Bennington Lake, Aug 22

This afternoon we trailered out to Bennington Lake. Matt and the kids came along. While I saddled up, Matt got the double stroller ready and the kids buckled in. They went on a walk while we were out there. I rode out alongside the river and saw two Blue Herons.

I had to use the restroom so I dismounted when we reached it 1/2 mile in, and I looked around for someplace to tie Sinwaan. There was a post in some tall grass with a hold in the top so I went over there and was trying to poke the lead through the hole when I felt something crawing on my finger. Yikes! I shook it off and decided perhaps I should look in the hole since it didn't feel like it went all the way through. What did I see? A wasp nest complete with wasps! I hightailed it to the other side of the restroom.

Luckily there was a hole in the top of the supporting wall. I unclipped Sinwaan's reins and ran it around and back to his chin ring. He seemed content.

It was such nice weather that it was a very busy day at the Lake. I saw a lot of foot traffic and a couple of people I knew on bicycles. Sinwaan did awesome. I wasn't confident that he would behave since he's had so much time off and last time he was so bad. He had a couple of nervous moments, little spooks at this or that but nothing major and we had a great ride.

The trails had been maintained and some were even still green.

We came across DeeDee on her new gelding, he is a really pretty horse and I hear doing well on the trails despite being an arena horse all his life.

Matt called me about 40 minutes in and we decided to meet back at the truck in about 30 minutes. On the ride back I saw them picking (and eating) blackberries!

Summer ride

It's been a long time since I've ridden, perhaps only once since pulling his shoes after our last endurance ride. Today we had a break in the weather, a slight breeze, so I planned to ride a short bit before helping to move a ton of hay. He was eager to go and met me at the gate. His hooves were very hard packed and it took a bit for me to even find the frog. He has put on a little weight (as expected) and I found his english girth to be a hole larger than average.

We headed out to the field and I mounted up. He walked to the end willingly but as we turned east the acting up began. It was just as I'd expected and experience before. First I had him back a couple steps every time he acted up but that soon led to him balking and then spinning and all while his head was high up in the air. There was probably a couple of minutes when I was not sure if I would win the battle but I worked to get him moving, to give him an outlet to channel his energy and eventually we worked through it. He wanted to run for the barn, so I worked to keep him to a slow trot (or jig), then made him move out (faster trot) heading away from the barn. Back and forth a number of times. When I could finally ask for the walk heading back and get it, then we called it a day and ended on a good note.