And then we were there....or "How I Simply Missed the Turn"

At 6am, I couldn't sleep any longer.  I was sore and stiff, and past ready to find camp and get settled in so the horses would have a long day of resting and eating ahead of them.

So, I rolled out of the truck, grabbed the horses and took them off for another graze while I looked around.

The view, well, not of my "campsite" was pretty.  Mesas and "mountains" and beautiful greenery as far as I could see.

I mean, just about anything looks prettier than "camp", doesn't it?

This right here, THIS is ugly.  At one point I guess this was the boat ramp parking lot?
For me, it was camp, Night One.

 

But tell me that isn't pretty?  In that "rough and rugged" beauty sort of way.

This was taken facing down towards the permanently closed boat ramp. 
More beautiful views.

The kids having made quite a mess overnight at our temporary lodgings.

What?  Wasn't us.  We're PERFECT!

Endurance ponies doing endurance pony things.  Like relaxing.  And pooping.

I have NO idea what was over there, but apparently Dakini found it fascinating.

Yep.  Messy ponies.  And no, no I didn't clean it up.

My neighbor overnight.  I think it was some kind of "honey" truck (for cleaning out bathrooms).

Anyway, after our handgraze, I put both ponies back in the trailer after breaking camp.  Which took all of 15 minutes so I was on the road by 6:30.

Apparently in the dark, I missed the low, brown with yellow paint signs pointing me to the equestrian area.  But, with the sun up, I was able to find it, pull in to camp and decide where I wanted to put myself.  I had almost my choice of campsites.  I opted to go beneath some trees for shade for the trailer.  And, while it was sandy next to me, the ground where I parked looked firm and solid.  So, I was in camp, offically, by 6:20ish or so.  My neighbor was like "Wow, you must have gotten up early to get here this early!"  My response?  "Something like that." 

Offloaded the kids and started to set up my pen.  I had forgotten at some point that with the hullabaloo at Shanghai, that Llano had said 1 horse per pen.  So, my neighbor came over to let me know.  No big deal, I had a jumper, so I could make it work if I cut my electric tape.  But, she said she was going to go check with ride management.

So, as I'm partially through getting posts in, she comes back, says it's okay to have 2 in one pen as AERC's new ruling seemed to come down on that side.  I was okay either way, but glad that's what happened.  So, get the kids arranged, and camp set up, and then....I sat around for the rest of the day. 

Let me say, if I ever have the time to arrive a day early to camp in the future, I'm going to take FULL advantage of that!!  It was so nice to just relax in the shade, watch my horses, read, nap, get my gear slowly set up and ready for the next day.  Take them out for hand walks and just, in general, enjoy my time off.

The ride meeting was quick and easy.  Vetting Strider in was simple as well.  I gave my Renegades to a friend who needed them for her horse.  Told her to just keep them.  It's good karma, and I asked her, if she ever had the chance, to pay the karma forward to someone else. 

Had some time to talk with my mentor, share the Doc. G electrolyte protocol and share some of my supplies so that she could try it out on their two horses.  (Fast refresher; Enduramax powdered e-lytes, kaolin-pectin [or ProCMC] and a splash of CMPK).  Spoiler Alert; My mentor said that she feels it really made a good difference in her two horses.  She uses Perform and Win, but was happy with how it worked. 

I ran into town after the ride meeting and spent some time at Braum's eating dinner, being lazy and checking up on my phone.  Ran into WalMart for more ice and some beer for my mentor's husband and headed back to camp later than intended. 

Crawled into bed around 10, but couldn't sleep.  I'm always attuned to issues or just the general "noise" of camp.  I read until I finally said I HAD to get some sleep. 

Rolled over, and attempted to get some.

Tomorrow, our first LD!!