Lily, The Lovely Bright Molly: Back to West Bowdoin

Today's weather forecast was for a nice day. A bit cool but nice overall. So, Linda and I decided to get out and take advantage of the day. We decided to go ride in West Bowdoin where I rode on Saturday. I wanted to go somewhere that the footing was good enough to move along at a good pace. It had been pretty good on Saturday and I figured would be even better today.

Linda picked me up at about 9:45 am. I had Luke all groomed and ready to go. He wasn't too filthy today. Mostly because there was no mud in the paddocks to roll in. We made the short drive to West Bowdoin and parked on the pipeline. It didn't take long to get tacked up and soon we were headed out. We decided that between the two of us, we should be able to move the tree that was across the trail right at the start of the ride. We tied Gus and Luke up to trees and looked the situation over. The tree was broken off but still attached to the base and roots. We tried pulling it out of the way but just couldn't do it. The tree was a popple and we decided we could break the branches off and have the boys just step over it. Well, this was a pretty good idea and we commenced to snapping and breaking the branches off. I got a hold of one larger branch and gave it a good yank and it snapped off easier then I expected it to and the end of it slid up under my glasses and the branch poked right into my eye! OUCH! And I said OUCH which got Linda's attention but of course I quickly had to do the "I'm all right, no big deal" routine, trying to cover for my stupid clumsiness. All the while I'm carefully opening my eye and quite relieved that I still have sight......... And since I did have sight and there was no blood, there was no need to not ride. After all, we now had the tree cleaned up enough for the boys to step over.

Gus inspecting the old couch

Trash on the trail. Disgusting........

We mounted up and off we went. Luke took the lead and the boys seemed happy to be out. They have been so good together the past 3 or 4 rides and today was no exception. They both took a good long drink at the stream crossing at the start of the trail. The old couch was still sitting in the middle of the trail. As on Saturday, Luke didn't give it so much as a glance. Gus however, was a little concerned about it. But, after giving it a sniff, he decided it was safe to pass. We did the loops off to the left of the pipeline. And then rode up the pipeline. Some partridges flew up beside us on the pipeline. It started Gus and he jumped, Luke didn't really react. We went out through the gravel pit, out to the West Rd. by way of the Witches House. At the intersection of the Witches House trail, an ATV came up behind us. We stepped off the trail to let it pass. Both of the boys are used to ATV's so we were not worried. HA! The ATV's suspension was making some loud squeaking and it scared the poo out of Luke. He jumped out into the middle of the trail and decided he might want to get out of Dodge. The ATV stopped, since I was now on a dancing 1300 lb mule in the middle of the trail. Once the ATV stopped, Luke got his head back together. We rode back towards the ATV and got behind him and let him go. Luke was fine. Silly mule!

Looking down the pipeline through Luke's ears

More trash on the trail........

We rode out to and then down the West Rd. and back onto the trails by the day care home. We explored some promising looking trails that we weren't familiar with. Unfortunately, they were all dead ends. It made for some good riding though. When we were back near the trailer, we still had time left that we could ride so we explored another trail that went out into the tire dump. We were able to make a nice little loop out of this trail. The trails were in excellent condition today. I was amazed at how much they had dried up in less than two days. We were able to move along at a good trot in many places and even got in some cantering. Luke is still barefoot and he is doing great. He is showing no signs of being tender footed and make no attempts to avoid any rocks.

When I got home and had taken care of Luke and Marie, I called Fred to see when he would be home. My eye was very, very irritated and I decided I'd better go down to the emergency room and have it looked at. He got home around 4:00 and we headed to Brunswick. On the way, I thought maybe I should see if my eye doctor could take a look at my eye and gave them a call. They said to come right in. I'm so glad I went to him instead of the emergency room. I scraped a 3x3 mm patch off my eye. And there was some debris embedded in it. Dr. Alexander cleaned it all out and then put a contact in the eye to work as a band aid to keep my eye lid from constantly rubbing over the injured area. I never would have though of using a contact for such a thing. It sure did make my eye more comfortable. He expects it to heal just fine.