Honestly, I'd say Dan was on his best behavior today!
We went to Charlie Elliot and rode with Sharon and Baylor, but also had Jamie and Duval and her dog Sailor and then Jessica Strott and Poppy join us. Which, is kind of a big group for Dan. Especially because I wasn't sure if they would all tolerate him leading a good bunch of the way. But all the animals were really quite cooperative!
We got there and there was another group or horses there almost tacked up. They were about ready to leave and when the Dad got on his friesian it bolted across the parking lot... and then bolted/squirted at the start of the trail. It got our guys all amped up! Gracious! Luckily they managed to get going and we weren't ready to go out right behind them. Once we all got tacked up (or barebacked up) and hit the trails they were gone. Phew!
We had a good ride. Dan started in the lead because he was a bit amped up and bouncy. And Poppy was a hair jiggy, but everyone was pretty good. After the first mile for sure they had all settled and we took turns being in the front, middle and back. Dan was great with the dog! He did try to nose her a time or two when she was right in front of us, but he never tried to chomp her or stomp her or run her over! Good boy! He was a bit rowdy when he was in the back some and made some serious snarly faces at Duval and Poppy and Baylor a few times, but never more than snark faces. And he didn't bite Baylors butt today. He did pick up the canter a time or two to catch back up to everyone but he was fairly polite about it. We also didn't (purposely) trot any because it was so slick. So the whole trail ride was at the walk, other than a few trots of them being silly and fighting for the lead or getting left behind a little and trotting to catch up.
At one point we all realized that there were no hoofprints so we guessed that the other group had gone the other direction. Which meant that we were likely to come up against them. And sure enough, we did. They had all gotten off and tied their horses to a tree.. the two on one side of the trail and the friesian (who acted/seemed like a stallion) on the other. With their reins... sigh. We stopped and the kids were like "Pretty horses"... and we were like "cool thanks, but can we pass?". After a minute the Dad managed to get back to the horse and pulled the stallion farther into the woods off the path so we started to pass. Then the paint horse turned his butt to us and was swishing his tail, so the horses got all weird and Dan spun sideways and I was so afraid he was going to smoosh that little girl! Luckily he didn't... and we all made it through unscathed. And once we got past them, the horses settled again.
And then we had no more antics the whole way home other than the occasional slip in the mud. It was a great time and I really like all of them! We definitely need to do that more often, and Dan needs to learn how to behave himself in bigger groups. But he did today. I was quite proud of him!
When we got back to the trailers I was giggling because it looked like I murdered an animal at the trailer because of all his hair! He's definitely going to have to get a bath in the morning before our clinic!
Tonight at bed check he was snoozing. I guess he was tired after his fun day!
No comments:
Post a Comment