Once a Week Rider

The weather and my schedule finally cooperated and I got in rides on all three horses.  We've had rain, and wind, and more rain and wind - yesterday we had gusts to 50mph - so the last time I rode was a week ago.  That's the downside of having my horses at a place with no indoor.  As we get further into winter, riding will become more occasional, until sometime in December or January where there's about 6 to 8 weeks where I can't ride even on the trail.  The arena becomes unusable earlier due to freezing of the footing.

Today wasn't bad at all - temperatures in the upper 40s/low50sF, with on and off sun and not too much wind.  When I went to the barn after lunch, Drifter and Dawn were both napping in their paddocks, and Drifter got up first so he got ridden first.  He was a ball of energy - several of the mares are in heat - and easily distracted, but we got some good work done and he didn't do anything untoward and relaxed a bit by the end of our session. We worked primarily on him stretching into a nice walk, going over poles and then a bit of trotting.  He was perfectly happy to trot but his trot doesn't feel completely normal yet - he's still feeling it out a bit and it got better the more we did.

Dawn was next.  She's a bit "footy" on hard surfaces right now - I think she got a bit too much grazing yesterday even in the (almost) dry lot, so today I pulled her into a paddock after only two hours.  She had a bit of bute yesterday and today, and I think she's going to be fine.  We had an easy session at the walk, just working on some lateral work, some poles and some stretching down.  In contrast to Drifter, who was a bundle of nerves, she was very relaxed and even stood completely still for mounting (rather than trying to back up - we may have this one fixed).

Pie and I had a nice short walking session, working on him using himself at the walk, and going over poles - his walk isn't 100% right yet under saddle but very close, and he seems completely comfortable and happy.  We also did a few short excursions outside the arena.

Keeping fingers crossed for more riding days soon . . .