I'm so grateful to God. He sure has a way of making mighty tasty lemonade out of lemons. As Dan and I were driving the 5.5 hours to Tennessee for Working Equitation Regionals, I just... was so grateful. I am living answered prayers!! I prayed so hard for Dan to be sound enough to be a trail horse... and if God would be so kind, for more than a trail horse. And sure, maybe we're not doing the Prelim 3 day... and maybe we won't ever jump again (or maybe we will do some low level hunters), we're really enjoying this new discipline! And maybe we'll not get to go up to the next level. Maybe he won't even be sound enough come Spring to do more than trails. But right now.... in this moment... we're qualified for Regionals! We got to do the one schooling show, the clinics, and the three recognized shows. And we did well too! And we're off on another adventure.. just me and him. So thank you God... thank you for giving me more.
We had a veterinary inspection at 2 pm, so I had to get up early and leave early. I wanted to make sure I had enough time to give him a bath if needed and not risk being late due to traffic woes. So we pulled out at 6:15 am. It was cool enough that I didn't want to give him a bath, but he also wasn't that dirty. Yay! (Which worries me slightly that he's not laying down to sleep, except I did see him sleeping the other day, so yay! It might just be that it's been so dry, he's not really getting dirty). We had a nice easy drive, which was great. We pulled in around 11:45 am, so we had plenty of time. Linda and her husband were already there so she came up to help. It was nice. She offered to take Dan and put him in the roundpen for me. Um..... okay... but.... um... I usually do this by myself... I don't really need help, but... okay. Just.... "He sometimes takes the leadrope in his mouth and plays tug of war and gets loose on goes on a gallop spree and he did jump out of my roundpen the other day, so....". But she had a hold of his leadrope, so.... I just let her take him. Luckily he cooperated and the roundpen is a nice panel round pen so he stayed put. He apparently had a good long pee and then went to grazing. The roundpen was nice! It was full of green grass and by a nice big tree so it had pelnty of shade! The whole farm was gorgeous!!! Once I got over the stress of making sure I had gotten to the right farm the right way (apparently there was a NOT trailer friendly way), I was able to appreciate the beauty. The views were stunning!!! While he was grazing, I parked my trailer and got his stall set up. The farm is massive but the hook up was right next to the covered which was super close to the barn, super close to the roundpen, and they even had bathrooms with showers right there too! All super convenient.
After that I got Dan and gave him a bath, because... he rolled. And he wasn't filthy, but... I figured I should at least make an effort. The only downside to the farm is that the washrack does not have a tie and it's next to their stray/hay storage. So of course Dan had to keep trying to grab bales and succeeded in pulling one bale into the washrack. But the bales on that end were already wet so .... we put it back and carried on. He went in his stall and chilled until it was time to do the vet inspection.
He was still clean for his inspection so yay. I did it in his rope halter because it said "in halter or bridle" and.. his bosal isn't really conducive to leading with the reins and the mecate. He was mostly behaved but the vet didn't really seem to want to touch him. Ha! He read his vibe. We walked down and then when we went to trot back, Dan did his big power trot and circled me and was a bit animated. I tried again and we got a little bit before we had to circle again. The vet was like "He's fine... he's sound". Phew! Phew that he was sound and phew that we didn't have to present more because I wasn't willing to tempt fate and have him get excited and get loose!
After that I decided to hop on because they were only allowing us to school the obstacles until 4 pm. And at 4 pm we had the opening ceremony, which they said we could do mounted or unmounted but encouraged mounted. I figured I could ride and school and then be ready for the ceremony. Only I didn't time it right because... I didn't want to do a ton of riding since he had hauled for 5 hours already. But I didn't think through it enough and was just worried I wouldn't get to ride, so.. I got tacked up and we went and walked around the covered arena (where they were doing Ease of Handling). They had most of the stuff set up. Not all of it, but a good chunk of it. So we did some walking and trotting and practiced a reinback or two and a halt or two. He tripped a few times. I'm not sure if it was fatigue from the haul... just the footing being slightly deeper/different... or what. But he felt sound. So then we played on the obstacles. I did practice the reverse gate but it looked like it was going to be a forward gate on the course map, so we did that too. We walked over the bridge, which didn't phase him one bit, and did the other obstacles they had set up. And then... we were done. But it was only 3:30. Doh! I didn't need to do anymore riding, but would have loved to have taken him on a hack around the beautiful farm. Sadly it didn't appear that they had any hacking trails. And I wasn't as brave as Linda... I wasn't going to go down the road.
I decided to pull his tack, sponge him off and let him rest. Then at 3:50 I tacked back up and we headed to the outdoor arena. It was basically a pony parade. They called our names and we walked in a big circle around the dressage arena. I was grateful that Dan was well behaved because he wasn't in the front. But since we were just walking, he behaved and didn't do anything naughty. A lot of the people were just leading their horse, so that might have helped too. Then we stood and halted and one of the Master riders rode into the center of the arena with an American Flag and they played the National Anthem. I joked that there was a big space between Dan on both sides... the other horses and riders apparently knew Dan's bubble was big. Whoopsy. But yay. And thank goodness, he was good for the Anthem too. He stood quietly and just watched. Yay! Then we paraded out. The rider with the flag did do a little canter around the arena after we had all exited. Smart. Ha ha. Most of the horses who stayed were fine with it but a few got a little bit excited. Dan was just watching like "When is my turn? I can do that too!". Good boy!
I got off and untacked him and let him have some more time in the round pen. Then he got dinner and then it was time for the competitors welcome dinner. Which was at the other barn near the outdoor arena. I sat with Linda and Fred. It was good food. Finger food and some buffalo chicken sandwiches. After that, I put Dan out for a tiny bit more, cleaned his stall, then brought him in and told him goodnight. Then I went and showered. Sooooo nice to have an actual shower with good water pressure. And then I went to bed. I was one tired chick!
I'm so grateful and so so proud of Dan! (and maybe a little bit surprised he was so well behaved!).
