Expanding our horizons....

I recently sold a great young horse, Solid Gold Coin, to a wonderful woman near Charlottesville, VA.  She bought him to be her next foxhunter.  Due to life circumstances, I took the horse to her to try, so I got to hang out with her and talk to her a lot.  To make a long story short, she suggested that I contact my local foxhunting club to meet new people and try new things in the horse world.

Our local hunt is the Yadkin Valley Hounds.  www.yadkinvalleyhounds.com  I contacted their secretary, who happens to be a sortof neighbor, and got all of the logistics of joining.  She invited me to come out to the "trail ride" they were having this past Saturday.  I thought, well, it will be a good long walk for Bug to get his fitness day in.

Saturday morning arrived, and I loaded Bugger up and headed out.  Bug was very confused when he stepped off the trailer to find lots of other horses and trailers, but he couldn't seem to locate the arenas and XC course.  

We rode for just under 2 hours!!  And boy, this wasn't like any trail ride I've ever been on!!  We were on trails, but we were not just walking along.  Bug got some serious fitness work in!!  He had a blast!  He wasn't sure why we were going XC with a group of horses, or why we were changing gaits so much, but he was SURE he was winning whatever we were doing! haha  If you've ever met Bug, you understand.  :)  We went through creeks, over real ditches, up and down real banks, up HUGE inclines.  Honestly, there were times where I was terrified, but Bug never thought twice about trailblazing.  I have some face scratches to prove it! haha  I wasn't getting out of the way of the branches fast enough.  

All in all, Bug and I had the BEST time.  I met a lot of really great people.  We are definately planning to become more involved with the group and trying our hands at Timed Trail Rides (basically Hunter Paces) and Foxhunting when the season begins again.  I think the horses will really enjoy this new work.  I like to keep it interesting for them, especially because Bug is so intelligent.  He gets bored rather easily.  I think making his fitness work exciting will really keep him happy.

I was also very glad to see how fit he really is!  After almost 2 hours of galavanting around the countryside, he was still fit and ready to go!  He barely broke a sweat on the 70+ degree day!  

I'm glad that I decided to take a chance and try new things!  I learned a lot about myself and my horse.

I hope all is well with everyone else!  We'll check in again soon.