Trail Ridin' in the Arena

Cash & I at the "top of the world"

Today, I had the hankerin' to go out on the trail.

Last night I had a decent ride on Jingle. I busted out the split reins, I always feel i'm more liberal with my release, and keeping off of his face with nice leather split reins. I worked on a lot of slow stuff, walking and circling, circling without my hands. I had my cutting lesson in my mind and kept my hands on his neck, and tried to only touch my reins if he was doing something I didn't want. It was hard for me, and he was mentally being a bit spazzy, but we're working it out.

At the end of the ride I could feel him still buzzing with energy, all the other horses had been loping in the arena and I knew he was thinking, "What, that's it? We're done?" My plan had been strictly slow stuff, but it was late, and the arena was near empty, so I decided to do something a little different. I asked for his left lead, the one he is most comfortable on, and just let him fly. I put my reins in one hand, unless he needed some direction, and kept them looooooong and around and around we went. I could tell he was happy, and I was pretty happy too.

My thought process was to just let him run, and only correct him when I absolutely needed too, however, I wasn't going to let him quit until he gave me something nice, slow and responsive.

It worked. He was wicked. The first couple laps were pretty fast, but I didn't feel out of control, the next couple laps were a little more calm, but still too fast, and then he kept trying to break down - nope, pick it back up ponyboy. Finally after circling and loping the entire rail, I got exactly what I wanted. A nice, soft lope. We quit.

I let a friend jump on him to cool him off and they just plodded along.

As my friend was walking him around I couldn't help but think about how much I truly love my horse - gushy stuff aside, I like how he travels - quick, sure footed, I like how he moves - really reaches under himself, has a nice low headset (if no one is even thinking about touching him with their legs/hands). We just gotta figure out how to become more of a willing duo together. It'll come.

Anyway, long ramble aside, during our big, nice lope, I couldn't help but think how nice it would be if we were out exploring a trail somewhere and came upon the flats, and just let it fly.

That is one thing I will truly, truly miss, especially once springtime comes around, where will I adventure?

It wont be so easy to roll out of bed in the morning and hop on a horse and just go anymore.

Figuring it out with my Shyboy.