Wahoo! Over the moutain and down the valley...

Yesterday, I got to go on my first NC trail ride with Jet and Emmett. Now Jet being a true Cal-Bred kinda horsey is not at all accustomed to thick forests. What's more, having come from Davis, she's as much a flatlander now as we were, and her little hind quarters had grown flabby from lack of climbing up and down hills. I have waited for a good opportunity to introduce her to both, and it came when Marilyn, the farm owner, took me along while she rode Buddy, a bomb-proof old quarter horse.

Wahoo! Jet was a total star, followed gamely, alert to everything but good all around, as we crossed wood bridges and narrow creeks, down towards the University Lake. Marilyn taught me to read the trail markings, which are pretty hard to read given the trail is submerged in half a foot of dead leaves. Emmett's tongue was down to the ground when we got back, and of course we had to wrap it all up with a victory canter. By then the weather had turned gray and windy, my hands and feet were frozen, but it took me a while to realize it all.

Well, as if that were not enough, next Marilyn harnessed up her pony Eyore for a little buggy ride. How fun! Four dogs in tow, Emmett of course but also her two long-haired Dachshunds Jamie and C.C., and a little foundling puppy Zoe. Canter through the grass, in a one horse open buggy, round the course we go, laughing all the way!