Ride Story, finally

Earlier that day, I brushed my beautiful white pony and braided her mane. Then I got real frisky and spot-washed the manure stains and scrubbed her tail. It came out almost white :) I suppose I could've washed her completely, but I have gotten really sensitive to wasting water in the desert, so I didn't. Then I bought a bale of alfalfa for a ride treat and headed home to charge my phone and hang out with my husband. I kinda feel guilty when I run off to a ride and basically leave him alone all weekend.

I rode to the ride, so I dropped off a bunch of stuff at the arena before I went to get Dixie. As it turns out I didn't drop off the right stuff, but that's the story of my life. ;) Then I drove over to where Dixie stays at, got her saddled, and rode over to the ride.

Ridecamp was at the Lemmon Valley arena, with plenty of room. There were at least 40 entries - I was 319 and I think I was at the end of the LD list. Dixie vetted in just fine with all A's. Aarene, she trotted out really really well! She's finally figured out the ready-let's go! trot out thing!

I tied her to ~C's trailer and let her eat hay. She is such a peculiar and contrary beast - she didn't want the perfectly nice alfalfa, she wanted her normal boring everyday hay. I barely remembered to boot her up before the 50s left at 7 pm, but I did.

Dixie freaked out when the 50s left, but it was only a minor freakout. I played Words with Friends til about 7:50, then managed to get on board and we headed out to the start. Apparently I pushed the start button on the garmin an hour earlier when I'd saddled her up, and I didn't notice til a couple miles out, so my GPS start isn't anywhere near the starting line. Anyway, here's the Garmin info for the ride.

We started out last due to standing still to mount issues, but I let her stretch out and trot really fast to catch up to the last horses. She wasn't nearly as out of control as at Rides of March, thank god! She spooked pretty hard at the dolomite trail markings at first, but she got used to them in a couple of miles.

The long bit headed north is pretty familiar territory, and she did really well - rateable and forward and full of energy. When the sun started to sink and we headed east, we encountered difficulties. Dixie just could not believe that I was riding her away from home in the dark. I kept her moving at a good pace until we hit the rocky part of the hills. The sun was totally down, and the moon was trying to rise behind the eastern hills, so it was amazingly dark. Plus it's the rockier part of the trail, PLUS when the moon did rise we were riding right toward it and it wasn't really helping.

Eventually, two people passed us and I let them "pull" us along. Dixie decided the only thing worse than being stuck pointed away from home with her evil bitch of a human was to be totally alone with her evil bitch of a human, so she tucked in with the others and headed up the hills.

Riding up the rocky pitch-dark hills was totally worth it. At the tops of a couple of ridges, you get really stunning views of Reno at night. And there was fog! I couldn't really believe it at first, but there really was fog oozing off the hills. Dixie spooked hard at a couple of innocuous bushes at first, then settled in nicely.

I rode the trail once before (in the daytime, in the opposite direction) with ~C, so I knew about how far we had to go. I think that helped me a lot mentally. Eventually, about the time the moon was high enough to see the rocks, we came out of the rocky hills and into the sandy canyons. I saw something very strange as we were coming out of the canyons back to the subdivision - somebody a couple hills over was shining a flashlight up into a hill. It wasn't the (awesome) ride staff, it was just Some Dude doing Something Weird at night.

We walked through the subdivision and pulsed straight in at 60, then I let her drink and eat hay for a while before we vetted in. She didn't drink til the third tank at mile 15 - I hope she figures out drinking soon. It makes me nervous :( But anyway, she got a B for gut sounds and everything else was A's.

The hour hold flew by as I staggered around in a total daze. It was 12:30 am and I was desperately tired, but we were so close to being done! I ended up drinking a bottle of electrolyte water and a cup of black coffee, then chowing down on some Advil and a fruit roll up. Midnight snack of champions, eh?

I pulled her boots for the second loop, because I knew it was short and sandy and she still goes a little weird in boots. There's something off with the fit on the right rear boot - it was full of sand again, and an O-ring had broken, and the toe velcro was half undone. But it was still on!

We rolled out at 1:30 with the same two people I'd been riding with before. Dixie felt like I hadn't ridden her at all, just as fresh and perky as you could hope for. Her heart broke when I made her keep going past the turn to go home, but she wasn't really that upset. The second loop runs right past the sand pit where the dirt bike guys ride, and we rode on a little ridge past some people hanging out around a campfire in the sand. I wonder if they knew we were there?

After the sand pit, back in the BLM land, I saw a huge shooting star right over the hills to the east. Of course I can't tell you what my wish was, but you can probably guess. :)

By the final vet check, Dixie was through with this trot out bullshit. She had a mouthful of hay and felt she'd done plenty of work and I kind of had to drag her up and down the line, so we got a B for impulsion. Everything else was A's - her gut sounds were back up - so I can't complain.

Then I tied Dixie up and watched her eat and ... fell asleep in a folding chair. Because I'd failed to bring anything for me to camp in. It was unbelievably cold, but I borrowed a horse blanket and draped that over my head and got a nap for a couple hours. A million shivering years later, the sun came up and Dixie was ready to go home. I saddled her back up and made her walk home - she wanted to trot home! But I couldn't handle any more trotting that day.

M says Dixie took a lot of naps on Sunday, but she's none the worse for the wear. Cool tight legs, totally sound, didn't run off too much weight, perky attitude. Yay horse!

This is plenty long, so I'll do a gear post and publish it in the morning.

Silver and black

Well, our moonlight ride was only half a success. The horses did great under the circumstances, but we timed things very poorly.

We waited til the moon was almost over the hills to the NE, then headed out. But the sun wasn't all the way down - it had just dropped behind the mountains to the west - and we were riding west so we couldn't see shit. The sky was bright and the earth was dark and it just wasn't a good combination.

But we were riding down the gravel road, so we persevered. We stopped for a while at the end of the road, til the sky got darker and the moon was all the way up, then we started down the straight sandy trail. But as soon as the trail headed downhill, even a little bit, we couldn't see anymore because the moon just wasn't high enough.

We were undaunted and turned to head home a different route - but then we were riding directly toward the moon and I swear to god it was too bright to really make out the trail. I could kind of see the trail, but that particular trail is just a twisty path through the sagebrush, and the bushes were casting huge long shadows and in 100 yards I wandered off trail and ended up against somebody's fence and we said fuck it and went home.

Our horses looked fabulous in the moonlight! S was on Summer, who is also a paint, and the horses were just glowing silver. The scenery was a million shades of grey, from midnight black up to pearl-grey. Really beautiful!

Dixie behaved quite well. I suspect she thought we were going to die and came into heat real fast in the hopes of getting some before death, but I won't know for sure til tomorrow. She stopped once to pee and Summer nickered at her, which he never does unless she's in season. But my sure sign that she's in heat is our monthly battle about the bit - she H-A-T-E-S contact and slings her head nonstop when she's in. I have to be extra light with her. I'll know tomorrow.

No pictures - it's hard to get a moonlight picture to come out from horseback, and I knew Dixie would need all my attention. Yall can imagine a silver horse in the desert :)