Haven't taken Quzqo out on the trails alone in, O, let's say a month or so. To say the weather this Fall has been crap would be an understatement. If it's not rainy and dark, it's windy, or it's snowing. Always on the weekends...and throughout the week, come to think of it.
But gosh darn, now the clock is ticking. In 20 days or so, firearm deer season starts, so the opportunities to go out and about are dwindling down to a precious few!
The wind and rain did a job on the fall colors...it's almost like Nature has turned into Seinfeld's Soup Nazi...snatching the beautiful leaves away, shouting "NO COLORS FOR YOU!". Nearly overnight, trees have gone from being a sickly brownish-yellow to bare branches. But at this point, any color is better than nothing, and even bare grey branches are best observed from the back of a horse!
I was a little concerned, since Quz hadn't been out by himself in so long a time. I tacked him up with the most secure saddle, breast plate, bear bells, our new Myler bit, whip and spurs and plenty of peppermints, ready for just about anything!
Happily he struck out with his usual apathy and leaden trudging away from the barn. I didn't get too much of a pouting Drama Queen display as we left the property, and we made it down the road without a single exploding spook or petulent refusal to move forward!
It wasn't THAT bad out, relatively warm (well, mid-40's are what passes for "warm" these days), with plenty of mud puddles to dodge. Quzqo had his shoes pulled two weeks ago, so he wasn't sore and trotted nicely down the dirt road. It was really quite nice, outside of the dark drizzley atmosphere and a feeling of impending doom.
Well, poopy...the trail we usually take through the woods, was now gaily decorated with fresh, shiny NO TRESPASSING signs! Crap crap crap!!! It's an 80 acre piece of property that's been for sale for around 7 years, nobody lives on it, they planned to make it into a housing development before Michigan's economy really tanked. Dirt bikers used to use the trails as well, but I'm hoping it's a temporary thing for hunting season. Of course by the time that's done with, there'll be two feet of snow on the ground, making it a moot point for riding!
Not like I haven't faced this before, so we just rode along the roadside up and around the property. When the traffic cleared, we zipped up a side-trail, ignoring the older NO TRESPASSING sign on a tree, and disappeared into the trees. Huh? What? did somebody see something?
Hard to sneak on a white horse, but I was glad I didn't have any Hunter Orange on, heh heh.
We enjoyed, guiltily, wandering around the trails back there, which was about as ugly and depressing as the rest of the area, moreso since the trees never really recovered from the tent worm invasion this summer. We crossed over into the property behind the elementary school, and walked around on the nature trails (relax, concerned parents, Quz didn't poop or pee the entire time we were in there, so it was safe for the kiddies).
Specifically, I wanted to go see, and get photos of....this:
I imagine it's some kind of art project....Hey Kids, let's do casts of your face and stick it to a tree, won't that be cool!!!
The first time we found this back there, I'll admit, it freaked the hell out of me. Seems a little too pagan for a public school project, little too New Age or maybe even Japanese mythology. Little scary dead-eyed faces stuck to trees!!
But no, they didn't limit it to faces, they had fun in art class, casting all sorts of body parts!
Grasping, reaching hands, and in the lower right, a frickin' TORSO impaled on a treetrunk!
Your tax dollars at work, ladies and gentlemen! (Pardon the blurriness, Quz was adamant we keep walking, no matter how I tried to stop him)
They are kind of cool, in a creepy, Blair Witch sort of way. Especially stuck out in the middle of the woods, a good 100 yards or so away from the actual school building. They've been there for years, and I've never noticed any new ones added. Maybe it was a one-time project. For good reason.
We made it back to the barn, with Quzqo saving his one major violent freak-out spook spectacular once we were back on the barn property and a few yards away from the driveway. I still don't know what he saw in the ditch, but it was pretty scaryfying, judging from his reaction.
Maybe we brought back one of those scary woodland creepies with us!
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