Progress!

So Sunday afternoon I girded myself for war... I mean  for a trail ride. It was pretty hot, in the upper 80's but there was a breeze to help balance it out. I brought one of my western saddle pads up, as it's made to let the horse's back breath. So I saddled him up with my english saddle on the western pad, breastplate, rope halter under his western bridle with the clip on reins and a lead rope clipped to my saddle. Ample fly spray was applied and an ear net put on.

Now because it was so hot I was in denim capris and flip flops. Yes, I wear flip flops to the barn. I'm a bad, bad example. I changed into my Ariat terrains and then put my half chaps on my bare legs and over the bottoms of the capris. Felt a bit funny but it was better then overheating.

UK actually stood to let me get on after a few tries. This is one of the other problems we've been having, as he's been too anxious to stand still if we're not in the ring. I double checked my cell phone was in my back pocket and then off we went.

Our goal was to ride down the driveway and then the road for about a 1/4mile to meet Selene on her horse Marty and Sylvia who is leasing her other horse, Romeo. We would then attempt to trail ride. We made it down the driveway and UK didn't really give me any attitude tell I asked him to step out on the road. We'd ridden down the road in the past, but at Betsy's.

I'm not going to bother going into detail, I rode him for a bit on the road then decided to get off when I noticed exactly how much poison ivy was growing on the side of the road (I'm highly allergic!). I then dismounted and walked till we met up with the others.

UK had some attitude/fear issues when I went to mount him again, and I ended up getting off again. I hand walked him down the trail a ways and then got on again using a handy stone wall.

About halfway into the trail ride a lightbulb blinked in UK's little brain. Maybe this trail riding thing wasn't a form of torture, maybe it could be FUN. He was still nervous most of the ride, but started to trust me and the other horses a bit more that we weren't leading him to his death. We rode over a wooden bridge, through the woods, up and down rocky hills, through water multiple times and even behaved when Romeo started getting fresh. We trotted a lot, which was harder for me then it was for him as I had my stirrups extra long in order to be more secure while walking. We cantered too, nice forward canter and a nice collected canter. He didn't care if I was ducking branches while we cantered either. We even did a bit of canter downhill.

UK was willing to keep going even once he started getting really tired. His natural curiosity was starting to outweigh his fear by this point. When we reached the trail head next to Selene's I got off so he could cool down on our walk back up the road to the barn. That was when I noticed he was missing a front shoe. Damnit! The farrier was already supposed to be coming out as he'd grown so much foot that he was due a couple of weeks earlier then usual.

UK was perfectly calm for the walk home, and didn't even realize that was where we were going until we were half way up the driveway to the barn. He can be so blond sometimes.

Overall I learned some important things about UK.

1. Once he gets over his fear he's all in.
2. He is pretty sure footed, not as sure footed as Jake was, but still more sure footed then the average horse.
3. The SmartBug-Off I've been feeding him works! The other horses were being swarmed by deer-flies every time we slowed down, while UK and I never had  more then 2 bothering us, if any.
4. He will stop is asked even when excited when following other horses.

And I learned that I'm in better shape then I could have hoped. I had no problem staying off his back while cantering and I still had energy by the end of the trail ride. I still have a long ways to go, but it's good to know the muscles are still there and still can do what I need them to. The only problems I had were due to trying to deal with my too long stirrups while trotting super fast.

Well the farrier will be out Saturday. Till then UK's been having a little vacation, only broken up to re-wrap the shoeless foot every other day. And of course because my horse is unrideable the weather has been awesome yesterday and today. Oh well!