A Misadventure-free Ride(ish)

I was sure today was going to be one hell of a hot mess. I completely overslept, so I quickly threw on some clothes and jumped into the car. Halfway up the hill, I realized I'd left my cameras and my spare set of reins. I was afraid that didn't bode well for the ride.

When we got to the lodge, Mom told me that Skeeter was on her shit list. Skeeter is super pushy on the ground, which I hate, and it's an ongoing fight with her. I'm thinking that she's so pushy on the ground, because Karma heard me complain that I would never tolerate a pushy horse. You know how a childless adult bitching about misbehaving kids, ends up with feral children and are forced to eat their words? Yeah, it's *exactly* like that.

Ugh. Not a great start and we hadn't even pulled the horses.

Skeets was a rock star while getting all tacked up, though Alloy was being twitchy and a bit of a spaz. He threatened to blow up several times while getting tacked up. At one point, I mentioned that I hoped that oversleeping and forgetting stuff was all of the misadventure we'd have. Then Beel spoke up and said that is was probably his turn for a "misadventure" (read: fall, since Mom and I had each hit the ground). I told him that we don't take turns. I know that's against everything we learned in kindergarten, but when it comes to horse misadventures, we don't take turns!

Mom and I both had passing thoughts of booting Skeeter, but since we were just riding in town, I passed on fighting over the boots. The ride started out better than any we've had this year - even though Alloy was kind of being an idiot during the tacking up phase, as soon as Bill mounted up and started moving his feet, he settled right down.

Because of last week's fiasco, we planned a short, successful ride in town. It was all going well until about half a mile out, when Skeeter just stopped. She just refused to take one more step on the gravely, pokey road. I pointed her to the grassy area along the side of the road and she stepped right up and we moved along nicely until we had to step back down on the road to cross a driveway. She stepped down, took two steps and stopped, which confirmed my suspicion that her feetsies were still tender. I mentally cursed myself for not putting boots on her, then stepped down.

Thanks to my mapmyrun app, I know that when we're riding, we average between 24 and 25 minutes a mile, but I also know that when Copper and I are walking, we average between 19 and 20 minutes a mile. I wasn't going to let her meander along at a 24 minute per mile pace, so I kept her moving along faster than she wanted. She might have gotten out of carrying me, but she wasn't getting out of working. For a mare that is usually very difficult to lead because of her pushiness, I had to do a surprising amount of driving and dragging her along. There's a reason she hasn't graduated from the 15' lead rope to a more manageable length one.

Mom and Bill happily rode along behind us while I dragged Skeeter a long. At one point, after having to drive her to speed her up, I looked back and she had the best eff you and eff this look on her face. I couldn't help but laugh at her. She thought she was going to get to go home once I dismounted, but the joke was on her.

You know the problem with forcing your horse to walk with you at a 19-ish minute mile? You also have to walk at that pace, so maybe the joke was on me. I know exactly how slow my walking pace is, but I figured I was making her move a good bit faster than her riding speed.

Ski Road meets up with Business Hwy 7, which is paved, so I mounted up again there and we rode happily back to the lodge.

We're calling today's ride a huge win. No one came off their horse, and though I walked, I chose to, plus she still had to carry me about half of the ride. Next week, the boots are going back on. I think we'll probably stay in town, just to see how she's doing, but by August we should be back up on the mountain.

You're welcome for the fancy artwork :)

4th of July parade, 2019

You know, at one point, I used to be really good about this blogging thing. Now, I'm chronically behind, for which I apologize.

Last year, Autobot rode Skeets in the Allenspark 4th of July parade for me, because I didn't think I'd be able to get up the mountain in time to participate. This year, I made sure not to schedule myself for any posse duties on the 4th so I could ride my own horse in the parade, instead of watching her be ridden. I'm forever grateful to Autobot for all of the time and effort she put into Skeeter last summer, and it was heartwarming to watch them in the parade, but I wanted to get back at it. I hadn't ridden in the parade since I put Estes down six years ago (it seems like yesterday, but FB memories tells me it's already been six years). With Autobot in the Army, I didn't even have to arm wrestle her to see who was going to ride.

Getting Skeeter up the mountain took some finagling since our trailer is broken, but Mom and Bill sorted it out to pick her up a couple of days before the parade to let her get settled with Washoe and Alloy. Mom was kind enough to take her out for a ride the day before the parade as well, just to remind her that she's a broke mountain horse (I'll hound Mom into writing up that post on her blog).

On parade day, Jay and I made it up to the lodge in time for breakfast (because it's a sin to miss one of Mom's breakfasts). I decided I wasn't going to do much as far as decorating Skeeter, but at the last minute I did attempt to put a pretty bow in her mane. She managed to shake it off twice before the parade even started, so I'm glad I didn't attempt more beautification.

Autobot's ex-boyfriend, who has become a friend of the family, came up for the parade and helped Mom out by giving Washoe a quick bath and prettying him up. I'm fairly certain Washoe still has the red and blue handprints on his booty.

Additionally, we had the pleasure of riding with a new friend, J. She is a fellow member of Horse Camping and Trails Across America which is cool enough, but even cooler is that she's read my book, Tales from the Trail. She reached out to me a couple of weeks ago, asking if I'd be in the Allenspark area while she was up there, so it was a no-brainer to ask her to ride with Mom and me in the parade.

Even though I haven't done much riding recently - we're talking just a few times since February, with weeks, if not months, in between - the riding that Skeeter and I did over Christmas break paid off. I'm gaining a lot more of my confidence back, which I really needed, because I was beginning to think I'd never get it back. I wasn't at all nervous about climbing up on her, even though it had been a few weeks, and Mom had reported that she'd been a bit of a pill to ride the day before.

The parade went off without a hitch, but I have to admit that I was fighting back tears as our turn came to enter the parade route. There was the band on a trailer in front of us, barricade ropes with flags on them on either side of the road, and hundreds of people lined up. Skeeter hesitated, but didn't try to fight me. She took a deep breath, let out a big sigh and took a tentative step, then another and another. Next thing I know, she's walking the parade route with our new friend J next to us and Mom and Washoe riding drag. Even when the crowd of kids surged into the street after candy, she stayed steady. In fact, I had to keep checking her speed, because once she relaxed, she decided that she needed to help the band and kept creeping up to their trailer.

As usual, we peeled off at Ski Road instead of going down into the madness of Ferncliff, and we finished our parade with an easy ride. We got lots of compliments from people walking home from the parade about how well-mannered and beautiful our horses were. And, well, that made my cold, dead heart grow three sizes.

The comments also reminded me of how far Skeeter and I have come. Five years ago, she was an untouched mustang from Canon City and we've had our fair share of issues. It took us a long time to get where we are, and a lot of people bring their 'stangs on a lot faster and go a lot further, but we're finally becoming a pretty good team.

She didn't bat an eye at the flags, the people, the noise of the trucks, the band, kids yelling and screaming. Other than her brief hesitation at the very beginning, she was amazing.

Damn, I love that mare.