Happy Dance!

If you look~

OK, the sun came out!  It was warm!  I could not do anything but saddle up & ride!  Since the trailer wasn't hitched, decided to ride from home & make another attempt to find the old trails that used to get us over to Paramount Stables on 99th. 

I saw tracks from ATV's & tried to follow them.  I knew they had to be coming onto "my" east side, from somewhere to the west of the power lines.  I checked every opening into the trees that looked like it might possibly become a trail & finally...  Success!

Green, Very Green!

It was absolutely beautiful with the trees covered with hanging moss.  The trail was rough, but nothing a good horse couldn't get through :-)

More hanging moss~

Once we came out of this trail, I finally reconized what we called the "big downhill" which it was then & still is.  Down, down to the creek & old rotted bridge - that had been rotted then.

Old Bridge

 Once across the creek, I was in for a surprise!  Someone had been working on the trails, opening them up & doing some grading.  Trails & more trails - some I'd never seen!  We just kept going & going.  Finally at 8-miles - we came to a gate.

Ben's House

Dogs started barking & a man came out.  Ben introduced himself & professed his surprise in seeing a horse & rider!  He filled me in on what had been happening with the 600 acres that are still - amazingly enough - undeveloped.  It was supposed to all go to houses, but with the economy - just has not materialized - yet.  Ben was the one working with his tractor to open some of the trails & do some repair at the crossing by a large pond.

There were plenty of other paths that we could have taken, but it was getting late & time to start for home.  It was dark when we got to our gate & found Butch home!  Farah was Very happy to have arrived back in time for her dinner!  I was thrilled to find more miles - several more than I'd hoped & more to explore!