The Crooked River 30 Mile CTR AKA the Maine Monsoon

Photo's by Wanda Clowater of Clowater Art & Photography

Was Luke up to a 30 mile CTR just 6 days after completing a 2 day 50 mile ride? I believed he was and we were going to give it a try. It had rained every day all week and the weather forecast for Saturday was for a total washout as well as cold, only in the 40's, and windy! Unfortunately for once the forecasters were right. The Crooked River was originally planned to be a multi-day ride offering a one day 30 and two day 50 and 60 and a three day 80 distance. But, the vet judge hired for the ride was unable to make it so there was a scramble to find a new vet judge. The new vet was only available for Saturday so the ride was changed to just a one day 30 mile ride and the vetting would be done on Saturday morning rather than Friday as is usual. The ride was in Waterford, only 1 1/2 hr. drive from me, so I decided to just drive up in the morning. I closed Luke in his stall Friday evening so he'd be dry and clean in the morning. And I dug out my rain sheets to see if I had one that would fit him. I was delighted to find that one did fit as he was going to need it. I was up at 3 am. had a quick breakfast, packed several changes of clothes, dug out my tall winter riding boots and then went out and fed Luke and Marie. I groomed Luke and dressed him in the rain sheet and we headed out to the ride. It was dark still, cold and raining. I admit I had some second thoughts but I hate wimping out. And I didn't think Luke would have any issues with riding in the cold or rain. It can be hard on the Arabs as they get cold easily. But Luke being a large hairy Percheron mule should be fine. When I got to the ride, which was at the Waterford fairgrounds, I quickly unloaded and tied him in a stall next to Mindy's horse, Movette, as we would be riding together. I wanted Luke under cover and as dry as I could keep him before tacking up. I lugged all my tack up to the barn also. Luke seemed excited but was well behaved and eating hay like he was starving. Once Luke was settled in, I picked up my ride packet then went to the food shack and got coffee and a breakfast sandwich.

Getting everyone vetted in was a slow process. We did the vetting up in the new cattle barn to be out of the rain. But, we spent quite a while waiting for room to get into the barn. Luke happily munched grass until we were in the barn. With nothing to eat in the barn, Luke was quite fidgety. When it was our turn for vetting, I quickly stripped off his blanket and he stood quietly for the vet. The area used for the trot out was just outside the barn and there wasn't much room. Luke trotted willingly like a good boy. I took him back to the stall and tacked him up. I noticed he was shaking slightly. I don't know if it was excitement or the cold though I suspect it was a combination of both. He seemed fine otherwise though. I donned my rain pants, tall winter riding boots, and rain coat in hopes of staying somewhat dry. My saddle being synthetic is much appreciated on a day like this. A friend had just given me a lovely new woolback pad that I was using for the first time. I generally have a rule to never use a new piece of tack for the first time on a competition but I could not imagine this saddle blanket being any problem. Once all the horses were vetted in, we went down to the dance hall for the riders meeting. While we were in there the skies opened and it just poured buckets! Three riders pulled out of the ride at that point deciding it just would be no fun riding in this kind of weather. I don't blame them! I did consider the sanity of riding 30 miles in such weather. But, I've done it before and lived to tell about it so decided to go for it.

Luke stood nice for me to mount but was quite excited to get going. I kept him walking around and he kept trying to head out of the fairgrounds. He really wanted to get out on the trail! I was very pleased to see him so eager to go. There were 24 riders and Mindy and I were the near the end in the ride order. When it was our time to go out, Luke took the lead and headed out like a locomotive. With so much rain, the ditches on the sides of the road were running hard with water and there were streams and little mini waterfalls everywhere. Luke was a little snorty about this but it didn't slow him down. Though at first he was getting some rain in his ears and was shaking his head occasionally.  After a while, Mindy's horse took the lead and Luke and Movette took turns throughout the ride leading and following. They traveled well together. We stopped once early in the ride to make sure we hadn't missed a trail marker. I turned Luke in the direction of the fairgrounds and he did not want to go that way. He wanted to head down the trail. I just love that Luke is really eager and enjoying being out on the trail doing these CTR's. Due to all the rain we've been having, the trail was kept to mostly all dirt roads and sandy tote roads. We had one short section of muddy trail to connect two roads but that was it. So, the footing was extremely good and we were able to keep up a good speed and even did some nice canters.

When cantering, Luke's new pad worked backwards under his saddle. I had forgotten to attach the velcro straps around the saddle flaps. One of my first discoveries of the ride...... my L.L.Bean rain coat, success. It did a good job of keeping my upper body dry. My L.L.Bean rain pants.... fail! I very soon had a wet crotch. Blah! And the rain ran down my rain pants right into my boots. But, I was not cold and nothing was rubbing so I could live with this. We got into the hold in good time. There weren't many other horses there. We asked if everyone had already left the hold. We were told no, were were the first group into the hold. ???? Uh oh, we had only passed on pair of riders so we should not be the first group into the hold. It turned out a majority of riders in front of us had gotten lost. We hadn't noticed any problems with the trail markers so were surprised at this. Because of the bad weather, ride management decided not to have the usual full 20 minute hold. They had us pulse in as soon as we came in and if our equine was 64 and under, they were passed go right to the vet for their trot out. Luke's pulse was 57 so we were good. He trotted out fine so we were good to go. Mindy and I did decide to take a few minutes to let Luke and Movette eat. Luke approved of this decision. I quickly fixed Luke's saddle pad.

Just as Mindy and I were getting ready to leave the hold, Stephanie Buckley asked if she could ride with us. Her daughters pony had been pulled from the ride and Stephanie preferred not to ride alone. We were happy to have her join us. It would be an interesting trio, Mindy's Arab, Luke, a Percheron mule and Stephanie's horse was a Welsh pony.  Luke and Movette left the hold moving along strongly and Stephanie's pony gamely keeping up . About 1/2 mile out of the hold, Tom Hutchinson and the 3 junior riders he had with him came down the trail towards us. He felt sure we had missed a turn. He's very familiar with the trails here as he runs a ride here also. We searched for trail markers and could find none. We rode back towards the hold and finally found one piece of a trail marker but nothing else. Mindy rode her horse up the trail we thought was the right way to go to see if she could find any makers further up the trail. She rode a long way up the trail and we were getting worried about her. But, she finally came back and said she'd found a marker. Someone had sabotaged the trail makers and removed a bunch of them. Gurrrrrrrrr. Tom rode back to the hold to get more markers so that no one else behind us would get lost.  We waited for Tom to come back and helped him to quickly mark the trail. Another pair of riders had caught up to us just as we headed out. So, we were now in a group of nine riders. We were moving along pretty fast and the horses were getting excited about this. I think Luke was fantasizing we were at the Kentucky Derby and I realized I didn't have much in the way for breaks right then. Since we didn't need to be moving that fast, Mindy, Stephanie and I decided to pull back and let the other riders go ahead of us. The rain had let up by the second half of the ride but not stopped completely. Still, it was a relief to only be getting drizzled on. Luke and Movette kept up a good pace to the end and Stephanie's horse, managed to keep up with us as well. We did some nice canters on the 2nd half of the ride also. We did make one pit stop for Mindy and Stephanie to answer a call of nature. The challenges of pulling down and then pulling up layers of soaked garments and undergarments can not be understated. I decided I would hold out to the end of the ride. After all, if this turned out to be a bad decision, it wasn't like anyone would notice a wet spot on my pants out of large group of soaked people! (yes, I made it back to camp just fine) Near the end of the ride we ended up catching up with the group that we'd let get ahead of us so we all rode in together.

We took Luke and Movette straight to the barn. We blanketed both of them and then sponged them off carefully mostly to removed dirt and mud as it was quite cold. We had to take the horses up to the cattle barn for P&R. Luke was a bit obnoxious here as he was sure he was about to die of starvation and was determined go get some grass. His pulse was 48. So we'd lose 1 point for being over 44. We then lined up in the barn for our  trot out. Luke was not bad at all about it. Yahoo! Though I struggled to trot myself as I think I had a gallon of water in each boot and my feet felt like they weighed 50 lbs each! After the trot out I then hustled Luke back to his stall and ran to the trailer to change my clothes! I felt like a new woman once I was dry. I took Luke back out and as the rain was fairly light at this time, let Luke graze. This made him very happy. We eventually lined up again in the barn for the hands on portion of the vetting. Luke was a good boy  again and we had successfully completed another ride. I tucked Luke back in his stall with lots of hay and packed up my stuff. They supper served was delicious and was followed by the award ceremony. They skies had opened up once again and it was pouring buckets. We were all so glad we were not still out on the trail. There were a lot of cold wet riders huddling around the little heater that was set up in the dance hall. Luke and I placed 5th with a score of 96. I chuckled when I read the not on the score sheet in the trot out category. At the start it was noted Luke was "silly". At the end it was noted, "not so silly".  Mindy won grand champion! Yet another great ride!

Crooked River 30 CTR

20 start - 19 Finished

1.   Movette                     Melinda Vienneau

2.   Via Vacious                Ruth Konecki

3.   Chase                         Esther Desjardin

4.   Luke                           Cynthia Ross (96.00)

5.   Tektonic                     Thomas Hutchinson

6.    Enchanted Safire        Michelle Valley

6.   LSF Benn Fortunate    Monica McKenna

8.   SPD Carousel              Colleen O'Connor

9.   Attala                           Peg Dockham

10. Bay Cliffe Flyer            Stephanie Buckley

11. Ivany Mahara               Patti McPheters

12. Sunny D                       Cindy Seames

13. Highcountry Piper +/    Marcia Deleware

14. Joseph                         Angela Clukey

15. Indian Smoke Sign       Vicki Austin

16. Mufasa SS                    Rachel Towne

J1. Theatric                         India Orino

J2. Lazaarr (Luke)               Kayla White

J3. Frontier Random            Calla Orino