I've managed to misplace my data for this ride. I do know it was at Hollenbeck Canyon, so we went about 9 miles or so. I know his recovery was good; I'd have remembered if it wasn't. So there wasn't anything particularly remarkable about this ride, except it was a week after Wind Wolves, and Hoss hadn't been out of the pasture in that time.
This was the first time I took foster-dog Jazz along for a trail ride. I had ridden Phoenix the day before, to see if she'd picked up enough to follow along on a trail ride at home. She went along quite well, taking her lead from my boys, and I declared her ready to come along. So when I hooked up the trailer, I invited her into the truck to come along with the boys.
Jazz is a very sweet dog. She's a cross between a border collie and probably Labrador. About 60 pounds of fuzzy dog who wants nothing more than to lick all the skin off of you. She belongs to a deployed soldier and will be with us for about eight months. She's integrated with our pack pretty well, and we've gotten her trained not to leave the property without us. My biggest concern when she moved here was the lack of a fence, but she learned quickly. Didn't hurt that my dogs won't leave, either. That was the biggest thing that got her taught not to leave.
So after saddling up Hoss – all the while watching carefully to be sure Jazz didn't take off – we headed off down the trails. Hoss was in high spirits. I wasn't using any bit. I haven't replaced the lost part on his hackamore, and I felt that the Kimberwicke was more than I really needed. So I just hooked his reins to the sides of his halter and off we went.
Our first obstacle was four sandbags that have been placed in a row about two feet before the cowboy gate. It's clear that the recent rains had washed the area in front of the gate out, and a repair was made to render it safe to pass. Hoss was very suspicious of those sand bags! He clearly wanted to go through the gate and get on with our ride, but boy! He did not want to step over those sandbags. I let him investigate them for a few moments, but decided he was probably going to use it as an excuse to be stupid and just pulled his head up and kicked him over. Problem solved.
I decided to go "backwards" on this ride. This way we hit the easier trails first, the harder ones farther along. I had planned on a relatively slow ride. It was Jazz's first time out, and I knew I was taking her farther than she'd ever gone. Her soldier mom runs six miles every day, but we were going nine, and following a horse who, if he chose, could outrun her mom any time. In addition, she was not on a leash, allowing her to do the typical dog thing. I'm pretty sure that most dogs end up going two to three times farther than the horse, they rove about so much.
Well, Hoss wasn't having the slow thing. He needed to run! This was one of those moments when I really wish I had a large arena to turn out in. As it was, I managed to get him around the ninety degree turn in the trail before I let him take off. And did he ever take off! If I'd managed a look at the GPS, I'm sure we were going 20mph or more. This was an all out race horse run, pure unbridled joy at being out and on the trail.
We got the ya-yas out reasonably quickly. Hoss is starting to pick up on the slow-is-not-bad thing. Slow is kinda nice, considering how much pressure there can be at an endurance ride. Still, when we got 'round to the flat on the far side of the recreation area, he wanted to run some more. I let him go and got more of that goofiness out of him. Boy, did we have fun doing that!
When we turned left off the wide road to single track trail, Jazz continued on up the road for a ways. Concerned that we'd lose her, I started calling. Some dogs seem to know that they can turn back on a trail and pick up where the leader turned off, or head out cross country. Others can't. Jazz is one of those who can't. She has spent much of her life getting her exercise at the end of a leash. Some of these discoveries about the properties of the world she simply hasn't had the opportunity to make. She stood up on the ridge of the road, at about eye level with me, and waved her tail in confusion for a moment before taking the plunge and coming to me cross-country. It may take some time, but I'm sure she'll catch on. She sure had a good time. She did start to look like she was getting too tired, but she bucked up and made it the whole way.
During that early part of our ride, I realized, as we ran full tilt along the trail, reins loose in my hand, easy in the saddle and a smile on my face, that we have truly become partners. To that limit that horsemen can, I truly trust this horse. He will not deliberately do anything to hurt me, and will do his level best to keep us both safe. And he trusts me, too. He knows that I won't ask him to do something I don't know he can do, and that I will do my best to direct him to the safest crossing, the best path, the ideal footing. I can't imagine a horse running with such wild abandon without trusting the person on his back.
No comments:
Post a Comment