All the Cute Horses--and some miles!

I must say I have collected some rather adorable, even good looking, horses in my little herd of 4 1/4. Desire is quite beautiful when she chooses to be, Sheza is pretty well stunning all the time, and Scrappy and Blaze are just adorable. Mini Horse Napoleon is a little oreo cookie, we shall not forget that 1/4! 

10 miles in on Blazer last weekend, and it called for bedazzling! 

 war pony patrols the neighborhood

 don't let him fool you, he's just glaring at the water for getting his toes wet

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With a 20 mile training ride goal with Scrappy in mind, I loaded everything last night, fed in the dark, and was out the gate for the lake early this morning. We ended up parked in the trail head parking lot that was 1/2 full of paving material, with a loader filling coming and going dump trucks, while the park service did a controlled burn on the trails nearby but Scrap wasn't bothered by it at the beginning or end of the ride. Not with hay in his bag to be addressed! 

I rode with my crop again today but barely needed it. Some bikes took the horse trail ahead of us as we left the parking lot and he was as close as he's ever been to jigging to get out on the trail after them.  After about 3 miles warm up/slow hill climb we hit our first steep downhills and I noticed some initial left hind toe dragging that seemed to decrease within 1/2-3/4 of a mile. I didn't feel toe dragging on the downhills later in the ride. The chiropractor is due out Thursday afternoon so will be interesting to see if we can learn/fix anything then. 

Overall he was forward for about 3/4 of the ride, confused by seeing places he knew but turning onto trails he hadn't been on yet, and totally flummoxed by me marching us into a pitch black tunnel about halfway through! Still he bumped his nose against my back gently as I lead him through the tunnel and was my good solid boy.

away jogging on a forward steed

lots of trail critters out early

Ah, the light at the end of the tunnel! 

 Almost out..I call him Rushcreek Dubious here! 

 The ride took us about 4 hours with some solid climbs, temperatures in the mid 80s which he noticed with his winter fuzz. He drank from every trough  and stream and sucked water out of a mud puddle, for that matter. I liked the mixture of the familiar and unknown as it kept his brain continually guessing and paying attention. A great ride for both our minds and bodies alike!