Gum Springs

Another adventure and some new territory covered today. I joined up with Keith, Gaby and Chuck at The Hitching Post. This is the parking area north of Trigg Tower where the River to River crosses the Trigg Tower Rd. I was able to locate it on the map so felt sure I would be able to find it with no problems. I was a bit slow getting going this morning. I'd been sick on Thursday but had felt a bit better Friday. But, lack of sleep and long work schedules made it hard to get going this morning. I knew it was going to be a lovely day though and was excited to see some new territory so I dragged myself out of bed and hustled around to head out on time. Lily loaded right up in the trailer with no hesitation. I thought I would need to fuel up and was not sure if there was anywhere to do so on my way to where we were riding. Hathaway's was the closest place I could think of and was not far off my path. When I got out to the intersection where I'd have to turn out of my way to get fuel, I decided that I have enough to get to our riding spot and make it back to fuel up on the way home. So, I kept going. I was glad I did as I'd forgotten about Mitchellsville Country Store that was right on my way. I was running close on time though so still decided to fuel up on the way home. The plan was to meet at 10:00 and I got there just a few minutes after 10. Lily was kind of excited when I unloaded her and I kind of rushed trying to get her groomed and tacked up. That did not help to settle her down. But, she was not really bad either, just a little squirmy. Once we were mounted and got moving, Lily settled right down fine.

We rode out to Gum Springs. What a lovely spot! We had a slightly tricky stream crossing there. Lily was a bit hesitant at first as we split up and crossed in two different spots so I was in the lead for where Keith and I crossed. But, Lily went and and made the steep climb out in true mule fashion. We came out to a dirt road with a wide concrete bridge. I happened to be in the lead there and could feel Lily tensing up as we approached the bridge. I told the others to let me get her across in the lead. Well, that plan didn't go so well. Lily was pretty convinced that bridge was a giant mule eating death platform and tough she kept making some honest efforts to work up the courage to cross in the lead, could not quite do it. And my legs cramped up bad from using leg pressure to get her to cross. So, Gaby led the way and her mare. Darn.....

We rode up over a ridge looking for a Mormon plaque out in the woods that Keith wanted to show us. We never did find that but did come across an interesting little cemetery with gravestones marked from the 1800's. We ended up on a trail that Keith and his group had never been on before that took us along a bluff beside a late that had an absolutely stunning view of a dramatic bluff across the lake that jutted out into the lake. This trail was a really nice trail and brought us back around by the bridge. I was in the lead here so again asked Lily to go across the death trap first. This time she worked up the courage to do it. Good girl!!

We stopped for lunch along the trail. When we headed out again, Gaby wanted to ride Lily. I was fine with this of course though hoped Lily would behave. Other than Anthony, who started her under saddle and put 1/2 dozen rides on her, only one other person has been on her and that didn't go very well. Gaby is quite a bit more petite than I am so my saddle was not very comfortable for her. The stirrups on her saddle were not easily adjustable so we left them where they were so I was riding her mare in Jockey position. Lily was not bad but she was not her best either. She kept snaking her head and breaking stride. Gaby's mare was a very good girl for me. I was in the lead on her mare and trying to stay on trail where we were was a real challenge. The trail was not real clear and with the leaves down, it was hard to follow. So, we did not ride all that fast though this part of the trail. Gaby was ready to switch mounts again fairly soon. Pretty sure she is not going to be rushing out to buy a mule anytime soon.

When we got back to the trailers we only had 10 miles in so decided to ride a little longer in a different direction. This was trail I have been on before when riding out of Jack Davis Camp. Very dramatically beautiful trail with the rock formations you ride though. Chuck wanted to see if there was still a big tree down on the trail by the railroad tracks. We had stopped to take some pictures by a pretty bluff wall and two people on mountain bikes came up on us. Mountain bikes are not allowed on the trails. That group has been fighting hard to gain trail access and we've been seeing them on the trail more and more. I am not against sharing trail with other users. But, I have to admit that many of the trails in the Shawnee are not safe for the equine/bike mix. Keith only asked them to speak whenever they were approaching equines so they would not spook them.  The tree was still down on the trail so we turned around and rode back the way we came.

Once back to the parking area, Keith and I both did a practice trot out. Lily did NOT load up like a good girl for the trip home. It still didn't take me long to load her but she let it be known she would rather keep hanging out with her gaited friends. Naughty mule..... The drive down to the main road was so beautiful. We were up on a hill and the view driving down was stunning. I stopped at the Mitchellsville Country store on the way home to fuel up and...... the truck decided it wanted to stay there. It would not start. It wouldn't even consider it. So, I called Delbert first as I knew I'd need him to come with his truck we we couldn't figure out what was wrong with mine and get it started. Then I called Fred and told him to come out with Delbert. Lily was such a good girl while we waited to be rescued. She nickered at me a few time and I realized she had not taken a drink while out on trail. So, I got a bucket and got it filled at the store and she gratefully drank that down. When Delbert and Fred arrived, we had no luck getting the truck started so Delbert pulled my truck out of the way of the pumps and hooked up to my trailer and got us home. Having the truck break down again is so frustrating BUT, at least it broke down on the way home and didn't spoil a great ride!

Our First Solo Ride

I took Lily out for our first solo ride today! I've long been putting it off. I just have not had the confidence I once had since I had my accident 4 or 5 years ago. And with Lily being so green when I got her, I just have not been able to work up to going out alone with her. But, she has been such a good girl for me and has so far proven to have a willing disposition and sane mind, I knew it was time to just get out there and do it. And what impresses me even more about Lily is even though she is still fairly inexperienced, she does not feed off me when I get nervous. She has enough confidence that she goes along nice and steady no matter what I'm doing in the saddle or how nervous I get occasionally. I KNOW she knows when I'm nervous but she takes care of me.

It was a cool morning and a bit windy but sunny and I knew it would be nice on the trail. When I got the the barn, I had to round up the girls with Delbert's ATV from the pasture down by the road. When I went out to catch Lily, she came right up and stuck her head right in the halter. Good sign for a good day. She was quiet when I saddled her. Another good sign of her being in a good mood. I decided not to mount up in the yard. I was sure there would be some point on the trail we'd have a difference of opinion on our direction of travel but didn't want to start the ride that way. So I led her away from the barn along the north trail. She led away from the barn willingly and the other benefit of doing this was there were a lot of branches down along the trail that have long been needed to be picked up so I got to do some trail clean up. AND, we did a lot of walking, stopping, standing quiet while I moved branches, keeping a respectful distance. Lily did great and was very patient with all this. I walked her down to the creek and mounted up there. She stood perfectly still to let me mount and get settled. We rode off with no protest from Lily at all. Even when I lost the trail a couple times right off, due to the leaves down on the ground, and had to retrace a bit, Lily just went where I asked her to go. We followed lower trail 185 along the creek to 005 and on to Initial Tree. When we came to the first muddy spot with a little bit of standing water that had a skim of ice over it, Lily had to stop and look that over thoroughly but decided to be brave and go though. Lily did hesitate a little at each trail intersection hoping to turn home but didn't fuss when I asked to walk on the way we were going. The shady spot between the bluff walls along the creek just coming into Initial Tree had icicles hanging off the rocks and it was so pretty. We got into Initial tree and no one was there. Lily's never been there alone as was looking around wondering were other equines were. I got off and tied her on the high line so I could use the ladies room and Lily pawed just a bit in protest at being there alone but it was a half hearted effort.

Lily stood quietly as I mounted up but when I pointed her in the direction of the Indian Wall trail, that was our one and only big disagreement. I knew this was bound to happen somewhere in the ride and was surprised it took her so long to do it. She refused to move in that direction so we had to do multiple circles and had to swat her with the end of the reins a few times. She kept her feet on the ground throughout our "discussion" on direction and once I got her moving the way I wanted to go, she gave up the fight completely and never questioned our direction of travel again. We rode out to Blackridge Rd. by way of the Indian Wall trail and then turned right onto the 1683, the wagon trail, towards Double M Campround. That was the one and only time Lily spooked and it was a BIG one. It came right out of the blue with no warning. We had just started up the trail and in a split second Lily did an explosive 180 degree turn and we were heading back the way we came. I first registered I was still solidly in the saddle as she thankfully had not dropped her shoulder when she spun. As soon as I picked up on the reins she stopped right away. I turned her around and headed her back down the wagon trail and she did not hesitate at all and we continued on our way with Lily not seeming to have any concern. Not sure what caused her to spook but she was over it as quick as it happened. We took trail 184 at the little pond near Double M. That trail is very pretty and does a bunch of switchbacks eventually coming out on  Blackridge Rd. at the Black's Cabin road. Lily power walked the whole was but was on a lose rein not breaking gait at all. This girl has a big motor and really can really walk out and eat up some trail. We did 7.5 miles and were out 2.5 hrs. including our stop at Initial tree. It was a great ride and I am extremely pleased with how Lily did today.

To Blue Hole and Beyond

 Another perfect day for a ride! I've been hearing tales since I've been here about Loretta Wheeler, the woman who likes to ride all day, and that I'd enjoy riding with her. Today we finally managed to coordinate our schedules and we made plans to ride together. It is indeed true that Loretta is not afraid to put in some miles and we had the most wonderful ride! Loretta has a permanent camp at Double M. Campground. We arranged to meet at her camp at 9:00 AM.

I decided to walk Lily to Double M. It's only 1.5 miles from the barn to Double M. Too close to bother hitching up the trailer. I got to the barn early and fed the animals. Lily was a bit cranky when I saddled her up but quickly got into the spirit of a new adventure. I led her her to Double M. She is getting to be very polite on the lead line. She snorked at a few things and hesitated twice thinking she might turn around. But, just a verbal cue to walk on worked to keep her moving. When we got to the camp, we easily found Loretta's trailer. I was a little early and she was close to being ready to ride. I tied Lily to her trailer while she saddled up and met the lovely buckskin foxtrotter mare that Loretta was riding. The two got along very well. We were heading out to the trail right on time.

Loretta and her mare led the way most of the morning. We had to stop once early in the ride to do an emergency tack repair when a snap on Loretta's breast collar broke. She had a spare snap with her so we were soon on our way again. We went by the stone cabin and by Blue Hole on to Haystack Rock where we stopped for lunch. It's a real pretty spot and we enjoyed soaking up some late fall sunshine and talking about trail conservation work. In Maine, efforts to unite equestrians to work on preserving and maintaining trails had been very unsuccessful.Here in the Shawnee National Forest, there are multiple organizations to be joined that work trails and advocate for equestrian use of trails.  

 After lunch, we rode by the "A" frame cabin. Both cute and somewhat creepy. I would love to have seen it when it was in good condition, I'm sure it was really cute. Loretta ride with her 3 dogs. Lily is good about dogs around her when riding so that was no problem. But when we were climbing out of one of the creek beds, one of the dogs darted in front of Lily and stopped. Lily went right over the top of him and must have stepped on him. He rolled to the side of the trail and  cried and whimpered holding a front leg up and gave us quite a scare. After a bit, he got up and started walking around. He limped at first but then seemed to walk it off or the most part, with just a very minor limp. After crossing Karbers Ridge Rd. We came across the carcass of a deer laying beside the trail. This kind of freaked out Loretta's horse and she didn't want to walk by it. I asked Lily to go by and she never hesitated and barely gave the carcass a glance and we led for a little while at that point.

We rode back to Double M Campground and rode over to to new covered arena that is under construction. And exciting new project underway by the camp. There will be an event center also so I'm looking forward to some interesting events being held so near where I live. Riding back to camp from the arena construction site, we crossed though a creek and into a large open field. And we came up the the hill out of the creek into the field, Lily got a little excited and jumped around in play a few times. A quick correction and she stopped and behaved herself across the field. We had over 15 miles in at this point and Lily was not in the least bit tired yet.

We stopped by Loretta's camp and she dropped off her dogs. Then she rode with me back to Black's Cabin. When we got there, we found Sally and Josh driving their big team in the field. Delbert was behind them in his truck. He'd come out to see how the team was doing and took a turn driving them around the field. Lily was fascinated by the team, Loretta's horse was curious and a little worried about. Her curiosity won out in the end. From Black's cabin, I headed home. Lily didn't hesitate separating from Loretta's horse though since we were heading home, she wasn't likely to fuss anyway. Loretta rode back to Double M. It was the first time she'd ridden her mare alone. When I saw her later, she said her mare did very well. We rode 20 miles today. Lily's longest ride to date and she could have easily done more. It was a great ride.

To Initial Tree with Del

It was a lovely day today and I had not really made any efforts to find someone to ride with. So, it seemed a good day to strike off on my own for my first solo ride with Lily. I headed over to the barn and told Del I was going to head out to Initial tree. Well, turns out Del wanted to get out for a ride also so I happily scrapped my idea of a solo ride. I can do that anytime. It's always fun riding with Del. He said he would like to ride to Initial tree as I'd originally planned and he let me lead the way. I DO know how to get to Initial tree by I'll admit that my original plan to take the most direct route there did not work out quite as I planned. However, I did get us there. There is a tricky spot on trail 185 right now where there is a downed tree. Someone had cut a spot in the tree to go though but it's narrow and there is nowhere at the spot to get around it at all with a drop off on one side and a steep hill on the other. Lily being tall helped, I was able to lift my leg over the high side of the log and squeeze through. Delbert made it also but banged his leg on the log.  There were quite a few people at Initial Tree when we arrived. We stopped and chatted with a few people then headed back. I took us a different route back and once again did not manage to take the most direct route. We rode about 6.5 miles. Lily was a very good girl and Delbert's mare is always good. We had a very nice ride.

Thanksgiving Day Ride

This morning Fred and I went with Delbert and Ruth to Galatia to a public Thanksgiving dinner. Delbert and Fred had gone there last year and said it was good. They were right, it was a very nice meal and we enjoyed ourselves. When we got home, Delbert wanted to go out for a ride as it was a lovely day. So, we decided to sneak in a quick ride as we didn't have a lot of daylight hours left. We just rode out trail 184, dropped down to the creek and came back around to Blacks Cabin. About 3.5 miles. Though it was a short ride, it was so nice to get out on such a lovely day. 

To Bee or not to Bee...

Today I headed over to High Knob to ride with Anthony. It was warm today but overcast and sprinkled a little but nothing to discourage riding. It rained yesterday so Lily was one very dirty mule. It took a bit of grooming to get her to sort of off white. I decided that any real white was not not a realistic goal for today. Lily was good about loading into the trailer and we got to camp around 9:45am. Lily was quiet when I saddled her up, no fussing at all. I went down to Anthony's camp and tied Lily to his trailer to wait for the group to get ready to ride. It was a while and Lily stood quietly the whole time. I was impressed with how patient she was.

There were 5 of us riding. When we headed out Lily was excited to get going but settled in easily in the 4th position. Lily has gotten very good about adjusting her pace to the equine in front of her. I only have to give her occasionally reminders to not crowd them. We here headed to Rice Hollow and rode by the spring and Cowboy Hideout.

We crossed High Knob Rd and I asked Lily to take the lead there. She gave a little protest but it was over the direction of travel, not over taking the lead. But it was just a head shake and hesitation. A bump with my heals and verbal correction and we headed off up the trail. We got up to a spot where there is a big rock the mule riders like to play around on. The more brave mule riders that is. It's quite a big jump up onto the rock. Anthony was riding Inca, a smaller mule and didn't want to ask her to jump up on the rock with him on her but asked me, as Lily is a big girl, if she would jump up there with me on. I knew Lily would not be all that excited about jumping up there with or without me and I was not inclined to try. Anthony got off Inca and climbed up on the rock and she jumped up after him. He got back down and asked again if I wanted to try Lily out on the rock even just leading her up there. He said he would help me get her up. I hesitated because I knew it would probably take a while to get Lily up on that rock and I didn't want to hold up the people I was riding with. But as usual, I did not listen to the voice of reason in my head and hopped off Lily. Anthony climbed back up on the rock and took Inca up with him knowing Lily would be more willing if another mule was up there. I handed him her lead rope and he asked her to hop up. She was much more willing to try than I expected but really wasn't sure how to handle it. She kept rearing up trying to figure out where to put her feet but just couldn't decide. She'd get back on all four feet and swing her hind end around trying to find another way to get up or just get around. She did this maneuver 8 or 9 times when suddenly she pinned her ears back flat and started shaking her head. She didn't pull past the end of the lead rope though. I though, "wow, she's really getting mad about this," when she then started kicking up at her belly when someone yelled it was bees. Sure enough, I saw Lily was being swarmed by bees and amazingly she did not panic or blow up or even pull away from Anthony. Anthony tossed the lead rope to me and I caught it and I turned to run with Lily. Unfortunately Lily and I went in opposite directions around a tree. The only way to keep hold of her was to pull her around the tree back into the bees or for me to run into the bees to get around the tree so I chose to let go of the lead rope and hope to catch it on the other side. I didn't catch it and off Lily went down the trail back in the direction of camp.

Anthony jumped on Inca and went in pursuit of Lily. That got the rest of the mules excited as they all wanted to follow Lily and Inca. There was a brief scramble to get mules secured and settled down. Once that was done, I headed down the trail on foot after Anthony. I figured if he got Lily, I would save him having to lead her all the way back. If he did not get her, I'd have to walk out that way anyway. I hadn't gone far when here comes Anthony down the trail with Lily in tow. I sure was relieved to them!! He told me Lily had gotten out to the road and some people hauling a horse trailer saw her and stopped to catch her. By the time Anthony got there, he said there was 4 or 5 trailers backed up down the road as they tried to figure out what to do with Lily. They were of course worried someone had been thrown and hurt. Anthony assured them that was not the case. He told them that a bear had jumped us and Lily had attacked the bear to save our lives and chased it off. Leave it to Anthony to come up with something like that. In any case, Though my brand new lead rope was a bit scuffed up, Lily was none the worse for the wear so I mounted up and we continued on with our ride. The rest of the ride went without incident and we had a great time. From Rice Hollow we rode up to the Tee Pee and then by Whiskey cave. It was the first time in the Shawnee for this group of riders and I still remember how I felt the first time I saw this incredibly beautiful place.