HRR: 68
HR10Min: 44
Miles: 11
Avg Spd: 3.9 mph
Time: 3 hours, 30 minutes
I took Hoss up to Cuyamaca for this ride. My intention had been to ride the trails used on the Descanso 25 mile ride, but it was getting late and I knew we'd have to go pretty quick to get it done. I had done some shopping on my way home from church, so even though I'd gone to first service, I got home later than I would've liked.
When I got in the truck, I noticed a rancid odor. The previous day, I had noticed there was a nasty smell starting, but didn't think much of it, figuring it must've been something I'd left in the truck. This time, the odor was way worse. I couldn't think of anything I'd eaten in the truck – I eat in my truck only rarely; it smells bad enough in there without me leaving trash in it, too – but, boy, it smelled like something died in there. And it didn't get any better as I drove along, either.
After I unloaded Hoss at the Sweetwater parking area, I went back to the truck for something. Opening the front passenger door caused a waft of deadly odor to come out of the truck. I started looking around, and quickly discovered the pound of ground beef that had slipped up under the front seat a few days earlier. A client had given me several pounds of organic ground beef as payment (I love the barter system) and I'd missed one when I pulled them out. I took the package out of the truck and disposed of it. Definitely didn't want it in there any longer making my truck smell so bad!
Once I got Hoss saddled up and ready, we headed on up Harvey Moore trail. Hoss was pretty cheerful, wanting to step out quickly. We turned down West Side trail, and he wanted to take up the trot. I kept him walking for a time longer, wanting a good warm up, but finally let him trot.
We took West Side trail around to Lower Descanso Creek trail, and trotted everywhere we good. There are rocky areas that aren't good for trotting over, but much of it is trotable. I know the next ride we're planning to do – the Big Bear 55 – has a lot of areas that are trotable for very short distances, so the horse has to trot every chance he gets, even if it's only 20 strides. So every time we came to a trotable section, even if it was short, I moved Hoss into a trot.
We got to West Mesa Fire road, and headed on up it. Hoss moved out at a nice trot for a time, but then the road started going uphill. As I've noted before, Hoss hates trotting uphill. This is something he's going to have to get over. Of course, at rides, he'll trot at a pretty good clip over anything, egged on by the high energy atmosphere I can't duplicate at home.
Hoss was trotting just about as slowly as he possibly could. Most riders agree conditioning rides should be done at the speed one expects to go at the ride. No amount of pushing, kicking, or beating will get Hoss going at the same speed he'll go at rides.
I let Hoss slow down to a walk after a while, but made him trot some more later. This road is rocky in some places, so walking is necessary in those places. I let him walk on the rocky parts and the parts that are steeper, but I pushed him to keep trotting otherwise. He wasn't going fast; much of the time his speed hardly justified being called trotting.
Once we hit the top of West Mesa Fire road, we turned down the connector to Harvey Moore. Hoss picked it up a bit here, recognizing we were on the way back toward the trailer. I kept him trotting everywhere it was safe enough to do so. We saw several deer off to the side of the trail, which Hoss always finds fascinating. He can't figure out why they're not on the trail, too.
We turned down Dyar Springs trail, which Hoss was very annoyed by. He knows Harvey Moore goes straight back to where we parked the trailer, and Dyar Springs does not. I kept him moving mostly by dint of kicking him. He kept trying to figure out how to make me let him turn around.
We came to a very small water crossing, and Hoss thought he'd found a way to make me let him turn around. He planted his feet and refused to cross the water.
The water crossing here is surrounded by plant life, the sort of plant life Hoss thinks very tasty. When crossing water, Hoss has developed the habit of putting his nose down before he'll cross. Since I let him do this, it means he can get his head down for a good snack when we cross.
I pretty quickly realized he was sand-bagging me, and yanked his head up and kicked him. Nothing. He was giving me "I don't want to," or "make me," he was giving me "you can't make me." After five minutes of having him just ignore me, I hopped off, wacked him a few times with the reins to get his attention, led him across the water a few times, got back on and we continued on our merry way.
A mile or so later, we came to another crossing. This one went downhill slightly before the crossing and had plenty of grass around it as well. Once I got him to the bottom of the hill, and well before he would be expected to cross, Hoss stopped and refused to go forward.
This time I spent ten minutes trying to get him to go forward from the saddle. I was able to fool him a couple of times by pretending we were going to go a different way or turn around to get him to move a foot and get him forward a little bit. I finally got off, wacked him with the reins yet again, and led him across the water. Then I led him back across the water and got back on. He refused to cross again. I got off, wacked him with the reins, got him a little closer to the water, and got back on. This time he seemed to decide he didn't want to keep playing the game, and that continuing on would be in his better interest, and crossed the damn water! Only took twenty minutes.
We reached the junction at the connector to Juaqapin, and I made him continue on Dyar Springs. He was not happy about it, but didn't plant his feet and play "make me." We made our way without further incident back to West Side trail, where Hoss picked up a nice trot pace most of the rest of the way back to the trailer.
If there had been time, I would have gotten my whip out of the trailer and we would have ridden back around to the spots he'd refused to cross. My past experience with him has been that he'll do what I want if I have a good "weapon" with me! I guess I'll just have to make sure I have my whip from now on. Indeed, I put it on my saddle so next time I won't have to think about it.
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