We're Mobile

I finally, finally was able to convince my husband that I needed a horse trailer. After haunting Craigslist and other horsey type sites I finally found a trailer that was in good shape and in my price range. Why is the price range thing always so hard?

So here it is, my first horse trailer as an adult! It is a five year old, barely used Moritz two horse slant load trailer. I think I should be able to get a lot of years out of it, it is in great shape. I hope to get a cover for it so I can sort of have it under cover this winter.

More to come!

Florida Wrap Up

My last day in Florida came very quickly. Luckily I had booked my tickets so that we were able to get a ride in before I had to head to the airport. Always thinkin' that's me! Ha, yeah right!

Anyways, Sunday morning before the flurry of packing we saddled up and headed to a local ranch that allows riding on its property. We basically just meandered around checking out different trails. I think at one point we were trying to find a lake but then it was decided that no one knew where it was. So we just found silly little things to do like climb hills.

After we had ridden for awhile one of us finally looked at a watch and realized we had better get our butts home if we wanted to fit in a driving lesson before I had to go. We hustled back and did a quick half hour driving lesson. My arms couldn't take much more than a half hour anyways so it worked out okay. We unharnessed Rosie, then went in the house to eat lunch, shower, finish packing and head back out the door. I kissed Rosie good bye for the next couple of months again and told her I would see her soon in Pennsylvania.

First Driving Lesson

On my second day in Florida I received my first driving lesson with Rosie. I was a bit nervous. I have driven a couple of horses before but never for very long. I am very paranoid about doing something wrong with Rosie and messing up all the training that has been done with her. I know this is something that I am just going to have to get over but for now I am a paranoid, anxiety ridden freak! Anyways.....back to the driving.

First we went over all the pieces of the harness, where they go and how they should fit. Yikes, I am going to need crib notes for this. Once the harness was in place we hooked up the cart. While we are hooking up the cart AT is going over not just how stuff should fit and where it goes but how a harness horse should behave and certain rules that must be adhered to for everyones safety. For instance, no one gets into the cart before the driver. This is a good rule, you wouldn't want the person with the reins getting left behind if the horse takes off with someone in the cart. After getting into the cart we discussed how a harness horse should never anticipate what you are going to do. No walking off on their own as you are stepping into the cart, etc. They can cock a leg or shift to get comfortable but other than that, nothing. Once we were in the cart and ready to go it was time for our photo shoot! AT daughter really likes to take pictures and when I handed her my big Nikon she went to town! Which is fine by me, I love pictures. Here is a sampling.

Isn't she so cute in her harness? The brown reins with the black harness is the traditional look. I have no idea why.

Here we are ready to go!

Upon the conclusion of our photo shoot we headed off to tour the property. AT trainer drove Rosie first while explaining to me all the different cues and voice commands. There is so much more to driving than I first thought. The reins were then handed over to me. Poor Rosie didn't know what to think when she felt a different set of hands on the reins. She handled it well though. I was a little bit drunken in my driving which is common with new drivers. We drove for a bit though, doing lots of turns and some gait changes. We also got to drive through the water! I love driving through water, it's so cool! After my arms felt ready to fall off, we drove back to the barn, put the harness and cart away and saddled up for a ride. We didn't take a break in between because it was forecasted to rain for most of the day with the morning and evening being the best time to be outside. We had already made plans to go to the dinner show "Arabian Nights" that evening so we had to get our horse time in that morning.

This time for our ride AT daughter was able to join us on her lovely palomino mare. We rode out from the house, down the road a little ways into the woods and onto some trails. We had a nice ride through the trees and at one point even saw a feral hog! I saw it first and thought it was a dog. It was all black and staring at us with it's ears perked up. Once it noticed us looking at it, it took off into the woods. We rode around for a little bit more but it started to rain so we wrapped it up and headed back to the house. Since it was raining, after lunch we decided watch horse movies. Did you really think we would watch anything else? First we watched National Velvet. Classic, classic movie. Then we joined The Black Stallion at the part where they are rescued from the island. Even if you aren't a horse nut, the cinematography in The Black Stallion is beautiful. I highly recommend it. The Black Stallion Returns was on after but we had to get ready to go Arabian Nights. So many horsey things, so little time.

Stay tuned for day three....

Oh Happy Day!

At the end of February I was able to take a trip to Florida to see Rosie. I was able to stay at the trainers house because she is awesome like that so it was almost like having my horses at home again. I also traveled alone which was a unique experience for me.

I flew out early on a snowy Friday morning. While the east coast was getting pounded with yet another snowstorm, the snow accumulation in Pittsburgh wasn't as bad. When I booked my tickets I was fortunate to be able to get a direct flight into Orlando. I think if I had had to connect anywhere on the east coast that day I wouldn't have made it. My flight got into Orlando just a little late (we had to de-ice, no complaints from me) but I was still there by 11:45. I connected with AT (Awesome Trainer), we headed to her place, ate lunch, loaded up the horses and headed out to ride at a local park. I was so excited to see Rosie! She has gotten taller and whiter. She also grew quite a winter coat for being in Florida. I guess that area has experienced a much colder than normal winter this year.

This moment was surreal for me, finally getting to throw a leg over Rosie! I think she was a little confused over her new rider but she handled it fine.

We soon were all settled and ready to hit the trails at the Lake Lizzie Nature Preserve. What a beautiful park this is. The local trail riders of Osceola County are very lucky. Wide sandy trails and very quiet. We met one group of bird watchers from Ohio and that was it. They asked us for directions and we almost sent them to the wrong parking lot but we got it figured out and nobody got lost. I hope.

We rode along for awhile and finally got to Lake Lizzie. Of course we had to get in it. Rosie didn't even bat an eye. I love this horse! I kept a close eye out for gaters. Not that I really know what I am looking for until it is coming at me with its mouth open but whatever.

We let the horses get a drink and played in the water for a bit until Rosie started wringing her tail and getting Gumby legs. I didn't bring my swimsuit so I didn't exactly want to get wet. I hustled her back to dry land quickly.

A view of Lake Lizzie from the shore

On our way back I spotted a cool looking tree that I just had to photographed under. I have a thing for trees in Florida. I love the way the Spanish Moss hangs off of them. I could stare at them forever. But we had riding to do, so we took the picture and moved on.

I wonder if Rosie has to pee?

Just after this tree there was a big sand hill that we decided to play on. Gotta get your hill work where you can in Florida. Rosie was a little unsure as to why we were doing this when she could see the nice, flat trail obviously did not go up this thing. I'm going to try and post a video but I have never done this before so hopefully it works.

After this we kept it pretty tame and just moseyed back to the trailer. It was a gorgeous day, bright blue sky with no wind. Surprisingly I wasn't all that sore from my first ride since October. The thing that hurt the most were my ankles because I brought a crappy pair of boots that I had forgotten why I didn't like them. During the ride I remembered. When I put my heels down the leather digs into my ankles. Once I got blood flowing to my feet again everything was all good. After arriving back at the trailer we unsaddled the horses, loaded up and headed home for dinner. It was an awesome day!

Women and Horses

This is an good article written by Julie Goodnight on the connection between horses and women that I found very interesting. One point she brings up that I had never thought of before is that women can understand the prey role that a horse lives in because women themselves are often prey in this world. Read on if you like. Women and horses.

Visit

I have booked my tickets to go see Rosie towards the end of February. I can't wait to get down there and see her! Plus, I will be traveling alone while the husband is on kid duty at home. Because I am going alone I won't be in Florida for very long but that's okay, the fact that I get to go at all is wonderful.

Another bonus: it will be warm in Florida. I am counting the days.

Finding That Perfect Barn

I am once again on a quest to find a barn suitable for my little Rosie and I. Really, we just need to stop moving. Well, one more move to Maine would be nice and THEN I'm finished. But that is a whole other blog post. Back to finding a barn. I have begun to outline on paper what has been rattling around in my head for the different wants and needs in a boarding stable.

First the MUST HAVES. These are things that to me are non negotiable and I will break them down into tangibles and intangible.

Tangible

1. Daily turnout. This is a deal breaker for me. I have even passed over barns that will let me come turn the horse out myself but I was required to stay there for the duration of her time in the pasture. To me a horse in not meant to be in a stall 24/7 unless put there by a vet. I know some people compensate with regular exercise but that is still not going to work for me. A horse needs to be a horse.

2. Arena. I need at least an outdoor. Doesn't have to be anything fancy although I don't like to work in a round pen made of barbed wire. Yes, folks I have actually been presented with this option and no, they were not kidding. Sometimes you have to do things that require an enclosed environment for everyones safety.

3. Cleanliness. Not just the stalls but the area surrounding the barn. I don't like a lot of stuff laying around. To me that is just an accident waiting to happen and it makes me nervous. One barn I boarded at had so much stuff and the owner was always going to fix it. Never happened.

(This is not the place where I boarded, this is just a random picture off the internet, thank God!)

4. The other horses must look good. Sure you are always going to have a oldster or a hard keeper but all in all the horses need to look well fed and healthy.

5. Feed supplements. You know how we horse people love to supplement! The only extra thing I give Rosie is a daily feed through wormer but I need to the barn to feed it so I don't have to run out there everyday just to feed wormer.

Intangible

1. Friendly people. What seem like friendly people to me may seem nosy to someone else or vice versa. This one is kind of hard to gauge.

2. I must feel safe. Whether it is the aforementioned junk or crazy people I can't feel like I am going to get in a wreck or be done bodily harm by a person rather than a horse. This is something that is also hard relay in words. More of a gut feeling thing.

Now, the things I would prefer to have but are not deal breakers.

1. Stalls at night. Now given my earlier rant on stalls this might seem odd but it is nice to know that in the course of being moved from stall to pasture and vice versa someone is physically laying hands on my horse to hopefully see how she is feeling and if there are any injuries or lameness that needs to be attended to. I also like it when horses are fed individually in stalls, that way they are getting their share, no more or no less.

2. Close proximity to trail riding. Now that I think about it this one might have to be moved into the must haves section. I like to have an arena handy but I prefer to trail ride.

3. Tack lockers. Stuff walks off in a public boarding barn. You need a place that you can lock up.

4. Indoor arena. In parts of the country that are visited by winter such as this area and indoor comes in mighty handy.

Now on to the stuff that would be nice but certainly isn't going to send me running if a prospective barn doesn't have it.

1. Hot water in the wash rack. I don't like to take a cold shower so I don't imagine the horse does either.

2. Free trailer parking. It would be nice if it were free but most places do charge a small monthly fee.

3. Within 15 minutes of my house. I don't think this is going to happen but it's nice to have dreams.

4. Close enough to a park with bridle paths that I can ride there, safely.

And all this for a reasonable monthly amount! I don't think I am asking too much, do you? Ha!

Please feel free to add your thoughts to this post. Everyone has had different experiences and can bring something to the table that I may not have thought of.