Sneak Ride

 So... today I had to work on the foxhunters. I normally do about 6-8 and then go to do another horse at another farm, not really close to them, but... not really close to me either and at least in the same vicinity. But then they told me they had 11 horses for me!!! 11!!!! So I told the other girl that there was no way I could come do her horse too. I told her I'd try to find another day, or maybe I could sneak over while I'm at the horse show this weekend. She's basically close to Aiken. So... when I got to the foxhunters barn, they told me that they only had 9 for me. So yay! I managed to get all 9 done by 3 pm, but it was still a two hour drive home. So... I decided that I was going to stick to my original plan and not go do the other horse. It would be one thing if it was just the one more horse, but it was also 45 min away, so add almost 2 hours to my day. And...because of the neck injections, I didn't get to ride all weekend... and the weather for Tuesday was a bit sketchy, so.... darn it, I went home and rode!! And I'm so glad I did.

 

I looked at the arena and it wasn't too wet. No standing water, but I figured it still might be sloppy. Plus, I felt like Dan might need a gallop so he didn't feel the need to gallop at the horse show... Well, not gallop before he was supposed to gallop on XC! So we went to Ashland. It was lovely out! There was a storm brewing so we got a nice crisp breeze and the humidity dropped. And luckily, the storm didn't hit us and we were able to enjoy our entire ride. :) YAY!

 

We did a quick hack to warm up and as we hit the double lake dam, the heron burst out of the edge and flew off. I almost got a photo of him but I wasn't quite quick enough. We were mostly warmed up so we went straight to the trot and canter and then got to work. We ran through the BN B test that we'll show this weekend. That entry is tricky! I'm sure I'm overthinking it but it feels like a lot of bend changes in a short time. (Turns out... yes, you are supposed to go straight, bend left and then change the bend and diagonal and then bend right). So then we went back to the big arena to play. We picked up the canter and once I got a nice canter I just tried things. We did a decent half pass... no swapping! Then we did a shallow serpentine... no swapping. Then I tried a 3 loop, and no swapping!!!! Sure, it wasn't super pretty, but it wasn't half bad. We did it both ways too. We did a lengthen and then a 10 meter circle. Then we played with the canter to walk to canters, to try to sharpen those up a bit. Then we went back to trot and did some leg yields and trot half passes. Then we did some really nice lengthens/mediums and then we practiced the halt again. And then we quit. Because... he was super and I didn't want to over do it. 

We took a hack to the XC field and I let him have a canter and then pushed him into a gallop. He did stretch out and drop a gear, although he wasn't in super high gear. But it was a legit gallop. We went up the hill and then I reined him in. I wanted to take him to the lake and I was worried he might go for a swim as hot as it was and how sweaty he was, so... we went back to the trailer and swapped out the tack for the bareback pad and the halter bridle.  Then we trotted to the lake. He didn't want to go in though! Seriously Dan?! After we got naked even? Oh well. He wanted to go back, so... back we went.