Same old same old!

We’re less than one month out from 20 Mule Team.

Traditionally (based on my vast experience) this is the time of year when I feel like a) everything we did the previous year was a fluke and b) there’s just no way I can ever get Dixie legged back up and c) even if I do it’ll all go wrong and I’ll break her. This year, finally, I’m only worried about breaking my horse, and that’s a fear no horse owner ever manages to completely lose. You just have to accept that they’re equal parts tough as nails and fragile as glass and go on with things.

This time last year, I was legging back up for Rides of March, and I did that by riding a steep hill loop over and over again. (Last year it actually rained, and a lot of the trails were too slick for trotting, so I worked steep hills at a walk rather than risk a slip injury.) 

I went out for one of our little having-fun rides and ended up doing the loop I did so many times last spring. Last year, Dixie would ask to stop a couple times on the hill climb - fewer times as she got back in shape, but still, she’d usually take a breather at one spot. This year, she just marched right up that hill, hit the ridge, and started trotting and cantering for home. Project Keep The Horse Fit is a success!

~*~

One of the reasons I’ve been quiet is that I haven’t had any good story-rides. I’ve noticed, especially among aspiring endurance bloggers, that we usually start off blogging every damn ride, because it’s all very exciting and new and we’ve got all these fears and problems and worries. It’s exciting to have a place to talk, and it’s really nice to get comments from people who’ve already been through the process… but after a while, you start to feel like you’ve told this story before. Because you have. Many, many times. 

So at this point, I try to only tell stories about stuff that’s unusual, and of course, to only tell my story. A couple weeks back, I took a new friend to Briones, on her adorable green Arab. He rocked it, with only a little green-horse-brain — but that’s her story to tell or not tell. My only part was letting Dixie hang back, being calm, while Gino thought about a few scary things and decided he could get past them on his own. We played walk-trot leapfrog, but I think he’s going to be ready for more advanced “games” before we know it!

Isn't he adorable? Gonna be a tiny dynamo.

~*~

Saturday Dixie and I headed over to Auburn to ride with Lucy and ~C. We went from the Overlook (the finish line for Tevis) up to the American River crossing and back. We’re not the kind of riders who ever manage to follow the advice of “train faster than you compete,” so it took about 4 hours (moving speed) to do 22 miles. There were a lot of other trail users below Lower Quarry, on the narrower trails, and everybody had some boot issues after the Black Hole.

The Black Hole is a creek crossing a couple miles from the finish. If you’re riding Tevis — even if you’re top-tenning, I think? — you go through it at night, and it’s very, very dark under those trees. Down a steep rocky bit of trail, through a rocky one-stride creek, then up an equally steep bit of trail. If your boots are at all iffy, you’re going to lose one there. 

I love No Hands. Tammy asked if this was the bridge that burned — that's Swinging Bridge, and it's about 50 miles up the trail. The area is still closed from the fire last summer. 

I have been running Dixie in the same pair of 0.5 Gloves for almost two years now. They’re stretched out, the gaiters are disintegrating, and the tread’s almost gone, but any time it’s not going to matter if I lose one, I pop them on her hinds. If I’m at a ride, I break out one of the slightly better pairs, but if I’m conditioning, I always end up grabbing the shittiest pair. Somehow these thousand-mile loose-ass half-destroyed boots survived the Black Hole. I did lose one a couple miles further along, when I led her down to the road crossing at the Quarry, but I popped it back on and it didn’t come off again. 

Once we made it past the quarry, the trail traffic cleared out a lot and we had some really nice trot/canter sets. None of our horses is really a born leader, but Lucy’s Roo seems to have decided that he wants Dixie behind him at all times, and if that means he has to lead the way, he’ll do it. When he’d get tired or his nerve would falter, I’d let Dixie march on past him and he’d make terrible faces and surge back in front. Brave, bold Roo!

She did not want to drink at the river. She did want to drink two miles later, out of a half-inch mud puddle that all the horses decided was the best water they've ever tasted. Whatever, she do what she want!

Dixie has been exceptionally moody for the last week or so. She was in extra-slutty heat on the 16^th and she’s been pissy every since, but she felt really good under me. Still ragingly PMS-y, but forward, sound, and offering a canter on both leads. I can only hope her attitude improves, but I can’t complain. I’ll take “keeps boots on with a pissy attitude” over the alternatives.

Stole this one from Lucy!

On the way back, we ran into more endurance riders, with a horse Dixie knew from my barn in Oakland. Karl is a Rushcreek gelding who used to live at my barn, but he wasn’t a very good fit for that human so he ended up back with his former owner, and she’s getting him back out on the trails. They definitely remembered each other! They went nostril-to-nostril and “said hello,” no squealing or pawing. My grinchy little heart grew two sizes. 

I don't really know why I took this one. I was probably wondering about the concrete block. But it's a good illustration of just how dry it is. We're going to have some terrible fires this year.

I had to leave immediately — I didn’t even take the time to hose her down. A quick trip by Echo Valley to buy a few things (including the Woolback I’ve been meaning to buy since, oh, October?) and we headed home. I didn’t do anything special for her at all — no ice boots, no diabeetus socks — and the next day she looked great. Perky attitude, not sore, cold tight legs all around. It’s on:  we’re going to 20 Mule Team! 

An extra-long ride at Briones Reservoir

I'm one week out from our next 50, this coming Saturday at Gold Rush Shuffle (pdf link).  I'd wanted to do one last 10-15 mile ride, just to check that all systems are still go.  What I ended up riding was a full LD, all alone, racing the clock as always.  But it was a beautiful day on a lovely trail with my best girl, and - bonus! - I didn't even wreck the trailer!!  Woohoo!

I got a late start on Friday, because BART wasn't running. I knew traffic would be even more horrendously fucked than usual, so I hung out at home til 10 am.  By the time I picked up the trailer, then the horse, then drove out to Briones Reservoir and got saddled up, it was noon.  There's a 13 or 14 mile loop around the lake, which was just perfect for my plans, and I figured I'd be back at the trailer by 3 at the latest.

We'd had a huge windstorm over Thursday night.  I commented to G that it was "Reno windy" outside, but our power didn't go out so I didn't really pay much attention.  It was still windy on Friday, but two and a half years in Nevada means that I don't pay much attention to wind anymore.  If it's gusting more than 60 mph, I won't ride, because that's hard enough to knock you out of the saddle if you're off balance, but any less wind than that is just "windy."

Priorities!

The sign-in sheet warned that the reservoir closes at sundown, and that they'd ticket your dumb ass if you were there after dark.  Fair enough!  I signed us out, mounted, and rode down to where the loop trail (another pdf) T'd off.  I looked left, looked right, shrugged, and turned left.  We'd go counterclockwise, keeping the lake on our right, and in about three hours we'd be back at the trailer.

It was really, really pretty.

There's a few hills, but it's less than 1,500' of total climbing in the 14 mile loop, so I'd call it "fast and flat."

It's pretty dead looking in November.  But the sun was shining!  I rode most of the day in a tank top, yall.

So we plinked on around the lake at a pretty good clip.  We'd started at the Overlook staging area, and we worked around the whole reservoir, past the Bear Creek staging area.  The trail was open and wide for the most part, but the last couple miles of Bear Creek Trail are single-track, with a very steep wooded hill on one side and a sheer drop down to the lake on the other.  At 2 pm, we trotted around a corner, just a couple miles from the end of the trail, and came to a sudden halt.  A tree was down, and I mean a whole tree was down completely blocking the trail.  

We'd walked over or through several large limbs on the trail so far, but this was the entire crown of an oak tree, blocking the whole trail.  I looked at that damn tree for about thirty seconds, running through all my options:  Dismount, tie the horse, and try to hack a path through with my Leatherman.  Go back up to Bear Creek staging, cut onto the road, and ride 3-4 miles down the road to Overlook staging. Call for help.  Or just go back the way we came.

We went back.  It wasn't much of a choice, really.  The sun sets about 5 at this time of year, so we had three hours to get 12 miles back to the trailer - more than enough time, even if we walked most of the way.

Dixie will go off-road just fine, but there just wasn't anywhere to take her on that section of trail. It was too steep and wooded on the left, and too steep and lake-y on the right. I haven't driven all of Bear Creek Road, but what I had seen was twisty two-lane road with no shoulder, and that's entirely too dangerous for the situation we were in. Calling anyone for help would've left us standing around til after dark, and leaving her tied or in a cattle pen and hiking to the trailer would've also left her standing around (alone, poor thing) until after dark.  So the best choice was heading back the way we came!

Dixie thought it was all bullshit. It wasn't an endurance ride, because there were no other horses or hay or carrots.  This was clearly all my fault, but she sighed and carried me back the way we'd come.

I was pretty disgusted by the day's turn of events, too, and I quit taking pictures on the way home. Except this one - if you click to embiggen, you can see the Bay between the closer (East Bay) hills and the further-away (North Bay) hills.

The footing was perfect.  I'd booted all around, but really, it's entirely doable barefoot.  It's a low-traffic area, and we only saw one hiker and one coyote all day - just me, my horse, and a billion birds.  I hiked and jogged quite a bit, and at one point I got tired of actually leading my horse, so I just took off without her.

We've been talking about jogging with horses in the Rider Fit Facebook group, and one of the members said that she's jogged with her horse loose behind her.  "Damn," I thought, "I bet Dixie would probably just trail along with me, but it's entirely too busy at our park."  And then two days later I found myself in a deserted park, with fences and gates keeping her from running seriously away from me, and I just did it.  I hooked the reins to the pommel, hollered "ok let's go!" and took off without her.  Dixie trailed along behind me as I slogged up and down the hills, doing about like I expected her to do:  she didn't run off without me, because she's inherently lazy, and she didn't let me run away without her, because she likes me ok.  It was just fine.

(If you're a rider who's trying to get more fit, and you're on Facebook, you should join us.)

I insisted on constant forward motion on the way back.  We walked the steep bits and "trotted" (gaited) everything else, and the miles actually flew by pretty fast.  Neither of us was very excited about our bonus miles, but we got it done and made it back to the trailer at 4:33.

Dixie was like, "thank god, there's food." And, honestly, I was also like, "thank god, there's food." I'd actually bought a powerbar and a gatorade that morning, just on the off chance I'd be slightly peckish after an easy three hour ride. I brought water on the trail, of course, but I'd left the food at the trailer and I was very, very glad to see it that afternoon.

Such a cutie.

We'll do easy walking rides or hikes for the rest of this week, but that's it, we're as ready for Gold Rush as we're going to get.  Sorry about the bonus miles, Miss D.  You're a champion.

Virginia City 100 pre-ride: complete

Previously on As the Funder Rides, I went to Reno but it was too smoky to ride so I ended up having an awesome little adventure at Skillman with S and Taz.  It was excellent fun, but it wasn't what I needed to get accomplished, so last weekend I made another speed-run to Reno.

On Friday, I dropped my husband off at BART, picked up the trailer, loaded Dixie, and drove to Reno. Traffic was pretty good, so I had time to stop by my favorite feed store and get a new rasp and get a faux-burger from In-n-Out - burgers without buns still aren't really burgers to me, but a lettuce-wrapped double-double is pretty damn good food.  Then I headed over to S's, met her, and followed her up to the Virginia City cemetery.  Three other Nevada riders were waiting for us, and we saddled up and headed out at 4:30.  

Right off the bat, we saw a small herd of mustangs! There's a white dot in the center of this picture, below the tailings pile, and that's a paint mustang - once you see that one, you can see the rest.  One was an adorable bay foal just staring at us, like, "Mom!  Look at those funny looking horses!"

Headed out.

 

The air quality was pretty good - just the usual amount of fire-season haze.

Here's a tiny video - break to a couple strides of canter then back to a step-pace.  She's so smooth :)

Pretty flat - Strava says 1700' of climbing - and pretty good footing.  Our tour guide B pointed out all the places where there will be water (and beer) and showed us where the trail will be tricky in the moonlight.  We had one experienced rider, and the rest of us were pretty new to hundreds/VC.  Yall, this is how you get new hundred milers to try hundreds/try your ride - the trail was premarked four weeks in advance (I know that's not possible for every ride) and the experienced VC'ers were eager to show us the trail and help get our nerve up to do this.

We ripped on through 17 miles in three hours - faster than Dixie and I will do it at 3 am, but it was such a nice trail and the horses were all fresh and happy.  It was one of the most fun conditioning rides I've had in years.

We made it back to the trailers as the sun set.  Had our post-ride snacks, loaded up, and drove back down to S's house in the valley.  I talked to S and her husband til ohmygod 11:30, then crashed out on her couch.  I was back up at 6:30 or so and back on the road at 8.

Dixie and I went down to Jumbo Grade, near Washoe Lake, and met G.  G's husband moved her trailer up to the top of the hill, to a pulloff near VC, and we rode up to the trailer for a point-to-point.

You've seen this climb before, from NEDA rides and the Washoe Valley ride, but this time when we got to the crossroads we turned left!  I've always gone straight or turned right, so left was fun and new.

The smoke was rolling north from the Rim Fire, but it was pretty low-lying in the morning. Somewhere under that haze is Dayton, and the smoky hills on the other side are where the NASTR 75 goes.

Up, up, up to some great views.  That's Reno/Sparks in the far distance, and if you look closely you can see 341, the road up to Virginia City, winding through the near hills.  I cannot wait to see this just after sunset, when the whole valley is lit up!

There was a lot more climbing, and the footing was a lot worse, so we took it easy and did 12 miles / 3000' climbing in three hours.

Dixie is very reactive to other horses - she's pretty chill when we're by ourselves or with a laid-back horse, but if she's with a group of high-energy horses she picks up on their excitement.  G's Zephyr is also a chill, lazy dude and neither of them felt the need to go very fast.  We trotted the trottable bits and walked most of the way.  I'm really glad I prerode this (thx G!) cause I think it'll be tough for me mentally.  Big climb, in the fading light, and then another 6 miles of shitty rocky stuff to get back to camp for the last long hold.

There will be a good moon - the full moon is the 19th, so on the 21st it rises an hour after sunset, at 8 pm.  I'll probably make it in to camp between 10 and 11, so I'll be doing the rockiest bit at 9 or 10. Hopefully the shadows aren't too harsh - sometimes when the moon is full and low it's harder to see than when there's not much moon.

Anyway, I feel good about this.  If I think about the whole thing - all those loops and all that climbing and all those rocks - I freak out a little, but just thinking about each individual loop, I think I can string it all together and we can get it done.  We have a good shot at finishing this, random lameness aside.  If we can finish Davidson (the Saturday ride), we can totally finish Cottonwoods (the Friday ride).

When we came around the bend in that last picture, we were looking down into the valley we'd ridden the day before, and Dixie absolutely recognized it.  She perked right up, thinking we'd keep going up the road back to the cemetery, but when I pointed her at the trailer up by the road she was like oh well that's good enough.

At the very start of the ride, there's natural water in the canyon, but they hadn't wanted to drink then. The horses were pretty thirsty by the time we got to the trailer, and they each drank about two gallons before diving into their hay.  We let them eat for a few minutes, then loaded up and headed back down to my rig.

The smoke was getting thick and it was time to go back to Oakland.

That's the same mountain from "you've seen this climb before."

I was hungry, but when I drove by In'n'Out half the population of Reno was there and it was 89 degrees so I just kept going.  I grabbed a powerbar from the cooler when I went through the ag station and powered on down to Auburn, thinking maybe I'd stop there for a burger, but it was 99 in Auburn - too hot to stop.  So I didn't stop, I just plowed through the central valley - it was 100 or 101 from Roseville to Fairfield, about 60 miles.  

I-80 has a beautiful median of flowering trees (giant shrubs? small trees?) between Davis and Fairfield. In the westbound lane, someone had thrown a cigarette out or maybe there was a car on fire, and we all had to slow down and drive past a merrily burning tree.  I knew it was just a burning car or something, but I couldn't help thinking that it was just so fucking hot the trees were spontaneously combusting.  Cali livin', yall.  

It finally cooled off outside of Berkeley, right when the inevitable bridge traffic jam starts, and the last ten miles on I-80 took fifty minutes.  Bay Area livin', yall.  But I made it home at 7:30, 36 hours after I'd left, and sitting down on the couch has never felt so good!

I don't usually run the AC when I'm hauling, out of some weird combination of not asking the engine to do more work and being in solidarity with my horse.  It was hot and horrible, but oddly, not that hot? Back in June or July, I got some new riding tops - New Balance tanks and a Nike Dri-fit long-sleeve shirt. It's long sleeve, but it's ~heat gear~, and you know what, it really does work.  I wore it all weekend, pretty much, in temps ranging from 64 to 101 and humidity between like 10 and 50%, and I was the same level of vaguely uncomfortable the whole time.  A little chilly in the cold, a little hot in the heat, kind of irritated that it's a little too tight on my fat arms big guns.  

Other gear:

• My boots are getting hella janky.  Now that I'm trimming Dixie's hinds properly the 0.5's don't really fit anymore, and the rubber is all stretched and the gaiters are shot.  I lost one rear boot on Friday, popped it back on, and didn't lose any more.  Saturday I lost one rear boot, swapped it for a less-torn-up one, and didn't lose any more.  I've got new gaiters to put on, so I can get some more training miles out of them, but replacing gaiters is about as easy as swapping out an easy-change gullet in a Wintec (i.e. not actually easy at all) and I haven't gotten around to it yet.
• I'm definitely getting Tami to glue boots on for VC.  I think Dixie will go in 0's all around, yay!  
• I borrowed a running martingale from Redheaded Endurance and it rocks.  Dixie was definitely ridden in a martingale or tie-down before I got her, because she never even tested it.  Between the long-nose riding fly mask and the martingale, she is not slinging her head at all.  Every time I get off it's a bit of fumbling to get the snaps unsnapped and resnapped and wait how did I get this so backwards arrrrrgh but it's doable.  I've got a martingale of my very own on its way from American Trail Gear, and it should be here in plenty of time.  
• Everything else is awesome.  Rode in the crupper, even though I'm quite sure we don't even need it any more.  The diabeetus socks slip on effortlessly if you stick the hoof in a ziplock - I don't know if they ~work~ because I didn't expect her legs to fill, but they're easy enough to put on after any ride.  
• Butt Butt'r is vastly superior to Body Glide.
• The Spot works - I can send check-in messages - but I still can't figure out how to do real-time tracking with it.  G should be able to check a web page and see the "breadcrumbs" as I dink down the trail, but I can't figure out how to turn that on.  Help?  

Good horse.  Good ride.  Gonna kick very slow ass in two weeks.  \m/

PS there were camel races on Saturday in Virginia City but we didn't get to see them.  I would have loved to see the look on Dixie's face when she saw camels racing, but I really didn't want to deal with the traffic in and out of town.  Le sigh.

PPS I almost fell off on Saturday!  Had to grab mane and everything.  Wear a helmet, yall.  Dixie was listening to the polite dove hunters slowly coming up behind us on an ATV when a giant friggin' golden eagle soared over us with its atavistically terrifying shadow coming out of nowhere, and she went sideways at mach-ten.  I can't even blame her, it scared me too!  Helmet, even on your dead-broke horse.

Meet my new multiday horse

This is Dixie, before and after doing back-to-back 50s at Washoe Valley this weekend.  I have so many words about the weekend!  Two big posts are coming, but I wanted to give you a little teaser first.

My new year starts in March

Hey, yall. I feel like I haven't had anything to say, so I haven't said anything lately. But the long dreary winter of my discontent is finally fading away and life's about to be fun again.


Dixie and I have been climbing hills. (My new iPhone is awesome at most things but dear god it really sucks at taking motion shots.)


We go up a hill, then I hop off and we run down together, then I clamber back on and ride back up. Repeat, over and over again. Doing all those hills - combined with the awesome barn guys actually feeding my horse - has improved her conditioning somewhat.

October of last year:


Early February - filling out, but still very fuzzy:


Early March:



With endurance, as with all things horse, it's just one damn thing after another. Dixie and I have worked hard to do all those hills, and it's obviously paid off - except that now her saddle doesn't fit so great anymore. She's filled out a lot and it's not quite wide/flared enough in the shoulders anymore. Our first ride is in less than two weeks, so there's no changing saddles now, even if finances allowed.

The AERC convention is next weekend, so I'll be doing a lot of window shopping there. I am leaning toward a Specialized, just so I can shim it to fit her properly - I just need to figure out what size/type *I* like. They're not terribly hard to find used, and they hold value well enough that I wouldn't really mind buying one new if I had to.

In other shameful news, I finally picked up a rasp. I hadn't trimmed Dixie since last year. Awful, I know, but she wasn't growing a ton of wall and we were doing all our miles barefoot. But I finally decided to cram her feet in her boots, and I had to whack off some toe and heel to make it happen. The boots still fit! I think I will order a Fit Kit before I buy new boots, just to test out 0's and 1's too, but I think she's still a 0.5 all around.

One more conditioning ride tomorrow and I'm done. I don't know if Dixie's ready for a 50, but I'm out of time so it'll have to do. There's rain coming in on Tuesday, then I leave for Reno on Thursday. We'll just do some light work next week, then I'll pack the trailer and haul back for Rides of March on the 16th!

Hoof pics, if you care to see them. Reminder: her heels are always contracted, no matter what, from the shoes and stacks when she was a yearling. When I say her frogs and heels look good for Dixie, I know they look awful in comparison to normal horses, but it is what it is with her. :)





No, I didn't take any after I trimmed. I just took her heels down level with her frogs and knocked her toes way back to the white line and called it good enough for now.

Dear Doctor

I'm sorry I laughed at you. Well, not entirely sorry, but I think flinging my head back and guffawing at you was possibly more than the situation warranted.  I'm definitely switching doctors, though, because you're a jerk.  I'm sure you deserve to be laughed at.

Dr. Godcomplex: So, do you exercise?
Me: I do endurance riding on my horse, so once a month I go ride 50 miles in a day. The rest of the time, I ride maybe 2 hours at a time, three times a week.
Dr: Yes, but that's not exercise...
Me: :laughs: Because the horse does all the work, right?
Dr:  Well, yes.
Me: :gales of laughter: OK, sure.
Dr:  I mean, I rode a horse once, it was years ago, but it wasn't hard.  My back was sore but...
Me: :still laughing: Ok, sure, in that case, I don't exercise at all.

The rest of the visit went predictably poorly. I've heard of the "but the horse does all the work" argument, but I didn't think people still said it. I thought it was a thing of the past, like "women can't be scientists." That's really why I laughed; I could not believe he was seriously saying it.

***

Alas, although it wasn't exercise, I did make it back down to Santa Cruz to ride in the redwoods with another future endurance rider. I ran the downhills, very slowly, but still maybe 3.5-4 miles of running. I doubt it counts because surely the hill does all the work or something.

Forty degrees hotter

Look, yall, I try not to rub it in about the weather here. Nobody wants to hear my first-world Pacific coast weather problems. But I do live where it's about 60 degrees 24/7, and I did just get home (58F) from Almaden Quicksilver (96F) and let me tell you buddy it totally sucked.

Here is my Strava:


Long rides, for me, are a microcosm of all the emotions. In four hours, I ran through feeling proud, smug, bored, elated, resigned, despairing, and back to triumphant. The tl;dr version:

It was so hot. I drank all my water. I didn't electrolyte Dixie enough and she ran out of go-juice at 16 miles, so I got off and walked the last two miles in. I let her graze, and she wasn't in any distress, and when we finally got back to the trailer she dove into her mash and drank a couple gallons of water and pulsed right down. I got blisters on the bottoms of both my heels and a heatstroke-headache.



Before the last two miles, it was quite a bit of fun. Dixie was a perfect angel to meet a random kid in the parking lot. She plugged on up the hills and trotted/gaited the flats and the downhills. Bikes and hikers and dogs didn't phase her, but she had to stop and stare HARD at a kid with a butterfly net. I had him wave it around and she eventually decided it was ok.

I have got to get my shit together and ride with people. I do great on solo 10 mile rides, and I do ok on 15 mile rides, but 20 miles all alone is just so hard mentally. And it's not like I don't have any choice - I have at least four endurance people I could email and meet up with! I just didn't get around to talking to them this week and then last night I was like "must go ride 20 miles tomorrow." Ugh.

I took a bunch of little videos on my phone but splicing them together and uploading them is WAY MORE EFFORT than I can put forth tonight. Here's some conformation shots of my incredibly ripped horse. I think I'd be happy if she was a little fatter, actually. Thoughts/feelings?

That face. <3 that horse.
 

Shameful dirty.


Oh my god, Becky, look at her butt. It's so muscular and veiny. Wait, that's not how it goes at all...


I just hope Gold Country has troughs every five miles for me to stick my head in. I do ok if I can stick my head in a trough.

Almaden Quicksilver: no mojo

I do not know what the deal is. I am still so uninspired to blog, or to comment on my friends' blogs, or much of anything really. Apparently I'm still decompressing or something.

Anyway, on Thursday I went down to San Jose to Almaden Quicksilver park. Very cool info in that link. It was a mercury mine for over a century. There's an endurance ride held there, which is why I went - there had to be enough trail to make it worth the trip.



tl;dr: It was ungodly hot and Dixie got footy.

It was a pretty hilly ride, with a good steep climb immediately. This is about 5 minutes in, looking down at my rig.


SJ is disgusting and smoggy and you can't even SEE the bay. I decided it's spooky and unnatural to see the curve of the earth for the horizon. It is right and proper to see mountains at the horizon. It is acceptable to see ocean. Smoggy land horizon? Wrong.


There was a lot of boring mining road, with really pleasant little singletrack side trails through the woods.


And a lot of very cool mining ruins.


Really pretty place.


So we made it 5 miles out and Dixie said she was through trotting on the rocks. I turned her around and we went back to the trailer at a nice swingy walk. She was sound, no harm done, but she was clearly not comfortable trotting on rocks any more that day.

When we got back to about a mile from the trailer, I hopped off and walked her in. It was hot. It was SO GODDAMN HOT. I haven't been that hot since I 'bout got heatstroke doing nothing at all at Tevis '10. So gross. Humidity is so disgusting. Also it was a 35 degree F swing from our maritime-climate house (59 when I left/got home) to stupid hot smoggy SJ (94 disgusting degrees). This was what I thought of it:



Dixie sweated a lot, but she was aiight, really. She'd have done better with sponging, but I didn't know if there was water out there (there are troughs at a couple of spots that I found).


So after we got back to the trailer and I drank all the rest of the water and had a snack, I trimmed her hooves.

Hoof nerd digression

We headed out barefoot because I couldn't decide what to do about her feet. There's obviously a ton of false sole that's trying to come out, but I couldn't chip it out and I couldn't tell how thick it was and I just couldn't decide how to trim.

Hoof recap (all front right)
Here's immediately upon arrival in CA:


After Tuesday's ride (don't mind the rock, I did get it out)


And that's where I was on Thursday. Obviously that's false sole and it's getting ready to come out, but it was not budging. The best thing I could think to do was ride on hard ground, so that's what I did.

Here's post-ride (and post-prying and trimming)


In person, you could really see the huge chunks of sole that came out - they were at least 1/4" thick. Hard to get pictures that showed it though.


Anyway, now that I finally feel like I know where live sole is, I trimmed her walls down to that level. I pried out what sole I could with my nippers. I'm still wildly unsure about what's going on, but I think her feet are doing ok?


BEFORE side view:


They're definitely shorter!


I know there's tons of white line separation from the sole view, but I think that's normal considering all that sole is trying to exfoliate. She sure doesn't have flaring. Her walls are still like half an inch thick. I think I'd be happy if her heels came down a bit more, and I think they might if that sole finally comes out. I don't see any metabolic problems / event lines. The little hump at the coronet band should smooth out when the sole cracks out and I can actually trim the bars.


Oh! And I encountered a local endurance rider and was rather underwhelmed. She was leading her spotted horse down the mountain as I was riding up. All matching biothane tack, carrying her helmet, leading her horse down a big hill - I asked if she was an endurance rider, and said I was also an endurance rider who'd just moved to the area. And she said there were lots of e-riders out here, and had I signed up with the AERC website? I was like "I'm from Reno, I just haven't done any Bay Area rides" and she was like "oh ok."

Yall.

I was wearing NEON SMILEY TIGHTS, a neon blue long sleeve running shirt, and a helmet. I was riding a horse geared out entirely in biothane, with enormous matching pommel bags. And she asked if I'd joined AERC? Would anyone really dress this idiotically if she hadn't already committed to the sport? REALLY?