Shaffer Bend Ride....or "Well, at least I got to ride my horse...?"

Now that it was confirmed to me that Strider really is okay under saddle, it's time to start bringing him back.

But, where to go to ride and condition?

I've already told Joe, I'm done road riding near our house after that last bad ride with Socks (which wasn't BAD, but you just can't get any speed going to work on conditioning like that).

So, off to Where The Trails Are to figure out what places are near my home, and which ones are barefoot friendly enough that I could go.

It just so happens that there are two near my home; Shaffer Bend and Muleshoe Bend. 

Shaffer just happens to be SLIGHTLY closer, so I'd planned to go out early Saturday morning, get my ride done, and be home for the rest of the day.

Except...no.  See my previous post about "The Great Cow Debacle" as I've taken to calling it lately.

I told Joe Sunday night, since we had no work on Monday, I WAS going riding since our plans had been shot all weekend.

So, the initial plan was Joe and I were going to go riding somewhere. 

Out the window.

I decided I'd haul over to Shaffer Bend and see if it would be suitable for conditioning for Strider and I.

It's about 35 minutes from home, and an LCRA park.


I pulled into the park hoping to find an attendant on duty so I could pay with my credit card.  No one on duty.  Disappointing.  Especially as I wanted to know where day parking was for horses.  Or a trail map would have been nice.

Instead, I paid into the honor box, making SURE they knew I was there as an equestrian (I scrawled it in BIG LETTERS all over the envelope), and then proceeded into the park.

And I drove.

And I drove some more.

And kept on driving.

Now, it's all gravel, and as I went down the road, I would see signs at the edge of the road indicating the riding trails, but I couldn't figure out where to park to access the trails.

I thought that SURELY somewhere ahead was day parking.

No.  Not at all.

I eventually dead ended into the camping sites, and had NO idea what to do at that point.

Now, the park was EMPTY, so not a single camper.  I eventually opted to pull through a site near the pipe corrals they have built for the horses and I unloaded Strider. 

He promptly looked around and realized he was IT!  The only horse.  Cue some enthusiastic calling for someone, ANYONE to answer him.

Didn't help the wind was blowing pretty fiercely, so he was a bit of a kite on a string.  So, I tied him up a little shorter, quickly tacked up, and got going.

We headed out on Homestead, taking our time as I had no idea what the trail conditions were, and I'd noticed on the way in that in the open fields, there were a LOT of pig wallows.  Not far down the trail, there was a drop off to the side so we had to swerve around that.  And then a little further down the trail, there was a big hole in the middle of the trail.  So, I'm a little nervous about the trail conditions, but wanting to move out a little....and yet wanting to be safe on our first ride back.

So, we kept it to a dull roar.  Lots of walking, some gaiting.  We saw a LOT of deer.  At some point on the trail there was another we could take which took us down to the lake.  Where there was an open place.  And fairly flat.

And he asked so nicely that I allowed the canter.  He wanted to go faster.  I could sense it, and while I wanted to allow it, I couldn't see through the grass, and he was a good boy about listening to me when I said we weren't going to.

We had to bushwack a little bit as I could see a trail on the other side of this ravine, but couldn't find a way to access it, so we wandered around some and eventually ended up backtracking on the trail we had been on. 

We had to double back a LOT on trails we had already done.  We went to go explore Dagger, but it's a bit of a climb, and after him stopping on me twice and pretty much saying he was NOT going to go up, I allowed him to turn around about halfway up...and had a "Oh, what have I done?!" moment.  The descent is steep, so I gave him his head, guided him only when I saw things he could hurt himself on, and let him get us back down.  It was a few hairy moments while I held my breath and hoped like hell he didn't trip, stumble or fall getting us safely back down!!

Perhaps a bit too much to ask of him in his current physical fitness level.  Noted.

We looped and added and repeated the trails I could find, and the best I could come up with was about 6 miles of trail that was "okay" at best for conditioning.  For the average trail rider who wants to sit and talk with their friends, Shaffer Bend is PERFECT.  For the endurance horse looking to move out and get some speed going, it is a fail.  *sigh*

Disappointed best describes how I felt when I was done.  I didn't feel we'd accomplished much, EXCEPT, I was able to go and ride my boy.  So, for that reason alone, I put it in the successful column.

Splits

	Time	Cumulative Time	Moving Time				Avg Speed	Avg Moving Speed	Max Speed
1	13:22	13:22	13:21				4.5	4.5	8.5
2	14:27	27:49	14:15				4.2	4.2	12.9
3	17:13	45:02	17:02				3.5	3.5	8.6
4	16:30	1:01:32	15:34				3.6	3.9	9.0
5	14:45	1:16:17	14:36				4.1	4.1	10.2
6	12:13	1:28:30	11:59				4.9	5.0	9.9
7	4:09.8	1:32:40	4:04				5.2	5.3	8.3
Summary	1:32:40	1:32:40	1:31:18				4.1	4.2	12.9

Back in the saddle...again....or "Okay Strider, let's see how you feel..."

With a clear diagnosis for Strider, it was time to figure out where to take him out for on our return to the saddle ride.

Just so happened that the Land Heritage Institute (the place where the River Run Ride is put on) is open every 2nd Saturday of the month to the public.

A group of us endurance riders decided let's all go.  We're going to take it nice and easy, no pushing, more of a casual and fun trail ride than a conditioning ride.

It went perfectly.  Well....let me back up...

I got up when I planned to (6:45am), but, the fog was so thick I didn't want to drive in it.  And, I had padded my schedule, so I laid around for a few more minutes before I dragged out of bed, got dressed and headed out to gather up Socks and Strider.

I decided to take Socks as extra insurance in case Strider got tired during our ride.

They were both an easy catch, followed me on the ATV quite nicely, didn't do anything foolish.  Zurkh followed us up to the gate, whinnied that hysterically comical "foal" sounding whinney he has...then wandered off to go graze alone.

So, here's my not thinking moment.  USUALLY Socks is a pro at just jumping into the trailer.  No big deal.  Except Saturday, he just didn't want to go in.  Partially my fault, I didn't open the manger windows (I'm still a little freaked out after Strider jammed himself into the manger the previous weekend, can you blame me?), and I didn't have any hay in the manger either.

Also, Socks does this strange thing where he sideways loads himself, gets his head over the divider and cannot seem to figure out that if he'd just go in, oh, I dunno, STRAIGHT things would go easier. 

So, here I am, hanging on to Strider, trying to load Socks, and this just isn't working.  So, I casually loop Socks' lead rope around the divider, because, he's not going to leave his Strider, right, and go walk Strider to the barn.

Except, Socks would, could, and DID leave his Strider.  When I shut the gate to shut Strider up, Socks casually meandered off.  And, when I walked faster, then jogged to catch Socks, the punk took off on me in a full fledged canter to the back.  *sigh*  Glad I shut the gate!  Found him there, and hand walked him back up.

Horses.  They'll humble you and remind you that you can't cut corners.

Get Socks tossed into the trailer, and then Strider pops in.

And away we go.

No surprise, truck has 1/4 tank (thanks Joe), and I have an almost 2.5 hour drive in front of me.  And I need breakfast and water to take.  Swing into a nearby WalMart for both.  And, as I'm leaving Joe calls, tells me Kaylee is throwing up and sick.  Uhhhh....not cool.  Asks if I'll get her some Pedilyte on the way home.  So, that kind of niggles at the back of my brain all day.

Soooo, was supposed to get to the park between 10:30 and 11?  I arrived at about 11:15. 

Quickly get the boys off the trailer, Socks set up in a pen, and start getting Strider dressed.

Socks, fairly unimpressed with the hay provided. 
Forget what it is; timothy I think?
One of those compressed bales from TSC.

Not a super flattering shot.  View as taken from Blondie's back
by my friend H, who joined us endurance riders!

Another one off Blondie's back taken by H!
Almost fully dressed and ready to get back to riding!

And from there, H on Blondie, L.B. on Spiderman (Spy) and I on Strider took off at a gentle walk.

As I said, the goal was just to see how Strider felt.  For H, to try out her brand new saddle.  And for L.B., to teach Spy to eat while on trail (he got a "D" on gut sounds at River Run, so he's got a few things he needs to learn to do endurance, but he'll get there!).

We took it nice and easy for a while.  What's funny is that I both know and don't know the trails at LHI.  I'm so used to following ribbons that I wasn't quite sure which directions to go, and yet, I would recognize things.  L.B. wanted to avoid the Skyline trail, which was quite fine with me.  The grade to get up to Skyline isn't bad, but the hill to come DOWN off Skyline can be a little intimidating, and some horses go down sideways.  I've done more extreme hills, but I didn't want to take Strider down that hill at the moment, so I made sure we didn't go that direction.

So, we meandered off the other way and just took it easy.  Walking, Strider would fall back, and when he asked to gait for the first time, I held my breath, and I'm SURE I was tense when he took off, because I got a bunny buck, which he never does at the gait, so perhaps between my tension and him finally being "back" would explain that. 

But he felt amazing.  Strong and forward.  Brave and bold.  Not a single misstep.  I was able to FINALLY breathe again.  He's back.

L.B. and Spy's butt, H and Blondie and Strider and I.
Photo credit to L.B.  :)

We 3 had a great time.  The other endurance riders we were planning to ride out with had already set off on their own gentle trail rides (my fault!), so we 3 just chit chatted and had fun talking about everything.  We practiced some leap frogging.  I tried moving Strider around off my leg and some yields, which he did in his hackamore.  Not beautifully, but he DID IT!!!  Considering I've allowed him to pretty much be a feral horse with NO ground work in 6 months, that's amazing!

We were out for almost 3 hours, just poking around, pausing to let the horses graze, letting H walk Blondie down to the river to try and drink...it was lots of fun and exactly what we needed.

Once we got back to camp, we slowly started stripping tack, and waited for T.M. and Galley to come back, then we all went and hung out at T's trailer.  L.B. looked at T's other horse, Sunny, and noted his toes were long.

So, while L.B. did a little rasping and work on his feet, and I got all up in her business watching and asking questions, we killed another good hour or so.

Then everyone packed it up and we all had to split and head for home.

Got both boys loaded easily and headed out.

Made a stop to get Kaylee some pedialyte and some things I'd need for work the next week, then meandered on home.

Those days are some of the best days.


And, if you're interested in the stats of the day....