Riding with Sandy and the Gang

My friend Sandy was down to High Knob for a long weekend with some friends. She invited me to go riding with them and I was delight to take up the offer. We had planned to ride out at 9:00 am but the weather was not looking good this morning so the ride was put off until 10:00 am. I was happy for the delay as I'd been a bit slow getting around this morning. As I was pulling out of the yard, a mouse popped out from under the truck seat and did several panicked laps around the floor of the truck! ACK! When I got to the barn, I left both truck doors open in hopes my little hitch hiker would hop out. I gave Marie a dose of banamine and checked her eye as she has managed to scratch it yet again. It was looking a bit better this morning. I got Lily and quickly groomed her. She jumped right into the trailer this morning. When I got to High Knob, the group was nearly ready to head out so I quickly saddled up Lily, who was quiet and cooperative and mounted up. We then ended up waiting a short time for something, and Lily was a bit impatient go get moving. But, she was not being all that bad about it either. Just a bit fidgety. It was warm today and a bit humid. Lily didn't seem to mind though. We headed out to Twin Towers but somehow missed it. We had a stop on the way to Buzzards Roost for 2 riders to switch tack and horses. That is where Lily decided to show off an impressive side pass down a hill over a small live tree and a small dead one sticking up in a rather pointy fashion and about belly height to her. Thankfully it broke off when she went over it and it didn't seem to phase her.

We stopped for a break at Buzzards Roost, then rode up to the top. From there we headed over to the Tee Pee and then through Rice Hollow. I love that trail! We stopped for lunch at .. I think it was Whiskey Cave. I tied Lily to a fairly small tree and then realized it was dead. As she was vigorously rubbing on it, I had visions of it breaking off and her running off through the forest dragging a dead tree. I am surprised at the lack of flies when out riding. There were a few big horse flies plaguing Lily when she was tied up a few times but only a few. I didn't see any deer fly today. Sandy and Terri headed back to camp part way through the ride. Terri felt that the horse she was riding was struggling a bit with the heat and didn't want to take any chances with him. So good to ride with people that put their horses well being first.

At one of the high line areas we rode into, there were 38 horses that I could count. Though it was tough getting a good count as groups were riding and and riding out constantly. We stopped there briefly. As we were riding out of there, we ran into Anthony and Cathy and their family heading in. Just after we left them, we found a horn bag laying on the trail. We picked it up and there was a cell phone in it so we knew someone would be seriously unhappy at losing the bag. We figured the best thing to do was turn it in at the office at High Knob camp. But, not much more than 1/2 mile down the trail we came across the owner of the bag back tracking to find it. 

We were out for 4 hrs. today and did 9 miles. We kept the pace easy and took plenty of breaks. Lily wanted to move along faster but did very well at handling the slower pace. I did lead for awhile with her and she did great with that too. Lily was, however, a bit of a snot about loading for the trip home. Guess she wanted to stay with her new friends.