That title just turned into a catchy song in my head..but honestly, this afternoon I WAS pulling in the driveway with a smile on the face. For oh so many reasons.

1. First time trailering out in two months–I know, where did the time go?! Last time I hauled out was the purse robbery incident..happy to say my truck and purse are unmolested and still in my possession after today’s ride.

2. First time trailering Desire anywhere— She hadn’t been in a trailer in just shy of a year and I wasn’t sure she would get in my straight load anyway, so I practiced yesterday to make sure left myself 15 extra minutes this morning to load her. Hey, I’m optomistic.
 
3. First time riding Desire w/ others— Again, no clue how she would be arriving to the lake alone, being joined by a strange horse, encountering others on the trail (there were plenty)

4. First trail ride w/ new buddy— I met N at the Patriot’s Day at Lake Almanor ride this past July and we actually started the ride and did the few first miles together. We had since met up for her to take and try out my Equipedic pad but today was our first trail ride together!

Oh, and the REAL reason I was smiling away? All of the above worked out fabulously and we had a blast!

A few details. I booted and groomed Desire at home and then left the cross ties to go see what sort of trailer loading escapade this was going to be. I honestly wasn’t that worried about it. As N and I discussed today, sometimes you can/should/might go into things just assuming things will work out as needed–while of course being prepared, alert, and aware. I operate this way with my horse’s out of a sort of necessity. After my accident when I was fearful to even get back on a horse there were all sorts of fantastic images whirling around in my head of just how I would get bucked off as soon as I got up on that horse (even though said horse was good ole little Blaze). I had to stop the madness in the brain. So I concluded that I just had to be prepared, alert, and aware, behave as safely as possible, and get on the damn horse. Things would be well. They just would. I told myself that as the boot went back in the stirrup for the first time and was still telling myself that when I finally settled into the saddle, the crucial point where previously the horse (not Blaze!) had exploded out from under me and shattered my leg. So anyhoo, I approach things with as much awareness and safety as possible, but with a positive assumption nestled in my heart. I think it prevents self-defeating prophecies and useless mental whirling. SO preparation maybe didn’t figure so much into the 15 minutes I left myself to see if my horse loaded into my scary dark coffin 2 horse straight, but my positive thinking did figure in and Desire took a couple sniffs, some slow hesitant steps, then popped up into the trailer. Ta da! She was definitely antsy and was tap dancing around in the trailer quite a bit but I can’t blame her since good ole Sheza and Blaze were galloping around and Sheza was screaming like a banshee. It was a first for her too of course, first time mommy loaded up and left her! All was well once I got the rig moving and I cruised slooowwww to the lake, not breaking 40. Its windy back roads anyway but most people fly on it. I wanted to make sure Desire had the most comfortable, quiet trailer ride to the lake as possible so I just took my time. I also hadn’t used up all my 15 extra minutes I left for loading so I could afford to cruise! Desire came out of the trailer sweaty on her neck and chest despite the slow ride but she didn’t seem too perturbed about being at the trail head alone, I walked her around and let her sniff and graze and was just starting to tack up when N pulled in.

 

 The trail ride itself went really well, Desire led the whole way and was in total power walk mode. I am in love with her walk, it reminds me of my dear old mare Angel’s giant walk only Desire is bigger in all ways so its even more powerful and fun! I think 14.3 is my definite height of choice in a horse. Hopefully Sheza sticks around there, I swear if she goes 16 hands like her grandpa I will have a heart attack. Desire is just right. What’s that fairy tale? Goldilocks I think it is, where one is too big and one is too small and one is just right. Well my Foxtrotter was too big, Blaze is too small (though treasured and ridden plenty), and Desire is just right. She had a couple of spooky moments, mostly at logs, but nothing beyond reason. We encountered 3 other groups of riders and passed them all without incident. Also saw this beauty, chasing girls:

 

 We did the shorter loop around the horse camp but it was a perfect length for the day and the horses, we did some nice stretches of trotting but only went about 7 miles and had lots of good chatting time. We also ran into a mutual horse friend who has a gorgeous house right ON the lake trails (jealous!) and stopped and chatted with her and her riding buddy. Desire wouldn’t stand still for the first few minutes but she settled eventually. Our friend’s mare had a filly about a week after Sheza was born and she and her friend were headed out the opposite direction but she told us to stop by her house and take a look at the filly. We headed out and took the little shortcut trail over and spied on her horses; her filly is very dark, born a smokey grey as I recall but I’m not sure what her technical color is. Her dam is a Mustang and sire an Arabian and it’s quite a nice cross! She’s a pretty little filly, very leggy. It was hard to tell how she compared to Sheza size-wise since we were on a little hill above the paddocks looking down, but she looked about the same general height. Sheza is MUCH thicker built, that’s for sure. After admiring the baby we were back to the trailers in no time and then just a short drive home.

It was a great ride, a beautiful day, a blast on Desire, and fun to ride with a new friend. I look forward to riding more with N and hopefully we will be seeing each other at some endurance rides next season too!

Well I’ve got myself a nice last minute (my fault) plan to get together for a ride with a newish endurance buddy. I met her at the Patriot’s Day at Lake Almanor ride this summer and it turns out she only lives about an hour away from me and often rides at the same spots I do. She is also the new owner of the nice green Equipedic pad I bought that was too long for Blaze. OH and speaking of green, tack, and exchanging, she has a brand new bright grass green endurance halter that would look snazzy on Sheza in the future. Its fun buying and selling and swapping between friends so we can all eventually get what we want and need, since I know I so rarely get it right the first time! Sad but true.

Anyhow I am packing up Desire, the western saddle, and the Easyboots and trailering out of here tomorrow morning for the first time in ummm 2 MONTHS! What the heck how did that time pass. Should be a great day, forecast of mostly sunny, high of 65 degrees. Can’t wait 🙂

Okay it may seem strange that I’m excited enough to title my post that, but I have ALWAYS wanted to be able to barter for horse items and I finally had the chance. So basically I had two older but still good condition waterproof turnouts that are always too big for any horses I own and I traded them for hoof work on Sheza and Desire this week. It gave me a little thrill, call me a dork. Desire’s hooves are recovering nicely. She grows hoof like its going out of style. Sheza is having a MAJOR growth spurt and her hooves had grown an insane amount in 4 weeks. Like, she was overgrown and should have been trimmed at 3 weeks! Amazing. I had no idea that much growth that quickly was possible. So I will be keeping a closer eye on that. Sheza did really well for her hooves again, she tried pulling away a couple times but D the trimmer is very gentle but firm and there were no shenanigans allowed. She also made a really interesting point about Desire that I am still mulling over with delight. We were talking about how tense Desire is in the cross ties and she said “clearly Desire has never been a little girl’s horse” I asked her to explain because I couldn’t quite wrap my mind around that and she said that Desire was obviously trained and did everything she was asked but wasn’t very sure about things and didn’t know how to be spoiled..yet. Key word yet, because as D and I acknowledged she will definitely become a “little girl’s horse” here with me. Its such a GREAT point because Desire does exactly that: what you ask, but isn’t sure of herself and always retains some low level of tension/anxiety. I think and hope that she will settle down here and really bond with me and maybe find another level of relaxation, but as it is I am enjoying her and she is at worst an interesting new challenge to deal with. But really at best, a fun, forward, slightly nervous mare! I feel like I ramble on about her a lot but I’ve just become so used to Blaze in the last few years that discovering a new horse, and a mare again at that, is exciting to me. I always have my closest bonds with mares, my highest highs and lowest lows. Here’s to some exciting years of highs with Desire!

In other news, I mailed the saddle back yesterday. I’ll be getting my deposit back and waiting to order the whole kit, probably til mid December. The saddle prices have gone up and while I could squeeze the money out now I think it was good I got a chance to trial the saddle with some (mostly) decent weather and now I will wait for another few weeks to order it when finances are more comfortable. I’m going to order the Eurolight with a bigger seat size than the one they sent me, western fenders, 2 shim kits, 2 different fitting cushions, and the suede seat. In the spring I will order the fleece seat and fleece fenders for summer riding. I also want to order one of the pads like the one they sent with the trial saddle, I assume its the standard fleece Specialized pad. Or I might try a Haf pad if GETC recommends that higher, I haven’t used either but I really like the shape and ease of use of those pads in what I’ve seen and heard.

Horses got de-wormed this week as well, the vet said I could switch Sheza to Ivermectin especially with the bot eggs out and about. So far Sheza still takes her wormer better than Desire does! Hopefully that lasts. I’m thinking I might start getting a flavored wormer so Sheza takes a liking to it which I’m sure her little piggy self will. The more she likes the experience the better and I know she likes anything tasty. It might be to my benefit to get her hooked on it, LOL. Leading youngsters astray with apple wormer addictions, what would my mother say.

My husband just walked in and said he had run a bath for me! How random and nice! Or maybe I just smell..

This morning was our first frost of Winter 2011. The time changed yesterday which unfortunately makes it dark early but also makes it light early too which I do enjoy. It was too weird when the sun wasn’t breaking the crest of the hill til 8-8:30 in the morning. Having some sunlight at 6:30-7 is just fine with me. Anyhow none of my trail buddies could meet to ride today after getting rained out on the weekend so I put on the Easyboots and fit the Specialized saddle to Desire and away we went up the ridge, just riding from home. The saddle sat nearly perfectly on her back with just the basic 3/4″ fitting cushions which was a relief after the gappy insanity that was setting it on Blaze’s back.

We did just over 5 miles in our usual hour and 20 minutes, thanks to the couple miles of walking along pavement/side of the road to reach our dirt road/trotting area. By my GPS we did about half a mile of circling/back tracking while working on not trotting towards home like a spazz. Desire walks out eagerly on the trail and at a great forward speed but when you turn for home hooooo boy that forward speed becomes the fastest walk you’ve ever sat (that speed walk that kind of gives you a stomach ache from so much hip action following it, ya know?) and generally progresses to a snotty little jive jog multiple times on our journey home. We are working on that.

Today was a great day for a ride as it threw a couple of unexpected things at us as well as testing the saddle and getting more trail time in the Easyboots. About 2 miles out when we were finally onto the dirt road and starting to do a slow trot I saw what I thought was a big round shouldered dog jogging around the corner down the road in front of us. It didn’t quite move like a dog so I sped Desire up down the mini hill and around the corner to see what it was before it vanished. Sure enough it was a big ole Bobcat jogging down the road and we followed it down the road for a little while only 20 or 30 feet behind it before it swerved off and disappeared into the bushes. Desire wasn’t perturbed by it and in fact was much more alarmed by the random guy walking down the road (just stopped and stared, moved on with encouragement) than she was by trailing the Bobcat. 3 miles out and heading up the steep hills for the ridge there was a big orange “Road work Ahead” sign and half of the road had been graded, creating a dirt mound running down the middle of the road which made a convenient barrier we later utilized. After convincing Desire to sniff the orange sign and moving on at a trot, sitting a big spook around a giant horse-eating rock the grader had uncovered in the road, and reaching as near the top of the ridge as we could without encountering any road work machinery, we turned for home. This was the time that her hot, homeward-bound self immediately asserted itself but that grader-created impromptu dirt barrier running down the middle of the road was pretty helpful as it made her have to LIFT her feet and LOOK when I made her turn back around and head back up hill in answer to her trying to trot/spazz downhill. She is agile enough that when I turn her around sometimes she just brainlessly spins a circle and then continues trying to trot toward home, its not even challenging for her! With the dirt barrier the first two or three times she actually tripped over it and then figured it out and started paying attention to what she was doing and lifting her feet over it, which got her mind back on business, and me, and we could move on towards home at the walk. A couple miles from home a gorgeous very red fox ran across the road in front of us too! That first sunny day after a storm the animals are certainly stirring. As usual about 3/4 of a mile from home after climbing the last of the hills she finally settled to a comfortable loose-reined walk. When we got home I decided not to spray her off, even with warm water, as its just not warm enough for comfort. Her sweat marks were fairly even from the saddle though I think I need to put a slim wedge shim under the pommel of each side for a better fit. I also didn’t recheck my girth enough from the shims compressing after first being ridden in, so my saddle slipped forward on the steep downhill home. I got off and fixed it and tightened the girth, I am so guilty of riding with a loose girth quite often. Anyway I think it was as pretty fun and successful test ride on D with the Specialized. I am getting all the details on final pricing if I do order one when I mail it back at the end of this week. I’m almost wondering if I want to go to one size bigger in the seat, its quite comfortable and feels like it fits but I almost feel like its on the edge of being slightly too small in the seat and I prefer a little more room in general. Its hard to tell because I’ve been riding the same saddle for 3 years so its hard to judge what is just different in sitting the Specialized and what is actually something that needs to be corrected. If I do order one I’m going to order it with the western style fenders as well, the English style leathers are a little pinch-y for my taste.

Horses are all blanket free and creatures great and small are out enjoying the sunshine coz its COLD in the shade!

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