Draper's First Trail Ride

Looking back at all I had done with Otoelene as a 2 year old, I saw that I was sorely lacking in Draper's training.  So J was wonderful enough to take the day off and haul us to the woods for Draper's first away ride.  

 Granted, it is only 5 minutes up the road, but it still involves loading and unloading, and getting ready in a strange place.  Being the middle of the week we didn't expect to have many other horses for distraction.  We got off to a great start, no problems with hauling or saddling.  J rode Hank since he is our most steady and predictable horse.

 I lunged Draper for less than 5 minutes and decided she wasn't upset or nervous about anything, and got on.  I was glad that I changed the reins out from the short barrel racing reins I have been riding her with.  I thought she might put her head down more to check things out and sure enough, she spent a lot of time checking out piles of horse poo, leaves, rocks, logs....so it was nice to have the longer reins.

 I love how she was listening to me with that left ear.

 J and Hank took the lead and we headed up Horse Heaven.  This is the easiest, obstacle free local trail so I thought it would be a good place to start.

 Hank was his usual Steady Eddie self, maybe even a little too calm and slow.

Draper did great following but wanted to walk faster than Hank.  Sometimes I would get in front but then she decided there were scary things that she needed to stop at and inspect, like that scary rock.  I don't understand how some rocks and logs are scary and others aren't.  But she never shied or spooked at anything, just stopped and looked.  

 It was a beautiful day, but got a little hot toward the end of the ride.  And maybe I got the combination of fly sprays right because they didn't bother us too bad.

Coming down the back side of the mountain, Draper was more brave and stayed in front better.   

  Then J took over the camera and actually got photographic proof of Draper's ride.

 We did run into one couple up on the trail going in the opposite direction.  Their horses were giving off some bad energy while J was trying to talk to them so we didn't dally long.  Then, once we were at the trailer and had unsaddled, they passed by again.  This time they hung around longer to chat.

 Draper was a champ the whole time.  I think it helped to have Hank there with his calm energy.

Then it was home to unload and eat lunch.  But wait, there's more, J even took a video.

We were almost back to the trailer at this point after a wonderful 3 hour ride.  Who's ready for the next ride?