A Quick Dart Update

This started off as the intro to my OD entry for this year, but it sort of took on a life of its own, so take it as a prologue instead...

I feel like we always have a lot going on around here. For some reason, however, this year seems to be extra intense, despite the fact that nothing special is happening. My endurance season seems to be taking a back seat to everything else right now, for the first time in several years. Despite the fact that I've been riding the LD train, and really not riding much this season, I have managed to make it to a ride pretty much every other weekend in some capacity.

Originally, the plan was for me to attempt the OD Triple Crown with Dart this year. Those hopes went right out the window when we got pulled at 45 miles at No Frills. I am hoping to make it to Fort Valley one year, whether it's as part of the Triple Crown or not. Initially, even with the pull at No Frills, I was going to try to do the 50 with Dart at OD.

Then Dart tested positive for Lyme. Thankfully, we had enough time to treat him between Biltmore and Old Dominion. After our ride at Biltmore, where Dart finished with all A's across the board in the LD, I felt ready to try 50 miles with him again.

Then I went on a conditioning ride with Jeff and Evelyn. We met up one weekend at their house, with the plan to do 15 miles or so near them. Originally, we were going to go to Baldpate, but the weather down by me was atrocious. Meanwhile, just an hour and a half north, they had clear, blue skies. I should know by now that when my plans seem to start falling apart, I should just throw in the towel and try again the next time. Things that don't start well for me generally don't get better with more effort.

As I sat in traffic behind a truck that had dropped an entire playground in the road, I had a feeling I was making a mistake.

All the Photos

I still have to blog about OD, and I'm going away to photograph another ride this weekend, so chances are I'll never catch up on here again. In the meantime, have a billion photos of my last two weeks.

This entry features: blingy nails, judging drama, critters, horses jumping things and doing ground work, selfies, a baseball game, trailer loading, random cars, a miniature Grace update, and a killer tree branch.

Gunner smiling for the camera.

Fall Down, Go BOOM

Those of you who are friends with me on Facebook already know that I took a bad fall off of one of my client horses two weeks ago. I honestly don't think I've ever fallen off of a horse this hard before. I have certainly never been bucked off like this. Two weeks later I'm still pretty sore, but I am getting around much better than I was initially.

NY Adventure

About a year ago, Dodie started talking about putting together an endurance ride in New York. At the time, she emailed me to ask if I would be interested in volunteering and bringing Mike to be the photographer. It's still funny to me that Mike has become such a great photographer that people forget I take pictures at all. When we first started dating, I handed him my camera and ask him to take some pictures of me riding. When I looked at the photos later on, I was really impressed with what I saw. I told him that he had a real talent for photography and he didn't believe me. He said, "It's just a nice camera," and I assured him that lots of people have used my camera and not achieved the same results.

Unfortunately Dodie was planning the ride for Memorial Day weekend. That is the busy season for Mike's work and I had a feeling that he wouldn't be able to take the time off to photograph the ride. I told Dodie that I would be willing to do the pictures if I was available that weekend and asked her to touch base with me as the ride grew closer.

About two weeks before the ride I got a message from Melissa saying, "I see you're the photographer for New York Adventure."
I replied, "I guess I better see what I have scheduled for that weekend."

As I predicted, Mike was not able to make it to the ride and I ended up going up by myself to do the photography. I spent the days leading up to the ride picking Becky Pearman's brain and buying a SmugMug and making sure all my gear was up to date. While I enjoy photography, I pretty much only do it for pleasure and my camera, although wonderful, is really just a point and shoot on steroids.

I went back and forth until the last minute about whether I was going to carpool up to the ride with Sandy. The idea of not having to do all the driving and having some company in the process was really appealing. The weather had other ideas, however. It rained and rained and rained in the weeks leading up to the ride, which really shouldn't have surprised me since every time I've been to a New York endurance ride the ground has been saturated, and half the time it has been precipitating. My concern was that Sandy's truck does not have 4-wheel drive. I didn't want to get stuck and not be able to do my duty. More than that I didn't want to risk damaging Sandy truck and potentially putting a strain on our friendship. At the last second I decided to bring the Rav and just sleep in the back of the car. I was pretty bummed since I had been looking forward to a girls weekend.

The good news about Dodie's ride being on a holiday weekend was that the ride itself was on Sunday. This meant I didn't have to take any time off work. Because I was just photographing and didn't have a horse in tow, I was able to sleep in and make the drive up at my convenience. I would also have the freedom to leave once the ride was done if I didn't feel like staying another night.

New York Adventure was being held on the same trail system as the Brookfield CTR. This put it a little under four hours from my house and was a pretty straightforward drive. I worried about the weather until the last second, and packed extra rain gear, just in case. I got everything taken care of at home and enjoyed a nice cup of coffee before hitting the road. The drive up was largely uneventful, although I did run into one jerk in New York who just had to cut me off to exit, even though there was nobody behind me, and then have the nerve to flip me off and road rage at a traffic light, before proceeding to run said red light and carry on with his day.

Grace Photos

I still have to tell the story of how I got dumped off a horse last week and am temporarily out of the saddle, but in the meantime, I thought I'd share some photos I took of Grace recently. I rode her before I took the photos, and it was super hot out. I'm a little disappointed that she has sweat marks in these (I tried to brush them out with limited success) but I thought they came out pretty well nonetheless. I can't get over how grown up she is looking these days!! I also had to stop taking photos at a certain point because Grace insisted on hanging out with me and I wasn't about to chase her off.

So Many Photos, So Little Time

I haven't even caught up on all the updates from my last photo post! I took some actual photos with a camera not attached to my phone in the last few weeks.

The rainy weather has made for some dramatic skies.

CP The Eventer

I have much to catch up on, including several big, individual updates, but this topic has me the most excited right now so it goes first.

On Sunday, the 4th, I was supposed to go on a conditioning ride with Holly at Hawk Mountain. I'll be posting more about her in the near future.

Unfortunately, I came down with a nasty chest cold right after I got back from Dodie's ride over Memorial Day (entry on that coming soon too). After battling the sickness all week, I was feeling somewhat better, but nowhere near 100%. Then I asked Holly what time she wanted to meet at Hawk Mountain, which is about two hours from my house. She replied, "Between 8 and 8:30am," and my jaw dropped. Dragging myself out of bed at 5:30am on a Sunday while sick was the furthest thing from appealing. Those of you who know me in real life know that I'm not a morning person to begin with. Plus, I need to be completely healed, or as close to it as possible, by Thursday (tick tock!) I made the difficult decision to skip the conditioning ride. I'm not sure I could have done 10+ really technical miles up a mountain on a really fit horse anyway. Holly had another rider available to take my slot, so no harm, no foul.

I ended up sleeping until nearly noon on Sunday, which my body desperately needed. I woke up feeling really refreshed, which lasted about ten minutes. I carried a measly 30lb. bag of dog food up the stairs to the apartment and was winded and sweating. Good thing I didn't go conditioning!

Instead, I got to go to the Horse Park and see CP compete in the Pony Club horse trials! CP had made his eventing debut the week before at Bucks County in the pre-starter division, which he won by a large margin. This week, he was entered in the starter division, and his ride times were really reasonable, starting at 1:55pm.

I reached out to Erin, who I had been meaning to catch up with anyway. Erin rode CP as a crash test dummy back in 2012 when we were working through his behavioral issues, and I thought she'd get a kick out of watching him compete. Erin and I agreed to meet at the HP at one-ish.

I spotted Frank's rig and my favorite chestnut pony as soon as I pulled in. I got lucky and there was a parking slot open right next to them. I shot Erin a text to let her know where I was parked, and then I jumped out of the car and snuggled CP, who has really matured over the last year and was standing like the good citizen he is, unfazed by the chaos that is a horse trial.

Erin arrived just in time to braid CP's forelock, which made me grin because she also braided CP for his first ever show in 2012 (dressage at DVHA... he ended up being reserve champion for the series!)

I got to meet CP's other trainer, Alexis. I follow her on IG and she works for my friend, Ashley, so I felt like I already knew her. It was good to put a face to the name, and we clicked instantly. I think our training styles are pretty similar, and we both believe in regular clinics with accomplished riders, as well as getting knowledge anywhere you can get your hands on it! Alexis was there in a professional capacity, which meant I got to just watch and enjoy for the day without any responsibilities! I got to be a spectator instead of an instructor, which was a fun change!

Not long after we arrived, Anne mounted and rode down to the warm up ring. They had a lovely warm up and CP was relaxed and on his best behavior.

June 10 Questions

I have been so busy that I haven't even had time for a "my life in pictures" catch up post! Since I last did a mass update, I have gone to NY to photograph an endurance ride, watched CP at a horse trial (entry in progress), crewed 100 miles at Old Dominion, battled a chest cold, and took the hardest fall off a horse that I think I've had to date. More on all that later.

BUT, this blog hop from Rocking E Cowgirl caught my eye.

Trail Riding at Horseshoe Bend

Two Fridays ago, Dawn, my client who runs the trail riding stable and owns Ragnar, contacted me and asked, "Do you know anybody who would be able to guide a two and a half hour trail ride at Horseshoe Bend this afternoon?" She had an open house at her farm the following day and was busy running around and doing last minute preparations. She didn't have the heart to cancel on the client, but wouldn't be able to give up two and a half hours of her day for a ride.

My schedule is always in flux. Sometimes I think I know what I'm doing a few hours before I do it, but usually I'm wrong. As it so happened, the temperature was in the mid 90's that day and my clients had dropped like flies. I had spent the morning getting training sessions done before the earth heated up, and then hid in an indoor arena. My plan was to go home and hide in the AC, but the chance to make a couple extra bucks while enjoying a leisurely trail ride was too good to pass up.

"I could do it. What time? I just need enough time to grab something cold to drink, then I can meet you there."

I had only been to Horseshoe Bend one other time, even though the park was designed with horses in mind and is relatively local to me. The other time I went, I rode Damita and we went out for a half hour loop to make sure the mare was safe on trail. Still, the park isn't that big, and the trails are well-marked loops. It wasn't rocket science and I felt confident that I could figure it out.

I downloaded the maps to be safe, and came up with a game plan.