First Trail Ride of the Season

Sat Mar 24, 2007

Took Quzqo out on the trails last night (loving the extra hour of daylight! Thank you, George W. Bush). Luckily he was already tired out from his busy day, so we didn't have ANY issues. Did a little bit of road riding to get to a dirt driveway that goes into the neighboring hayfield...the path along the road was under 3-4" of snowmelt water. Cars, trucks blasting by, Coos didn't care one bit!

Had to go through some snowmelt anyway, but again, he didn't care, and kept stopping to fladdle his lips in the water and to paw at it. Did some trotting along the fenceline, and the little goober picked up a canter on his own and cantered maybe 50 yards on his "bad lead" (the left) before tuckering out down to a trot (it's all uphill, poor flabby lad). No theatrics at the corner where we turned away from the barn up the trail...the fact my farrier still has the gate shut probably helped. Up across the hayfields to the dirt road, down the dirt road, and when he wasn't suspecting it, we turned around and came back, went past the hayfield, then turned around and came back (he was expecting to automatically turn in there...don't want him doing that) & back to the barn, through all the standing snowmelt without a problem!

Was NOT happy to see my farrier's house/property up for sale...bummer. He's getting a divorce, he moved out, moved his horses to Bob's barn, and the wife and daughter are in the house, but not with it for sale. $300,000+, probably 30 acres, two barns, nice place. Hope it doesn't get bought by a developer for a subdivision, or bought by some assholes who won't let us ride along the property line to get to the trails (otherwise it's 1/2 mile of road riding on a busy county road). Too bad

Today I'll taking Coos out again for a longer ride, get to play with the new trail stuff I bought at the Michigan Horse Expo (pommel pouch, new saddlebags w/bottle holder, etc). Not as sunny and nice today, but that doesn't matter, it'll just be nice to not be riding around in circles!