on. Of course some curious smart ass little cow decided to trot after us and that got him swinging around to stare again:

No, seriously, what are those?!

Pretty clouds, pretty boy:

The clouds were getting a bit ominous and the temperature was dropping, so we decided to turn around after about a mile and a half.

Hmm, we might be getting wet..

We made it past the cow herd again, down the hill, and this time I got a picture of the little concrete bridge crossing:

It got eye balled long and hard, and then we crossed:

His feet were moving but his ears said “Really?”

It started to sprinkle and then rain pretty consistently in the last half mile to home. I put my sweatshirt back on and encouraged Joey forward when he wanted to graze, and we made it back in the gate after 3 miles in about an hour and a half.

Almost home, in the rain:

Joey was a very good boy and it was great practice for both of us on a number of things. And it was fun, and a workout. So many benefits, I just might have to do it again!