I was excited today, I was getting to go riding for the second day in a row! Susie, Linda and I planned on meeting in West Bowdoin to ride at 9:45 am. I called Cierra the night before and asked if she'd like to join us. She is the young lady that rides Marie when she can. She is 13 years old and a wonderful girl to ride with. Both of my saddles for Marie are broken right now. So, I had called my friend Bonnie the previous night also to see if she still had her treeless saddle and to see if I could borrow it if she did. Bonnie did still have the saddle. It was was at the local feed store as she was trying to sell it. She told me to go over and pick it up and try it out on Marie. That would work out well as the feed store would be right on the way to pick up Cierra.
So, I headed out to pick up Cierra, get abut 3 miles from home, out onto Rt. 197 and find the road it closed!! AGH! The road was still flooded at Pleasant Pond from the recent rains. So, I had to turn around and head back. Now, this is almost a case where "you can't get there from here". Ok, you can but it is the LONG way around. 2.5 miles back to Lewis Hill road. 5.5 miles down Lewis Hill Rd. to Rt. 125. 1/2 mile down Rt. 125 to Rt. 201. Then 5.5 miles up Rt. 205 back to Rt. 197 where I was to begin with, just now on the other side of the flooded spot. And, to add insult to injury, they are paving Rt. 201 so I has to stop and sit twice where it was down to 1 lane traffic. Needless to say, I was a bit late picking up Cierra. Then of course, I had to track all the way back around the long way back to my house to get the horse and mule. Again, needless to say, I was late meeting Susie and Linda. Good critters that Luke and Marie are, they were quickly caught and loaded into the trailer. We got to our meeting spot at 10:15 am. Not bad all things considered.
Linda and Susie were already tacked up and ready to go so they took a little jaunt down the trail and came back while Cierra and I tacked up Luke and Marie. I had Luke groomed and tacked quickly. It took just a bit longer with Marie as we were putting the treeless saddle on her and had to adjust everything. I tightened up the saddle but when Cierra went to mount, it slid around Marie's side. So, I tightened it again as much as I could and it seemed ok then. Soon we were ready and all on our way. We started out on the gas line and right off there is a very steep descent to a stream crossing and a very steep climb out. Cierra has not done all that much trail riding and I knew this might look a bit scary to her. She did great though and just followed us through without a word. She did later tell me that she had never done anything like that but she trusted us and felt we would not ask her to do anything that was not safe. She is right, I would definitely not do that.
I could see fairly quickly that Cierra was struggling with the saddle. She kept losing the stirrups. We stopped once to shorten them and that helped. But, the saddle wanted to keep rolling around on Marie if Cierra put weight on one side more then the other. She never complained but I knew it couldn't be much fun for her. And today Luke was a little tender over the rocks. DARN! So much for being able to keep him barefoot. So, we slowed down to take it easy on him anywhere it was rocky. As we were riding down a section of the West Rd. I spotted a dug well right beside the road that would provide a perfect mounting block. So, I took the opportunity and asked Cierra if she would like to switch mounts. She stared at me uncertainly for a moment then tentatively said sure. Though I've only had Luke a short time, he has already proven to me his steadiness and dependability and I had no worries about Cierra riding him. And she is a good rider. So, we quickly adjusted stirrups and made the switch.
Wow but the treeless saddle did not fit me at all. It was WAY too small for my ample behind. And I too kept loosing my stirrups. And though I tightened the cinch yet again before I mounted, the saddle did want to roll around my barrel shaped horse. Cierra seemed immediately at ease on Luke. Once back on the trail and where the ground was soft, we picked up a trot and Cierra just loved the way Luke moved. She started out trying to post but ended up just doing a sitting trot because his trot is so smooth she said there wasn't enough bounce to post to. Then once out on the gas line, we picked up a canter and Cierra was in heaven. She was grinning from ear to ear and was completely at ease with Luke. And Luke was taking very good care of her. When we did the steep climb up the bank, she just loved how easy and smoothly he handled this. She was disappointed that her ride on Luke came to an end so soon. Once off him she hugged and patted and scratched him and he soaked it up like a sponge. Cierra had definitely fallen in love with Luke. I can understand that as there is simply nothing not to like about Luke. She wanted to try riding him bareback, and sometime maybe try him over some jumps (Luke was formally used for Eventing) and maybe she could take a lesson on him and maybe....... Lets just say she was bubbling over with her excitment over riding him. Cierra said she'd never felt so relaxed on an equine on a first ride as she had on Luke. Once we got back to my house, Luke got more hugs and scratches. When Cierra's mom came to pick her up, Cierra excitedly told her all about her mule ride and then had to take her mom out back to meet Luke and he received even more hugs and scratches and Luke continued to soak it all up with pleasure.
It was so much fun seeing Cierra have such a good first experience with a mule. I just wish I'd thought to take my camera so I could have gotten a picture of her first ride on a mule.
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