To Busy To Ride

My Lily White......  has been getting an unwanted vacation over the past few weeks. Well, unwanted on my part anyway.  She may be enjoying it. She is alone here at the farm as Marie is out on a lease for the winter and my boarder moved her horse to another stable due to my impending move. Lily's been wonderful about being alone though. No fuss at all, not bothering the fences. Just chilling out and I think enjoying no competition for anything. Though she is more happy to see me now then she was before. We are in full force packing mode here now. Everything is going forward with the sale of our house just fine. The buyer signed off on the inspection other than we have to shock our well. Which we are in the process of doing right now. The closing was scheduled for Oct. 1st but the buyer is having a survey done and that won't start until the beginning of next week. The surveyor said he would not be able to get it done by Oct. 1st but should have it done by the following week. So, we are shooting for a closing date of Oct. 15th.

We have put in an offer that has been accepted on a home in Southern Illinois. It is in the Shawnee National Forest. We would have liked a bit more acreage but as expected, due to our lack of being independently wealthy, we had to make a few compromises to get as much as we could of what we wanted in a price range we could afford.

I have been searching the real estate ad's for where we want to move quite obsessively and also have an agent there looking as well.  I've been determined to find a place with direct trail access. I am not going to move 1/2 way across the country to a place with over 1200 miles of trails and end up living where I have to trailer out all the time to go riding. Well, finding an affordable trail side property has been a bit of a challenge in the area of Shawnee I want to be in. Trail side property seems to be like lake front property here. More expensive if it has direct rail access. We found a few that we looked at when we were there in June that were in our price range but the houses either needed a lot of work or they didn't have a barn etc. And the price didn't leave us money to do any work on the place or build a barn of garage if needed.

A group of us went down the Shawnee in June to pick up a mule I had purchased and also so Fred and I could check out some property's. There were a couple we liked but really only one with direct trail access. It had a fabulous barn and workshop but the house wasn't much to get excited about. Our friend Anthony took us to look at a place that was for sale by owner the morning we left. We could not get into it as we could not get in contact with the owner  who had died 3 weeks prior, so  wasn't answering his phone...... Anyway, after walking the property, we jumped back into Amy's truck and it would not start. We ended up spending hours and hours hanging around while the guys worked on Amy's truck. We liked the property that we had come to look at. The building was the question. Nice big metal barn but the "home" is an apartment built into the barn. I'm told it's nice and I have no trouble living in a house in the barn. Fred was less excited about it.  BUT, enough about that place as it's not THE place....

In our time hanging around, I noticed the place right next to it was also for sale by owner. I kept thinking what a nice looking place it was and walked up by it and just figured it was out of our price range. We were later told that it had sold so I didn't think about it again. A few weeks ago I was searching homes on line and low and behold but I see this place on the market. I contacted my agent and the sale fell through and it's up for sale again. !!!! I'm excited as it turns out it is within our price range. We know what the property looks like and I know it has very close trail access. It has a new 30x40 metal barn/garage. The house is a manufactured home but looks good. 15 years old. I contacted Anthony and asked if he and Cathy would be willing to go look at it for us. He said yes and got in touch with my agent and went down last Saturday. He and Cathy said the place is very clean and well maintained and thought we would really like it. So, we put in an offer and it has been accepted. We have a tentative closing date of Oct. 30th on this home. 

The house is just 1.1 miles from a nice equestrian campground. There are 3 trail heads right from there and a 4th close by. The campground is open year round and....... has a restaurant! 

Pictures of the outside of the house in Illinois. We will add on to the left side of the garage to put stalls in.

Pictures of the Kitchen/Dining/Living room. The home has an open floor plan. 3 Bedroom and 2 full baths. Not excited about all the carpeting but that can be changed after we're settled in. 

Wonderful Relaxing Ride

Today Mary-Jo came over to ride with me. We didn't get a very early start and I did have to work today so we didn't go out for all that long and only did 4 or 5 miles. Today was a fabulous day. Sunny, breezy, in the 70's and not humid for once. Cierra moved her horse yesterday and I was very pleased that Lily was taking it very well. My horse is out on lease right now so Lily is now alone here. But, she doesn't seem to mind. She was, however, happy to see Arthur this morning. She was very quiet while being brushed and saddled. No avoidance today. And she stood quietly to be mounting. Both she and Arthur were wonderful today and we just moseyed enjoying the lovely day. I didn't take my camera, phone or GPS so have no photos or map of today's ride.

Two White Mules

 

Well, today was an interesting day. Tracy, Linda, Leesa and I planned to go riding. I was going to pick up Tracy and we would meet Linda and Leesa in Phippsburg. We invited Cierra to ride with us but she had a riding lesson so couldn't go with us. I got up early enough to have time to get ready. I fed Lily then after hitching my trailer up, I took it for a short trip down the round  making sure my brakes were adjusted properly. I got back and caught Lily and led her to the trailer, pointed her in and she stopped, took a look inside and said, "Nope, not today". What!!!! Lily has been wonderful about loading since the day I got her. Unfortunately, she really meant it. After a few more refusals, I kind of lost it as I KNOW she is not afraid of the trailer. The impatient angry person approach to loading wasn't really very successful. I finally stopped, took a breath and tried a quieter and more persistent approach and in a fairly short time I had Lily on the trailer. Of course now I'm running a bit late. I called Tracy to tell her I was just leaving my house and headed down the road. As I'm getting to the end of my road, I'm hearing a noise I should not be hearing. I rolled down my window and hear a scrape, scrape, scrape sound that is way to much like the sound I was hearing when the wheel came off my trailer. So, I did not dare to go any further and turned around and went back home, unloaded Lily and put her back in her paddock. I called Tracy to say I would not be coming to pick her up. After some discussion, she decided she would just come to my house to ride. I called Linda and Leesa to let them know that Tracy and I would not be meeting them. A few minutes later, they called back and said they were not far from home yet so would just come to my house to ride also. I have such good friends. Then Tracy called me to say she wasn't sure when she's arrive as her mule, Ellie Mae, had gotten loose and run off. Thankfully, it didn't take her long to catch her as she didn't go past the first apple tree she came to.

When Lisa and Linda arrived I went back out to catch Lily. I'm figuring that she is now not going to want to have anything to do with me or with going anywhere near the trailer, where I was going to be tacking her up, after the trailer loading incident earlier. But not so. She saw me and came right to me and led up to the trailer with no hesitation. Yet another example of just how forgiving mules are. Tracy was not that far behind Linda and Leesa and we were soon ready to go. Lily was pretty good about mounting today. We took the lead right off and before we had even gotten out of sight of my yard we met Cierra coming back from her lesson. So, she ended up joining us after all.
 

 

We headed out towards the alpaca farm but did the loop that had not trail for part of it. I've never bothered marking a trail though as the woods are so open and clear though there that there is no need to mark a trail. Once back out on the main trail, I asked everyone if they wanted to try a trail I've only done a few times that come out very close to the turnpike overpass. Cierra and I did it last year and the trail was fairly good. Everyone was up for trying it. We got within sight of the road and could not make it all the way through. there was a nasty muddy spot that none of us wanted to try going through. So, we turned around and headed back.

We then took the trail that comes out below the alpaca farm. At the stream crossing, I took the lead as I wanted to go across first and then take pictures of the others coming across. There is a steep bank drop into the stream and a short steep climb out. It's all very good footing though so very safe. I've done the crossing with Lily quite a few times and the last time I led across. So, I pointed Lily down the back towards the stream, she looks down and says, "not today"...... And I said, "yes, TODAY". It took a while but I finally convinced her that I was more determined we were going to cross that stream first then she was determined not to. Once we were on the other side, I turned, got my camera out and as the others started to come across, the camera pooped out! Gurrrrrrrr. I only got one picture of anyone crossing. We came out on the Academy Rd. and took that to the trail back into the woods by the overpass. I led quite a bit but Leesa's Billy Bob would often work his way to the front where he likes to be. Linda's Gus is always happy to follow. Tracy usually takes the back with Ellie Mae as she doesn't care to have horses behind her. The rest of the ride home was nice with all the mules and horses being on their best behavior. We got in some nice stretches of trotting today.

Oh, and the good news is it turned out there was nothing wrong with my trailer.
The bad news is the sound was coming from my truck.

Barefooting It

My friends Leesa and Linda came over to ride with Cierra and I today. It was a nice day. A bit humid and foggy when we started out and we could see some very ominous dark clouds to the north of us.  But, it stayed fine here and the sun was shining by the time we got back. I tied Lily to my trailer to groom and tack her up. She stands so well alone when she knows there are other horses around. She did manage to dump my saddle on the ground due to moving around when I was trying to put it on. Naughty girl! Not really her fault though. She was showing some signs of a bit of soreness in her shoulders from the saddle so has gotten a little fussy about me putting it on her. The saddle is a bit too wide for her and I've added a front raiser pad which has made a BIG difference in how she is going out on the trail. But she is still anticipating discomfort I think. I'll still be keeping a very watchful eye on how things go. She's such a good girl under saddle and I don't want to do anything to ruin that.

Cierra had lost a hoof boot when she rode a couple days ago so we made plans to ride out in search of the boot. Lily took the lead today with no attitude at all. Telling me the slight attitude I was getting the past few rides from home had more to do with saddle discomfort than her "testing" me. While she's bound to do a bit of that just because she is so new to riding, I'm not going to assume anything with her. She's also so much happier with the bit I'm using on her now. I've switched to a Phelam from the longer shanked bit I started her with. Lily has a very soft mouth and doesn't need much. I had Lily's shoes pulled yesterday so it would be our first ride totally barefoot. She has been missing her front shoes for a few weeks and seemed to have no trouble so I decided to try her completely barefoot. She has nice feet. Lily and Leesa's gelding, Billy Bob took turns leading throughout the ride. Lily cruised right over all the rock, and there were a lot, with no trouble at all. She watched where she placed her feet but no "ouchie" steps. We found Cierra's boot before we'd gone more than a mile so that opened up opportunities of where we could ride. I decided to take them around the traditional Tarr's Mill loop. I have not done that yet this year. When we got to the mill site water crossing, I was in the lead with Lily and she went right across with no hesitation. It's all slab rock on the other side and turned out to be very slippery for bare feet! She did some fancy footwork trying to stay upright to better footing. She did manage it thankfully. The plan was to ride the pipeline from Tarr's Mill to the trail that goes out to Lewis Hill. It had rained hard last night and there is a lot of clay on the pipeline with some steep climbs and descents. It was kind of slippery so after the first hill, I took the old trail out to the Lewis Hill Rd. connector trail that we used to use before the pipeline was put in.

We got in a bit of trotting where we could but only in short spurts between rocky or slippery clay sections. We got out to Lewis Hill and crossed to the trail that goes to the Starbird Corner Rd. That trail has been widened out into a regular dirt road for quite a ways. Looks like someone is going to put in some houses. As we came out to the Starbird Corner Rd. There was a LARGE trash container pick up truck right there picking up a container. It was very loud. The horses and Lily were all good about it. We headed down that road, which is tar most of the way, and as we were nearing the end of the tar section, and had just come around a corner, we heard the truck coming down the road kind of fast, and it was LOUD! He did slow down when he came around the corner and saw us but it was kind of too late for by then. Linda, Leesa and I had made it to a driveway and stopped there. Cierra on Tink had been a little behind us so the truck passed her before she got to the driveway. Tink wasn't too impressed with it but she is such a good girl and didn't do anything. Billy Bob, Gus and Lily were good when it passed us too. Then, we had to pass the truck again right where the road turns to dirt as he was picking up a container there. All equines were good. Lily did eyeball it pretty hard but made no fuss. The rest of the ride home was uneventful and it was a good ride for everyone. We were out for just about 3 hrs. and rode 9 miles. My camera is broken so I didn't get any pictures. Linda took my mare Marie home with her today. She is going to lease her for a while.

Otter Pond in Standish

I got an invitation to ride today with a group of friends. They were going to Otter Pond in Standish. Trails I've never ridden that I have heard were very nice. I didn't have time to put in for an automatic day off at work. You have to give them 48 hrs. notice. We've been very busy this week at work even working overtime so I didn't think I could get the day. But, I pleaded with my supervisor and she approved me to have the day off. Yippee!

It's been very hot and extremely humid all week. Today was predicted to be cooler but still very humid. Susie, Lind, Joanie, Leesa, Barbara and Mary-Ann were the group planning to go. Wednesday night Barbara and Mary-Ann decided not to go due to the predicted high humidity. The rest of us decided to give it a try as though it was going supposed to be humid, the temps were only going to be in the 70's.

I was a little late getting going this morning. the plan was to meet at Susie's house at 9:00 am. I did get up at 7:00 am but by the time I fed and cleaned the barn and then hooked up my my trailer and everything put back in it that I usually just keep in there (my trailer just came back from the repair shop) I knew I would be a bit late. I had to stop for gas also. I was not too late though meeting the others at the highway at 9:15 am.

It was an easy drive to Otter Pond and the parking is good there. Lily had loaded right into my trailer with no fuss at all. Good girl! She stood quietly while being groomed and tacked up. I have switched her bit from the long shank to a short shank Pelham. I think she will be happier with this and she is soft so I think it will have plenty of stop to it for her. I also put a lift front pad under her saddle as she is showing some signs of discomfort in her shoulders. My saddle I think is a little to wide for her so I wanted to try this to see if there was a difference. Lily was very good with this bit and definitely happier with the front of the saddle lifted. Her gaits were much more even on each side and very steady.

The trails at Otter Pond are indeed lovely. Lily has lost both of her front shoes but Susie told me I would not need them here. She was right, the footing was lovely. The weather turned out to be great. It was a bit humid when we got there. But overcast so not hot. Then a nice breezed picked up and the humidity dropped as we were riding. We did quite a bit of trotting and Lily didn't even break a sweat. At one little stream crossing with a bridge not safe for the horses to cross, we had a bit off a pile up. Susie was on the lead with Dixie and though she has crossed this before, she decided she was NOT going to do it today. Then Joanie tried with Franny. Not happening. So, Leesa gave it a try with her Billy Bob, one of the least experienced equines in the group other than Lily and he looked it over, and then carefully and easily made his way across. He's such a good horse. The rest followed once he crossed though I still have to take a minute to convince Lily it was ok. There were also a few places we could get into the water which was fun. Lily is quite suspicious of the water. She doesn't like it if she can't see her feet or if she feels it getting deeper. But, she did go in. I sponged her from the saddle for the first time. She did not care at all about me throwing a sponge out on a string from the saddle or about being sponged. The horses and Lily all got along very well and we had a great ride. When we got back to the parking area, we took care of the animals, and then let them graze for a bit. Then tied them all to the trailers with hay while we relaxed and had lunch that we had brought with us. I'm so glad I got the day off to go, it was a lovely day and a wonderful ride.

Riding in My Sleep

Well, I had planned to ride yesterday with Leesa, Linda and Lori. Leesa was going to pick me up as my trailer is still in the repair shop. But, when I got home from work Wednesday night, or rather Thursday morning (as I get out of work at midnight) I quickly cleaned the barn, went in and had a quick bite to eat and then went to bed. HA! Sleep was NOT happening. I tossed and turned, then got up around 2:30 am and decided to go out and watch the Perseids meteor shower. It was a clean night so might as well get something out of my sleeplessness. I went out onto the back with the dogs. I didn't have to wait long to see some action. I saw 3 or 4 and then finally got a bit creeped out being outside in the dark alone. Especially since my dog Bubba kept rushing to the edge of the woods barking like a fool. Possibly he saved me from being abducted by a Bigfoot.....I'm guessing not...we'll never know. I went in and went back to bed. I tossed and turned, tossed and turned. I gave up again around 4:00 am and went back out on the back deck as Perseids was supposed to be most active towards dawn and that was true. Fred got home around 5:30 am and I had breakfast with him. NOW I was getting tired! UGH. I had to work in the afternoon so I ended up sending a message to Leesa that I would not be able to ride. I went to bed around 7:30 am and was finally tired enough to sleep. That evening, Leesa sent me a message that she would come ride with me on Friday if I wanted. So, we firmed up plans for a ride this morning.

I ended up getting out of work early at 9:30 pm. I stopped at the grocery store on the way home and picked up a few groceries and picked up a bottle of wine, as a sleep aid. I WAS going to sleep one way or another. I took care of the animals, had a quick supper, a glass wine and......... I was wide awake. I had another glass of wine...... I was even more wide awake. I went to bed and tossed and turned. I got up, turned on some music to help turn off my brain, hopefully. I tossed and turned. No sleep was happening. AAAAARRRGGGHHH. I gave up, got up and went to work on some braiding projects and at least got some work done. Again, around 7:30 I was suddenly tired. Great. So, I did get a one hour power nap before having to get up and get ready to ride. I didn't care, I was not going to miss another ride.

Leesa arrived a little early. I was cleaning the barn so got Lily and tacked her up. She was a bit fidgety but not bad. I changed her bit today to one that has short shanks. She is too sensitive for a long shank bit. I like that she is soft and I don't want to ruin that. As usual, I took a few circles around the mounting block before she stood for me to mount. I am going to have to take some time to work on this when I am not heading out for a ride. I started out in the lead but not far down the trail, Lily stopped and gave me some attitude about going down the trail. Nothing serious, just stopped and would not move forward and was giving me some head shaking and pinning her ears. I finally popped her a good one with my romel reins. Lily bucked up once but moved off down the trail. Leesa took the lead on Billy Bob. Lily tested me for a while by just not paying attention, trying to wander back and forth along the trail to eat leaves and such. I had to get after her a few times. Then worried her tack was bothering her. But, after a while, she came to the conclusion we were not going home and she settled out and was a very good girl. So good I decided that tack was not an issue, but rather just new to riding testing of limits. We did the alpaca farm loop. That loop has a lot of good footing so we were able to do some nice trotting. The deer fly were bad when we first started out but then thinned out for most of the ride so it was a really nice ride. I didn't take my phone and forgot my camera was in my pommel bag so didn't get a single picture. Leesa's Billy Bob was wonderful and led most of the ride. He handled the steep stream crossing like a pro. The loop is right around 6 miles.

Attack of the Deer Fly

Since I am presently without my trailer, my friends Mary-Jo and Leesa agreed to come over and ride with me today much to my delight. So, I was out to the barn a bit earlier than usual this morning. I fed everyone their grain and was going about my chores and Lily is nickering at me. I look at her and she is in her stall and would take a look into her grain dish (a rubber pan on the floor) and then look at me and nicker. She kept repeating this so I went over and looked into her dish and could see nothing wrong so I went with my chores. Lily continued to look into her dish and then nicker at me. Hummmmm, I swept off a section of her floor to bare mats and I put some new grain down on the floor and she gobbled that right up. When she had finished that, I took her dish and dumped it onto the same spot on the floor and THAT was when I saw there was a fresh guinea hen poop in her bowl that I had dumped her gain onto. No wonder she didn't want to eat it. She would not even eat the grain when I dumped it out of the dish, it was tainted poop grain. I cleaned it up and gave her a normal ration in a clean dish. Now, it that had been Marie, she would have eaten it poop and all. Princess Lily is above such things.

Leesa arrived first with Mary-Jo soon after. We tacked up and got ready to go. As usual, Lily was a bit excited to start and today she tested me a bit right at the beginning of the ride giving me a little bit of attitude. Nothing serious at all, just seeing if she could do things her way. We quickly worked that out. Leesa on her new Arab gelding Billy Bob quickly took the lead. He's a really cute horse. Mary-Jo on her Spanish Mustang gelding, Arthur and me on Lily took turns bringing up the rear. Arthur is doing so well this year out on the trail and it's nice to see Mary-Jo really enjoying being out with him. We hadn't been out too long when the deer fly swarmed us. Leesa had a fly whisk. I have one but it's in my trailer which is at the repair shop. So, I broke off a leafy branch to swat them. Lily quickly figured out what I was doing with the branch and was more than happy to let me swat her about the head with it. I did get in front for a few short spells as did Mary-Jo just to give Leesa and Billy Bob a break occasionally. But, Billy Bob was truly dealing with them better than either Arthur or Lily so he led the most and took the brunt of them. Lily slipped off a rock and pretty much sat down. For a moment I thought she was going to go all the way down but she got her legs back under her and I managed to stay on top. She scraped her hock but it wasn't serious. About the time we were thinking we'd had enough of it, we were nearly half way around the planned loop. We came to a trail that we could do a small loop but would end up going back on most of the same trails we rode out on. Or, we could go just a bit farther and do a nice loop with little repeat of any trails. We decided to go on and do the larger loop ride. We knew the deer fly were horrible the way we'd come and figured they couldn't be any worse if we just continued on. It was a good choice. When we got out on the Adams Rd. it was much better with very few deer fly. Once back in the woods, we did get them again but never as many as the trail we started out on. I had to hustle once I got back as I had to get ready for work. So, I was a rude host and left both my friends in the yard. Not that they needed me for anything but it still feels rude to rush off like that. We rode 8.57 miles and it was a good ride despite the deer fly