First Real Ride & Trailer Loading

I am kind of late in posting this but there's been a lot going on around here!! I've only ridden Louie about three times since we got him home. Two of those times were just quick "hop on and let's see how it goes" rides - both went very well. Zephyrs Mom and I were talking about going to the beach and riding and also going up to the Great Pond Mountain Conservation Trust to ride since it's so close and has great trails/roads. This planning though brought about a problem....Louie does NOT load well. He's not nervous, he's not scared, he's just plain obstinate and it takes a stand off to get him on the trailer - battle of the wills, who can hold out the longest.....which, by the way - is ME! LOL

So I asked ZM for some tips on the sending method she uses with Zephyr, wouldn't that be nice? I've NEVER had a horse that I could just point at the trailer and say "go" and have them get on all by themselves. Buck was good (for the most part) but even he had to be led in. So anyway, she gave me some tips and even invited me over to see her work with Z on my trailer and work with him some myself - which he was entirely too nice to me of course!! ZM invited me for dinner which was yummy, and we had a nice visit - between her work schedule and my kids/zoo around here, we really don't spend much time together unfortunately!!

I came home and set out the next morning to work with Louie the way ZM showed me.....it didnt' work. I don't know what I'm doing, he doesn't know what I'm asking - can you say FRUSTRATING!!?? So I sent an email to ZM and asked for her help, she was available the very next day and was more than happy to come help. She worked with him for 1 1/2 hours and he finally got on the trailer!! YAY!! He was going on fairly well as long as the divider was open. We learned a few things about him.....#1, he is very sensitive and over reactive - ie: he bit ZM she let him know that that was NOT acceptable however she was NOT mean or harsh about it and the way he reacted you would have thought she was trying to kill him! #2, he gets mad and almost braces himself for you to explode.

Before ZM left, we made plans to work with Louie on Saturday, maybe head to the wildlands for a ride afterwards and the beach for the following Monday! I got Louie on the trailer no issues on Saturday morning and headed to ZM's house. We unloaded him, and ZM asked me to show her how he was doing - he immediately got resistant and shut down on me. I went to grab my gloves and ZM started working with him. She had her trailer all set up so we could get him on that too - her's is a 2H slantload/step up - quite different from my 2H straightload/ramp! It didn't take too long and she had him on her trailer. As I'm writing this, I don't really remember all of the details but if you follow that first link, I know she posted more details.

After a bit, ZM asked if I was pretty confident that "eventually" he'd get on - my response was something like "yeah eventually". So we decided to go ahead and head to the Wildlands for a quick ride. I had a family dinner at 2pm so that gave us about 2 1/2 hours to get to the Wildlands, ride, get back to ZM's house and then for me to get home. Time enough for a nice easy ride......

We got all our stuff together and headed out. When we got there and got saddled up - my anxiety was thru the roof. I'm such a 'fraidy cat ALL the time now. So, we get all saddled and then it occurs to me....I didn't bring a bucket. HOW am I going to get on?? Louie doesn't stand well to be mounted, the saddle slips to the side if I'm not standing on something.....UGH! ZM got on using the gate so I figured I'd try...I couldn't get him close enough and then get him to STAND! ZM ended up getting off Z and trying to give me a boost using her leg....I'm not exagerating, I thought I was going to break her!! FINALLY, I got Lou next to the gate and ZM held him while I got on. It's moments like these that I am totally discouraged by SO many things, my horse choices, my weight issues, my coordination, my fear! Just to name a few!

So finally we were on our way! YAY! It was nice - the sun was out, no real wind. We walked mostly and then ZM asked if I was ok with a trot. Yep! So we trotted for a bit. Louie did NOT like being behind Z, he'd pin his ears and toss his head. He definitely was not the relaxed horse of our little rides at home. When he's in front, he's happy, being behind - he's grumpy. At some point, we were trotting along and he broke into a canter. We cantered a couple strides and I slowed him again to a trot. ZM and I talked and decided to try a planned canter (I hadn't gone faster than a trot with him so far) - we were cantering along and Louie bucked. MAJOR anxiety for me. I pulled him up, he is NOT hard to control even when being "naughty" which is good, ZM said she thought that he'd broke thru the packed snow and that it wasn't a real buck so we decided to try again. With the same results. We decided to try it with Louie behind ZM in case it was the sound of Z coming up behind him that was upsetting him. Again, the same results. So we need to work on that....we turned to go home and were going along nicely. Somewhere around half way back to the trailer, maybe a little more than half way ZM let Z stop to eat some snow. Louie started to put his head down like he wanted to eat some too so I let him have his head. BIG MISTAKE! All of a sudden, we were both on the ground. Apparently he was itchy!! LOL He got right back up but um, now what?? There was NO way I was going to be able to get back up there with NOTHING to stand on. So I walked a bit. ZM kept looking for places for me to get back on , but with the snow being deep in most spots and where there wasn't snow, there was squishy sucky mud. *sigh* I walked a good bit, and then finally ZM spotted the perfect spot! She ended up having to get off and hold Louie while I got on, but I got back up there and Z is a saint so she got back up with no problems. We got back to the gate, unsaddled and took them back to see if they wanted to roll - of course not! LOL ZM had to "argue" a bit about the trailer with Louie but he eventually got back on and we headed back. By this point, I was running late (big surprise). So we got back to ZM's, got Louie back on my trailer and all my stuff in my truck and I booked it for home. Was REALLY late for the family thing but they didn't really care about seeing ME anyway - just the kids and Vince! ;)

Tosh and Dan and Keags came over a bit later for dinner and we had a good night. I was so sore though that I fell over the fence, spilled my drink and was the joke of the night. :) I was sore for DAYS after - walking funny even, and Lou was sore too. Not sure at this point if it's saddle fit or just too much work for a green, out of shape horse/rider!!

Oh! The beach! Monday got rescheduled to Wednesday - and unfortunately, on Tuesday I came down hard and fast with a sore throat, chest congestion and sinus issues so I stayed home. Z and his mom went though and had a blast! I'm hoping to get to go on the next trip!!