Misty ride with my unicorn

-
It was a rainy day, but I decided to get out in the woods despite my regular companions abandoning me. I do enjoy a solo ride just the same, and chose to put on the bareback pad for a quiet amble.





I also switched back to my bit bridle with a slightly bigger snaffle which doesn’t pinch Qs lips. Although I enjoyed my hackamore rides, I felt that it was hard to not put pressure on his nose (and create a rub or indent) and I also felt he was starting to disrespect it on our last ride when my buddy and I practiced side-by-side canter on the way home. Ok, maybe that was an unfair test.

Anyways, we had a lovely ride in the woods heavy with fog, and lots of sprouting mushrooms. Q was a gem, and I feel he does a good job of protecting me when Im bareback. He got tense when he felt a deer nearby, and did a bit of a scoot when there was some new tires lying about, but he was quite cautious of not unseating me.

Things are good. Im riding 3-4 times a week, logging about 40-50 km, and both of us are benefiting from regular work and a balance between long&fast and short&easy. And lots of treats.

Comments

  1. TeresaAOctober 2, 2019 at 7:33 PM

    It looks like a beautiful ride.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Nat DNovember 12, 2019 at 8:59 AM

      I miss the beautiful autumn woods. I wish I had spent more hours on the trail when the leaves were in their full glory!

      Delete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Riding English or Western? Which is safer?

-
Image
We had another trail accident this week, the fourth this season, that required an ambulance. All four accidents involved solo riders in English tack. Our club facebook posts were all atwitter about the safety of English vs Western tack. As an amateur rider having spent equal amounts of time in both types of tack under similar conditions, I feel reasonably confident in my perspective. Western tack is safer.  The saddle fork on a western saddle (also on an iberian, australian, and some endurance saddles) blocks a certain amount of the centrifugal force that comes with a sharp spook, hard buck, abrupt turn or stumbling horse. The stirrup leathers provide more stability and it is more difficult to get your foot caught in the stirrup during a fall. However, the bulk and heft of a western saddle can also make a wreck worse, such as riders getting bucked onto the neck and caught in front of the saddle, horse and rider falling and getting pinned under the saddle, boot stuck in stirrup with...
Read more

Pocketful of mints, aka the slowroll

-
Image
It has been over twenty-five years since I did a solo trail ride bareback. Today was the day. Q was amazing, and gave me the confidence to ride on the buckle most of the way. When we came up to a road crossing, I got nervous because I could hear an unseen car climbing the road and was afraid it was the roadster sans muffler that had been gunning it up and down the road earlier. So I asked Q to trot, and he steadily complied with the smoothest transitions. Comfy and confident! The last time I had done this was with my first QH Rocky that I moved from Canada to Costa Rica (in the winter - bad idea) to live on the Pacific Ocean with me. We would go ride on the beach and in the ocean and bareback was the way to go. It was mostly walking around and I honestly don’t remember galloping bareback since my poney days as a teenager. Of course my new best friends bareback pad is amazing. It provides a little cushion, gives a stickiness to my seat with the suede-like top and adheres to Q...
Read more

Does this work on humans?

-
Image
After four days of despooking clinic and some reflection time, I want to share my broader perspective on what despooking can teach us. Only humans dwell - sometimes you just need to go with the flow. Horses have wonderful lessons to teach us in this regard. Their desire to be one with the herd, to establish hierarchy and rules, and to be in the present moment forces us to reconsider our thoughts and actions. Being such generous and forgiving souls, horses begin every moment as a new one. They dont dwell on past issues, they dont cry over lost relationships, they dont get angry over spilled milk. They lock in to their surroundings, feel their environment, find the path that leads to safety and grass. They are fluid. Let us learn to connect with the “herd”. Dont focus on the obstacle, focus on what you are doing. Obstacles are everywhere, physical and psychological. Some are created in our minds (“Im not good enough, Im not worthy, I cant do that”) and we fixate on them. We give ou...
Read more

All kinds of feels

-
Image
Annual Trail Rides: 186/200 (Bareback 25/40) Weather has turned brisk, rain has set in for multiple days, work is very busy so riding has dropped in frequency. All this has transformed Q into a fire breathing dragon. (it could also be the Bemer sessions working too well) So much that I was screaming to myself two days ago “THIS is NOT fun. THIS is NOT fun.” after shutting down Qs bolt-in-progress on the trail. The ride before the storms  This morning I was feeling better and up for the task of channeling Qs abundance of energy. I put on his bareback pad, got on .. and then ... oops ... immediately got off. I was sitting on a live grenade! I took off his bridle, and let him loose in the big paddock. He leaped, bucked, spun, galloped and then did it all over again. I then put on his saddle (seriously this was not the day for bareback even if the trails were sloppy wet) and headed out thinking that his energy would be more normal now. It was NOT NORMAL. He was high as a kite as we hea...
Read more

Section 1, or Q’s revenge

-
Image
Me: Can we walk please? Q: But you said “zoom zoom zoom”. After yesterday's ride, Q decided to show me just how much he had a need for speed. Our first day of summer and it was hot and sunny. I packed a water bottle and set out on the buckle.  As soon as we hit the last ravine and got to the first long sandy track, he was all business. I spent the whole rest of trail either on the buckle or on the handbreak. Not much middle ground with Q today. The last ravine of Section 2 before we get to Section 1 Each of these ravines has a bubbling brook at the bottom, some of them the horses can drink in. This sandy track is the official beginning of Section 1, occasionally called The Arches for a large wooden arch that used to stretch across this trail at the top but has since crumbled to the ground. This fork is actually a great loop through the forest. I started trotting down the right, and then came galloping up the left 15 minutes later. Mostly ...
Read more