Getting Back in the Groove~

To Victoria~

It had been a while - Dec. 11th to be exact, since I'd ridden at Victoria.  That was my fourth ride in the new Stonewall Sport.  Today makes nine rides in the saddle & every time I saddle up, I'm very thankful that after such a long search, I found something that seems to be working so well for us both.

Tree of my Stonewall Sport

When you look at the width of this tree & amount of spine clearance - you can see why these saddles have been so successful, for so many riders over the years.  Even as lightly ridden as Farah has been lately - she wasn't the handful that she would have been before.  More forward than up & that works for me!

Gray day - clouds cap Mt. Washington

Linda & Count met us at the parking area, we ran into Kathy, Darlene & Susan on their way back as we were going out.  We stopped to chat for a few minutes.  It seemed much colder than the temperature told us it was...  Probably low 40's up there, but with a bite to the breeze, fog & low clouds, it felt much colder.

The fog~

 A couple times, Linda put Count into a good trot.  The hackamore worked, I had to be careful, just using a quick pull on one side to ask for a more moderate pace - but we did do some up/down galloping behind them :-)  Only the second time I've used it when riding with others.

Farah~

Farah was happy to be out & glad to have company.  She settled in much quicker than I'm used to - no doubt that a comfortable saddle helps her attitude, as it does mine!  The hackamore too - has really helped to calm her under saddle.  That was a relief to me, since I still seem to be at somewhat of a low ebb since my trip to CO.  She still looks for the bit when the headstall goes on, but has figured out the name of this game :-)

Linda was kind to me, we just did the usual winter road loop.  Both of us happy to sit in the cab of Linda's warming truck to eat a snack before heading home~

2015 - First Ride!

Mt. Rainier - 12:23 p.m.

Finally, Lynn & I managed to arrange a ride!  We'd hoped to go on a long point-to-point, but with all the flooding, the trails that we might have done this on - were under water in many places!  Instead, I talked Lynn into coming up to Victoria, where on the mountain, the roads are dry.

Our lower loop

During our much enjoyed time off the trails - I called Garmin & finally figured out how to overlay my routes onto Google Earth - again!  Not only that, but now I can go back & save images of the rides I did last year - happy - happy me :-)

Lynn & Sophie

It was really nice to have company on the ride - it had been too long!  Lynn & I had plenty to catch up on :-)  Every time Farah tried to act up toward Sophie, or started her bucking routine, I just turned her around, walked her back the way we'd come - she would sigh & we'd turn back.  All in all, a pretty successful way to manage her & she did seem to enjoy having company with us as much as I did.

Plenty of water~!

All the little streams were very full & we could hear them before we saw them!  It was cool in the shade, but so warm & wonderful in the sunshine!  When I was going through Arlington about noon - it was 44.  Coming home this afternoon - about 4 p.m. it was again 44 - with fog moving in.

Mt. Rainier 3:10 p.m.

There was an amazing view of the mountain both as we started out & as we were returning!  Heavy cloud cover or fog over the lowlands~

Farah's "Saddlebred" look :-)

Just after I took the photo, we saw a horse far up the hillside - which put Farah on alert :-)  Thanks for the photo Lynn!  A really stellar day for early January! 

Another Cold One!

If it took standing on her head :-)

I'd wanted to ride the Centennial Trail earlier this week, but it was just too cold & frozen.  The weatherman kept saying that each day was going to warm up - sure...  Lynn & I decided with the report last night - to ride today.  When we both got up to sub-30's it was obvious that the warming had yet to happen.  There was sunshine though & that made the difference :-)   Lynn had a last minute horse change happen - so was a little late.  Farah didn't mind - there was a Lot of grass at the trail-head!

Our ride out~

First we rode through the little town of Hartford, under Hwy-92 & up onto the trail itself.  Within only a few strides, we knew that the longer ride we'd planned wouldn't happen.  The ground was frozen solid & very slippery.  All the little creeks & wetlands were frozen solid.  The mares were slipping even at a walk & the ground was humped in places from all the hard freezing.

Looking like Winter!

It was strangely quiet & very beautiful though!  This is one of my favorite sections of the trail & it was easy to enjoy the muted colors & watch as the clouds again started to cover the sky.

Dock at Lake Cassidy

The day stayed Cold!  Very cold & even a slight breeze off the lake made it colder & left lots of frost on the leaves further up the trail.  The plan had been to ride to Armar Rd. - but time was running out - there was no way to make any - so we regretfully turned back at Getchell.  I'm going to post our stats here - when I downloaded them I had to laugh at the difference on our ride outward-bound compared to the increase of speed on the return :-)  The turn-back point was at 1:40 min.  Needless to say - the mares knew this was not a point-to-point!

Today's route

It was just so darn good to Get Out again!  The last seven days have been the longest I've been out of the saddle for a very long time.  Farah was full of energy - but besides some nasty looks at Sophie (who was happy to return them!) she seemed happy to be on the trail.

Now that it's actually December - it will be the weather that dictates riding...   Don't you love it?  Not!

Snow Day~

Cottage~

It's cold, about 32 degrees, wet & again we have large, wet flakes of snow falling through the air...  The dogs & I huddled on the swing while I sipped my tea & watched them fall.  It seems like the last few years we haven't made it through January without at least one or two snowfalls.  
Last year it held off until mid-month~

January 15, 2012

 2011, on the same day, you see below that we were white~

January 9, 2011 Dogwood Gulch

 We did get enough snow yesterday to cover the grass & it's still covered today.  At least as far as my photographic record goes, we didn't have snow on the ground in January of 2010, but the mountains were white!

January 6, 2010 - Three Fingers

 In 2009 though - it was  different story~

January 2, 2009

That year we had plenty of snow coming into the New Year & sunshine too.  It was such a "nice" January that I did a lot of riding & my friends did too :-)

January 17, 2009 - Khari, Joyce, Annie, Elation, Diane, Kendall, Jesse, Charlotte & Fancy

January 19, 2012  How it looked heading for home from Arlington

There you have it, a little history of the weather for this time of year!  Let's hope we don't continue to get slammed with huge snow storms, downed trees, power outages & all the interesting days of last January! 

Clear & Cold

New Clear-cut & view

Today we saw the blue of the December sky!  The yellow of that glowing orb that we know is the Sun, though we hardly see it often enough this time of year to remember what it is!  Was really looking forward to riding with Linda again.  She was ready & we headed up to check out the changes on the tree farm.  I see clear-cut & say; "ugh".  Linda sees it & says;  "New trail!"   Her positive attitude helped me to gain perspective.  We're scheduling a day to decide what we're going to work on & try to re-open a couple trails that will help to connect one area to another.  Lets call it post-holiday ambition to get exercise one way or the other!  :-)

Roads are taking a beating.

 For the cost of a permit from the farm office, people can come in to cut up the left-overs from the logging operation.  It pays to be extra careful & watchful of these amateur woodsman with full loads going down, or empty heading in - not expecting to see anyone, let alone horses.
We were out for over four-hours, finally realizing that the day was rapidly coming to a close & it was time to head back!   Farah let me know that she's more than happy to be gainfully going out on the trails again!  She loves the mountains & so do I.  We walked the last miles back this afternoon, so both horses were mostly dry by the time we returned.  I used towels to give her a good rub down when we got home.  Happy horse, happy rider!