Eastern Mojave Scenic, Day 4

In the wee hours of the morning, I lay half asleep listening to the rain on the tent. I waited in the tent, not wanting to arise before I had to, and thinking I would feed Hoss early, but would like the rain to stop first. After some time, slipping in and out of sleep, the rain abated. I checked the time – 430 – and arose to feed Hoss.

I stepped out of the tent to find Hoss standing in the bright full moon light in the snow! What an amazing sight. I turned about to see the tent covered in snow, as well. I retrieved my camera from the tent and took a few pictures before I fed Hoss.

I crawled back into my sleeping back and slept pretty well for another hour and a half or so. When I arose for good, I could hear other riders debating whether they were going to ride or not. I was already determined to ride. Didn't really much matter what the weather was! So I saddled up and headed out. And Hoss was still not tired! He was nearly as strong as he'd been on the first day.

The snow did not let up in the morning. I did manage to remember my camera, but, when I changed the batteries in my GPS, I managed to put the dead ones back in rather than the new ones. So I had to sacrifice my camera batteries to operate my GPS. I supposed I didn't really need the GPS, but I like it. I did get a few pictures of the desert in the snow before the GPS died and I switched the batteries out.

The snow continued through the early part of ride, which was up in the higher elevations. Some new trails had been cut through a beautiful canyon. I didn't get pictures in the canyon, but it would have been unlikely for me to get good ones and keep Hoss under control.

For a bit, we were riding with four or five others, trotting along a jeep trail. There were a couple of men out there with cameras. I assume they were with the Forest Service. We were supposed to be riding in pairs. I think they were out there making sure that was what was happening.

After a water stop, the bunch broke up a bit. I ended up riding with a rider on a stocky black and white paint horse. Again, the two horses were evenly matched, so it worked out well. The other rider and I didn't spend a whole lot of time talking, and we weren't really riding together, more like parallel to each other. It was easier for both horses to be motivated with the presence of the other.

We passed old abandoned shacks and mines. There was a burned out bus at one spot. We climbed up through what appeared to be a seasonal river bed. We continued on up to the top, where we were confronted with a clear plastic bag tied to a bush. The snow had fallen on it such that the sign wan obscured. The other rider got off and knocked the snow off. The sign said, "Take a piece of paper to lunch." In the back were small squares of yellow legal paper. We each took one, and rode back down, where we discovered a turn-off that we hadn't seen on our way up. Turned out the vet check had been supposed to be where the bush was, and to make sure everybody covered the trail as marked, the management had put out the take-a-paper check point!

Because of the cold, the vet hold was reduced to fifteen minutes. Hoss couldn't have cared less about the cold. I had sent a crew bag with his cooler in it. I threw the cooler over him, but I really don't think he needed it particularly. He dove into his hay, and nosed at the bag he knew his bran was in. I mixed up his bran mash, and he slurped it right up. We stayed in the vet check longer than we needed to. I didn't want to take him away when he was eating so enthusiastically! Still, I did eventually take him away and pack up the crew bag. I vetted him through, put my crew bag on the truck, and we headed off with the other rider.

The other horse seemed to know what leaving the vet check meant. It meant we were on our way home! That horse trotted out with ears up and no effort to slow down. Hoss kept up with him just fine. I decided to let him continue to keep pace with the other horse, as it was a pace he could reasonably keep.

Once we descended out of the higher elevations, the sun came out and the snow had melted off. It got quite warm, really! The trail was nice with good footing and few treacherous spots. I was pretty content to let Hoss trot on behind the other horse.

We were about four miles from camp when my foot started hurting badly enough that I needed to slow down. I just couldn't keep up posting any more, nor could I stand in the stirrups with that weird pain. It was a nervy sort of pain. I pulled Hoss down. He didn't like it, but after a while he settled in to a walk. It helped a bit when another horse caught up behind us.

I kept Hoss at a walk until my foot started to feel better, then let him trot. He picked up a nice, even trot, not trying to catch up with anybody, just setting his own pace. Finally! Only took three days and most of 150 miles for this to happen!

Once we were within two miles of camp, I slowed Hoss down again. No need to go rushing in. A few times he started looking about, and I kicked him up to keep him from deciding to behave foolishly. Despite that, we walked nicely in to camp.

On our way up to the vet check, Hoss decided he needed to be spooky about everything he had been walking past for the previous two days. Lots of looking about and going any direction but truly forward. Someone commented he was tired. Uh, no, not really. He's just being overly silly.

One last time, Hoss vetted through nicely. I took him back to the trailer and untacked him, and for the first time since I put him in the trailer, I took the boots off his front feet.

I did find that sand and gravel had collected in the gaiters on his boots, and there was sand between his sole and the inside of the boot. However, he had no wounds or rubs. A few days later I discovered some hair loss where the gaiters had rubbed his pasterns, but it wasn't huge. I have to say the Gloves were a success. I know in the future to clean the gaiters out regularly, but otherwise, I am very happy with the performance of these boots.

On Monday morning, I removed the pair of shoes I had nailed on Hoss's hind feet. I found that he had worn through the leather pad on one hind foot. I also noticed he had been pretty persistently hitting his right hind foot about an inch below the hairline with the shoe on his left hind foot. This resulted in a thin spot that was just starting to show blood! I suspect the extra length of the pad was the reason he was doing that. I suppose he'll just have to have boots instead!