Great Weekend!!!

What a wonderful weekend for riding. It started on Friday where I had a good, but short ride on Cruiser. During it, he cantered 48 strides before he stopped. I see a pattern, here. 16-32-48…


I attempted to ride Cole on the trail Friday evening, and he wasn’t good at all. He kept trying to trot, tried to spin towards home once and just wouldn’t relax. Sigh. We turned back early and headed home. The good news? He got quieter the closer we got to home, and ended up walking up the last hill without a single attempt to trot. Well, I did lead him, not ride him. By that point, I had had enough.

Saturday, I rode Cruiser with my sister on a great ride. They have finally settled down. We trotted a lot…I then took Cole out on another ride. He was a different horse. Since he was quieter, we did do some trotting. He only tried to canter twice. He really loves to trot…he walked home.

Sunday, we had a repeat ride with Cruiser and Ranger. Yes... consistency. I decided to go a bit further with Cole. In order to do that, I had to cross the concrete ford that the cars use because I didn’t want to cross the river in that spot. It was pretty deep and murky, and there are huge rocks scattered through it. Without being able to see them, I didn’t want to ride through it.

The ford isn’t really a big deal, but I used to have so much trouble with it with Mingo. In the end, he was crossing, again, but it was an on and off again thing. I wanted everything to go well with Cole. I was alone, so I dismounted to lead him. I clicked him all the way across, and I was lucky that no cars came by. He looked at the serrated edge with some worry, but we made it across beautifully. On the other side, I had to ride him up a short but steep and rutted hill. We haven’t been there since last year when the hill didn’t have any ruts. He did well. On top of the hill, he pointed out to me everything that was different from last year. Mostly it was fallen trees. When we reached the end of the trail, there was a particularly scary-looking fallen tree that he didn’t want to pass. His head was up, he was blowing and trying to back up. I asked for one step forward. He gave it to me, and I clicked. I kept doing that, and soon we went right by. I turned around, passed it again and then repeated it. He was no longer worried and walked by like a champ. Clicker did it’s magic.

He behaved all the way home—including crossing the ford. Things are starting to fall into place…