Trail Pony Returns!

Had a good day out at JF's barn. I took Jetta so that I could practice on her trail course. Well, we didn't really get to do that, but that was fine with me! JF and another lady was at the barn and asked if I wanted to go on the trails behind the barn. Of course!

The trails back there are crazy steep. Like scary. But it was fun and a really good experience/workout for Jetta! It's funny - all of the hills have names with stories behind them. There's bareback hill, where JF rode Lollie up bareback - she said her feet were almost hanging down to Lollie's tail it was so steep! And then there's Calvin's slide - where Calvin, a return training horse and the cutest little thing ever (also the horse I played around with cutting cows) slid down on his butt when it was muddy out. 

Jetta did really well. Unfortunately for her, we had to be at the back because I had no idea where we were going in the mess of trails and her stride is so incredible long and I kept having to make her stop or walk really slow so we wouldn't run the other horses over. But she was really great.

That was an hour long trail ride and I think Jetta was quite tired afterwards! JF was going to go back out on a different horse so she asked if I wanted to ride Jetta back out, stay at the barn or take another horse out. I decided to take Russell out, a little 4 year old palomino. He was really good too, except for trying to be (not so) sneaky and take bites out of all the vegetation, edible or not, along the trail. He was much more laid back and so short compared to Jetta!

After that ride I schooled him a little bit, then got back on Jetta. She did really well except for a little bit of a "scoot and run away" canter transitions the first couple times but she seemed to have improved so much. I don't know if it was because she was tired or if I was riding differently or maybe the weight of the mecate reins was making a difference, but she was lighter in the canter and I was even able to give her a light, almost loose rein while she stayed round and didn't try to take off. Impressive!

Blackmail photo! Jetta stayed tied while I went out on the trails
with Russell, she had to wear this muzzle so she wouln't chew the
wood. How humiliating! She was really confused at first, lol.

And don't forget to leave your ideas in the comments on naming this horse!