Our First Canter

Cierra and I got out for a nice ride today. It was warm but there was a breeze. We planned to ride by 10:00 am but got a slow start thanks to me. I think we did get out around 10:30 am. Cierra tacked Tinkerbell up in the barn. I took Lily out to the trailer as that is where my saddle was. I was happy that she didn't care about being led away from the others and stood quietly tied to the trailer away from the others.  Lily had to circle the mounting block a few times before I could mount but then stood nicely. I took the lead to start and for the first time today, Lily tested me a few times about leaving. She stopped a few times and when I told her to go, shook her head and swished her tail a few times. But, she went and quit after the second attempt.

I led with Lily until we got to the spot were the beaver had made a water channel across the trail. Lily didn't want to walk across. She started to go at one point then changed her mind and hopped up into the air, all 4 feet, and backwards at the same time. I've never had an equine leap backward in quite such a way before. Cierra said it looked quite impressive. She then lead the way across with Tinkerbell. We rode out to where they did all the logging last year to see if anyone has cleared a way though. If they have, we could not find it. It's a real mess out there so we turned back and decided to do the loop that goes out by the overpass.

It was on this trail that Lily and I did our first canter. Cierra got up ahead of me trotting so I gave Lily the cue. Of course she has never cantered under saddle so had no clue what I was asking. She just sped up her trot at first, and then finally about 4 strides of canter! Yippee! The 2nd time I got her to keep cantering. We got in the lead at one point and I asked her to canter and she wouldn't do it until Cierra got up front. We did several more canters along the trail. Each time Lily picked it up with a softer cue and kept going when asked. I was very happy with how she did. We rode 8 miles today and had a great time.