A Week with Starry D.

A Week with Starry D.

And it was a bust.  Not that it was Starry’s fault.  It was the fault of the weather.

Kevin had to babysit his grandchildren for the week, and Ellen and I had to babysit Starry.  Two days before Kevin left, the farrier replaced Starry’s shoes with snow pads with plain old shoes.  Of course that could only mean one thing--snow.  Ellen was supposed to ride him on Saturday and Sunday on the trail.  Not only was it snowy, but it was so cold that I didn’t ride Cole on the trail, either.  March can be like that, sometimes, in Cleveland.

The snow melted and the temperatures improved on Monday, so Ellen and I were able to take him on a lovely ride with Cole.  That was our only good ride of the week.

We got rain on Tuesday, and it made the river too high.  I was out, by myself, in the evening and took him on the hill.  I was going to go three trips, but it started to rain on my second trip up, so we went home early.

I knew the river would still be too high on Wednesday, but I was hoping to do better on the hill.  It was an extremely windy afternoon.  Honestly, I have never experienced wind like that in my life.  It was constant strong winds with gusts up to 60 mph.  I took Cole out for a ride, first.  We didn’t get very far at all when we came across a pine tree crossing the trail that it didn’t look like we could go around.  I thought I might be able to lead Cole under the branch on one end, so I got off.  Suddenly, a huge gust of wind came and all the trees were waving.  I could hear cracking over my head--and I realized that I shouldn’t even be out there.  I turned back.  Starry didn’t get ridden at all.

It may be a good thing that I did turn back.  There were 3 other trees that had fallen on our trail--including one that was right where I was standing when I turned around.  There were others that fell closeby, too.  I don’t know if any of them would have fallen when I was riding, but I am glad I wasn’t there to find out.

The following day, my car died, and I wasn’t able to get out to see the horses at all.

Friday was my last chance.  It was cold, the river was still a little high but I managed to take Starry up and down the hill three times.

Kevin was back on Saturday to take him on an extremely cold ride, again.

And now there is snow...