Today was date day with Mike. We took the Triumph to the mountains. And it was cold and rainy. But not terribly so. We warmed up by the fire at Two Wheels. And because the weather was sketchy we got home at 4:45. So, I opted to go ride Funny. I really wanted to practice our dressage test and Jean put up like...30 jumps... (Ha, not really but the arena is slap full of jumps) so I can't practice it at home. And tomorrow it's a good chance of storms and rain so I didn't know if the arena would be closed or not, so... I just went tonight. And I'm glad we did. We had fun!
We had the whole place to ourselves. We did a quick hack around the little lake to warm up. The pterydactyl took flight twice and scared us twice. But at least he didn't screech at us! Then we went to the XC field and did a little trotting. She was so amped up though it wasn't relaxing and she felt a little explosive so... we just headed to the arena. I did a tiny bit of trotting and then we went in the arena and ran through the test. It was actually really not too bad! I'm thinking that might be my tactic at the show next weekend. No warm up. No chance for her to escalate and amp up! She was still pretty quick as it was. But it was doable. And she had some good moments. So then we rode and it got worse. Doh! We managed to get some good moments and ran through the test another time or two. At least our halts are getting better!
We headed back out to the woods for a cool down hack and she kept picking the longer routes. But that's okay. I was game for it! However, she was jumpy! She spooked at a squirrel. And then when we were by the hay fields with the gallop track there was a deer feeding in the woods that was doing that weird blowing/snorting thing and it freaked Funny out! I managed to get her past it but we had to swing way wide into the hay fields. (Sorry Lucy!!). And then she was so jumpy and threatened to bolt every which way. Then she spooked hard at a tree with a big wide weird stump and almost spun again. I finally got her past it and she finally took a breath in the field behind the lake. We were able to get across the damn, although a bird flew by and she almost spun again. We managed to make it back home without any more spooks. We did a little bit more trotting and cantering. Her canter is much quieter.
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