Last few days - a photo post

Tried to take some photos of the boys in their current herd/pasture before we move them "home" on Friday.  A certain black horse was not participating.  Booker snuck into quite a few photos as well.

The Last Couple Rides

Bitter sweet for sure.  These aren't our last last rides, but they are very likely our last rides in the cities.  The boys are moving out to our farm at the end of this week, I'm a little sad about it actually.  So we packed in a couple more trail rides before it was too late.  Our first ride was on Monday, which I already posted about.  Then Friday we went back to the same trail for another after work ride.  The weather was a little gloomy but no matter we had a decent time anyway.  We headed off in the opposite direction on the trail as Monday and Cody was as calm as could be.  We had even picked up some b-calm supplement just in case but he was so calm on his own we didn't give it to him.  I think we ended up going a little over 5.7 miles that day.  We're guessing Monday's ride was between 4 and 5.

Cody behaved really well.  Still a bit of trotting to keep up but he wasn't calling or trying to turn around all the time.  We even let the boys run for a stretch.  Got a little hairy near the end when I wasn't sure Cody would turn a corner or even listen to me if I asked him to stop but Booker was a star and reals it in when asked so then Cody slowed down as well.  But for the first few strides of the gallop, it was a great ride.  Both boys loaded in the trailer with no issues and we made it home and got everything put away right as the first sprinkles of rain started.

So Sunday we planned to take more of an all day ride and have a little lunch.  But when we woke up Sunday morning it was storming and the weather people said storms on and off all day.  After breakfast things hadn't picked up and the weather forecast had changed to no storms.  So we rolled the dice and met at the barn at noon.  Turned out to be a gorgeous day and thank goodness we decided to go!

We made it over to Murphy Hanrehan park this time.  Figured we needed change of scenery.  The parking lot was a lot larger than I remembered and there was only 2 other trailers in the lot.  Despite the large area I still couldn't back the trailer in a straight line!

So in total we rode 8.27 miles on Sunday.  Covered just about all the trails at Murphy.  And the sky was blue and the bugs were minimal.  Couldn't really ask for much more.  Cody was calm despite the mud.  The trails were pretty mushy and we even had a water crossing in the beginning.  Not sure why we didn't take a photo but both horses went through.  Booker was awesome, Cody needed a little encouraging but it's been a few years since we've been swimming.  The water was up to their bellies.

We rode one trail, took a break at the trailer to dry off and get more fly spray.  Then set out for a longer section of the trail.  The boys were pretty sweaty from the ride, Cody's saddle was sliding back like crazy.  I guess the Tacky-Too saddle pad is no match for heat and high humidity!  Had a few spots of trotting, a nice little canter (would have had more but everything was so wet), ran across some dogs, chatted with a little girl who called out "Hi Cody!" when we passed later on, jumped a log, and even chatted with the park police for a bit.

The boys loaded like pros and we made it back to the barn in one piece for our last adventure (of this part of the story - there's bound to be more adventures in a different form later on).  Daniel and Jeff even came out to meet us at the barn and Daniel had a little ride on Axel for a few minutes.

I'm surprised at how hard I'm taking this move. I will see the boys about as often but I guess not having them right near by is tough.  Plus now that we've had three progressively better trail rides I'd love to do that all summer. I'm just going to have to get Cody out in the pasture and push the cows around a bit and get Daniel riding Haji this summer instead.  Plus I'll still go to the barn and work with and ride Booker.  Our plan is to do a few rides/runs a week with Booker.  There's no Ride and Tie events in Minnesota but we're going to try our hand at our own version.  One of us will run while the other rides and then we'll swap.  Then I think in the spring we're going to get signed up for some Mounted Shooting clinics and try our hand at that.  We think Booker will take to it well.  So that will be the next chapter of this blog.

So I guess that ends this chapter, the next chapter will start with our move on Friday.  Like I said, bittersweet ...

Getting Our Farm Ready

Since we're moving the boys out to our property in a couple weeks we've been trying to get ready a bit.  Jeff spent a good part of last weekend pounding in t-posts for some new fencing.  The grove has two sides already fenced (some might need a little reinforcing still) but we wanted to fence in some of the yard so we have less to mow and the horses have more space.

They dug up the grainery footings and plan to plant grass there.  That was going to be my pumpkin patch so I had to go to plan B on that and put the pumpkins in the barnyard at the inlaws farm.

Jeff and I both mowed this past weekend as well.  Hopefully it'll grow a little and be ready for the boys in two weeks, might actually have to mow again before then. The actual barn yard is so overgrown.  My FIL wants to lock the horses in there first and have them clean it up but I'm not sure they will eat the grass when it's that tall.  Guess we'll find out.  Looks like in total they will have about 5 acres give or take a little.  About half of that is trees and the other half is grass.

The red is the existing fence and the blue is the fence we're adding.  It's about 450ft by 500ft or so not counting the zig zaggy parts.  I'd love to fence in the parts east and south of the barn yard but I don't think we'll get to do that.  Maybe a temporary fence for a weekend so they can clean up the grass.  Can horses eat asparagus?  We have one patch left of that in the yard.

My shopping list keeps growing for what I need to get to have the horses on our own land.  Gonna need a few trips to Fleet Farm in the next two weeks I think.  And I still need to find a vet and a farrier out there.

A Real Trail Ride

We finally did it.  We made it out to an honest to goodness trail ride.  Now that we have plans to bring Cody and Axel back to our farm we have the trailer in town (still not completely finished but good enough).  So we're squeezing as many trail rides as we can in the two weeks before my horses move.

I successfully drove the trailer to the barn and with the help of J backed it into place.  It's been a while since I've had to drive the trailer.  J said just go slow then you have time to fix any problems.  After helping catch Booker (who made a break for it after slipping out of his halter while being fly sprayed) we brought the boys down to the trailer.  Cody was acting a little worked up so J thought Booker should go in first, thinking he'd be a champ.  Well he proved us wrong.  He didn't seem scared but he wouldn't get in all the way.  He was testing some limits for sure.  But we finally got him in and hooked up and it was Cody's turn.  Only took a little verbal encouragement and he stepped right in, slow and steady and cautious.  We made it to UMore park (Lone Rock Trail) in one piece with a slightly long parade of cars behind us ;) Cody unloaded as slowly and cautiously as he loaded and Booker rushed out facing forward.  So Cody won the trailering portion of our evening.

So Booker definitely won the trail ride portion of our evening. Cody was in a constant "trot to keep up" gear.  He never really relaxed.  He wasn't horrible, just bouncy.  Near the end of our ride Cody decided he knew the way home and kept trying to turn around (away from the trailer) and was calling like mad.  I don't know if he heard some other horses in a distance or what the deal was but he was quite unhappy.  Booker just walked like a champ and gave Cody a "WTF" look every time he called.  We had a little canter at the end of our ride. Cody started out a little frantic but settled in.  Would have maybe cantered more but the trail was full of gopher holes so it wasn't safe. There was only a few nice stretches of grass that didn't have holes.

Booker got in the trailer at the end of the ride with just one balk and Cody got in like a pro.  We stopped at DQ on the way through town and got everyone unloaded and put away while it was still light one - the one advantage of it staying light so late.  Both horses unloaded really well and J backed the trailer into its parking spot for me. :)  Overall I think the evening was a success.  We have our farrier appointment today and we're going to try for another ride on Friday.  Booker should have fancy new shoes so hopefully he'll be feeling 100%/

So other than our trail ride adventures we've been making it out to the barn once or twice a week for a ride down the road and Cody and Booker have been doing great. Cody is slow as ever but fairly calm in general so I try to not nag him.  I've had Axel out a few times to groom and clean up his feet, his scratches are looking pretty good now.  I've used WD40 3 times on them now, I think that's doing the trick.  It is late in the season but it's still raining and there's a ton of mud so I think I can safely say it's the WD40?

After the boys leave I'll start doing some more work with Booker and hopefully we'll fix any of his little respect problems.  It'll be interesting to see how he does for shoes this afternoon.  We do know his MO now, fly backwards, when he wants to protest something.

The First Mile

Well we did it! Made it down the road, about a mile, and back, in one piece!  Cody and Booker (he's Booker now, though I still like Booger better) went like champs.  Cody still doesn't keep up but he's calm and steady.  Even when traffic passes he looks but doesn't spin around and run for home.  So I call that success.  The next couple weeks my plan is to just let him go as slow as he wants as long as he's calm.  Sure it's nice to ride up next to someone but Cody is going to "retire" in style ;)  Of course then we'll have to see about riding out at the farm, that'll be whole other chapter.

And not only did we make it down the road once, we went twice in one week!  The second time the wind was blowing like mad but the boys were saints.

The trailer is hopefully coming back this coming weekend so we hope to get out a few times to some trails before the boys move to the farm.