Monday, October 04, 2004

Fall Riding

It sure has been nice outside weather wise. The crisp cool mornings and evenings and temperate afternoons make for ideal riding weather. Saturday we joined a number of other like minded people for a trail ride in our local county trail system. There were 13 of us and we had a great time. There was such a wide variety of horses ranging from an Islandic pony to our Percherons with Paints, QH’s, Appy’s and Morgans filling out the remainder. We rode for close to 3 hours enjoying each others company. All the horses were on their best behavior as well which really put the icing on the cake. Afterwards we had a filling pot luck dinner and chatted till it was time to go. Our boys were just great and handled the tight spots on the trail with grace. They never cease to amaze me with how careful they can be despite their size. When we headed back over to the trailer after dinner we found our geldings fast asleep tied to the trailer. Lauren was of a similar opinion and she crashed on the drive home and didn’t wake up till Sunday morning. Poor kid sure was tuckered out from all the excitement. Her and Hank really did well on the trail. He was kind and considerate with her and did his best to keep her out of any trouble. She of course did well guiding him. I was very proud of her. It sure was nice to do something fun with the horses. Don’t get me wrong, we enjoy showing very much but there is nothing more fun then a relaxing trail ride with good friends. I think the horses enjoyed the change. They seemed to be really interested in what we were doing. Sunday we went back to work and took everyone up to the fairgrounds arena to gauge where we were in our training since we had given the boys some time off after the State Fair. Barney is 100% on mark for the Great Lakes show October 14th. Doug is a bit behind in his training, this whole year has been trying on him. It just seems that his injury (superficial but requiring stitches and time off) really put him behind in his training and we have not really gotten ahead of it. Hank is doing much better then I would have imagined. He is only going to this show for the draft under saddle class and I have been working very lightly with him on his canter leads. He has only been under saddle for a year and at 12 it’s been interesting teaching this old dog new tricks. Even harder yet because I don’t have a ring to work him in so all the ground work has been in fields and on the side roads. He is finally getting it and I was amazed at how well he worked for me in the arena yesterday. I don’t anticipate Hank doing well in the saddle classes since he is only 16hh but you never know. Seems that the judges like the big “hitch” horses even out of harness. At least I will know that my horse is trained as a saddle horse and has impeccable manners. Unfortunately, most of the other horses in these classes are not trained saddle horses and things can get a bit screwy with some bolting horses at the “canter” (or should I say attempted canter) so who’s to say. I’m hoping for a decent finish like last year when I rode my old mare Midnight. We got a 6th in Western and a 7th in English so that’s my goal this year – to at least stay close to last years finish. Of course Midnight was 17hh and she had 4 years of solid saddle training so I had a BIG advantage over my current situation. Time will tell and regardless of our finish I think the world of my little guy who's heart is a big, if not bigger, then most horses.

posted by Chris @ Real Horses @ 3:15 PM

1 Comments:

At 7:52 PM,  Unknown said...

I've found that Aimee (my now retired Percheron mare... I'm only using her for light hacks... her ongoing hoof problem has finally started to take a toll on her endurance) is fearless, cool-headed, totally calm and composed on trail rides, except for bridges, she loses all her poise at the thought of crossing a bridge alone, however she'll follow anyone else over, she just won't go first. Alise has never been a good riding (or driving) horse... she's too spooky... but she sure is beautiful and she's excellent as a leadline "pony" (at 17hh, she's hardly a pony!) go figure!
Sounds like y'all had a wonderful ride... I wish I knew more people that rode around here (that weren't the "giddy-up cowboy" type)... oh well... can't have everything!

Shea

 

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