I got one last ride in two night ago on Maggie. Since we were short on time and bad weather was rolling in, I opted to do a few hill intervals with her. I had the perfect training hill in mind over at the state land.It's good footing and it starts out steep, levels off , then goes up again for about a 1/4 mile. I thought we would just cruise up it at a big trot 3- or 4 times or for a 20-30 minute time period, which ever came first. Maggie decided she wanted to try to qualify as track pony and wanted to gallop up the hill. After a few strides I thought "surely, she'll tire enough and let up into a trot".. I was wrong. When the hill leveled off a bit , she just gathered herself up more and galloped even harder on the second part of the hill. I chalked it up to blowing off some steam but after she did this two more times, I was beginning to wonder. The 4 time up she did finally trot most of it and at that point I decided she had had enough. Her recoveries were pretty decent , to my surprise. She did hit 220 at the top on the second run but she recovered in under a minute to 117 and by two minutes she was down under 100.
She was still pretty energetic after all of this so I decided to take her for an easy jog and do a quick loop before we headed back. The weather was holding. We trotted along and pretty soon came upon a stump that had been pulled onto the trail and had been torn apart... that's a positive bear sign and I had been this way only two days before so it was a recent bear sign. hmmmm...
Keep trotting but now add singing and loud talking as well....
Not surprisingly, it was only a couple minutes later that the stump assaulter showed his face. A black bear indeed. He was probably a year or two old and not a very big one but big enough and when your only 50 yards away and he stops to check you out, it's still unnerving. Maggie got a good look at him and just stared . She didn't spook or move, just looked. She has seen bears before but never this close. He finally decided we were boring I guess and meanered off over the hill. Maggie did decide to pick up the pace after that and we made it back to the trailer in record time!
We are headed to Hamilton for the weekend for "T" Kassai Horseback Archery competition. I have a saddle fitting scheduled, a scheduled visit to a Marchador ranch (stay tuned) and with any luck a ride in my old stomping grounds.
Better go pack and get ready to go!
She was still pretty energetic after all of this so I decided to take her for an easy jog and do a quick loop before we headed back. The weather was holding. We trotted along and pretty soon came upon a stump that had been pulled onto the trail and had been torn apart... that's a positive bear sign and I had been this way only two days before so it was a recent bear sign. hmmmm...
Keep trotting but now add singing and loud talking as well....
Not surprisingly, it was only a couple minutes later that the stump assaulter showed his face. A black bear indeed. He was probably a year or two old and not a very big one but big enough and when your only 50 yards away and he stops to check you out, it's still unnerving. Maggie got a good look at him and just stared . She didn't spook or move, just looked. She has seen bears before but never this close. He finally decided we were boring I guess and meanered off over the hill. Maggie did decide to pick up the pace after that and we made it back to the trailer in record time!
We are headed to Hamilton for the weekend for "T" Kassai Horseback Archery competition. I have a saddle fitting scheduled, a scheduled visit to a Marchador ranch (stay tuned) and with any luck a ride in my old stomping grounds.
Better go pack and get ready to go!
1 comment:
You're getting a fit pony, girlfriend!
Way to go, you're doing it right. Hope all works out for City of Rocks!
~ Amanda
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