Friday 17 June 2011

Vest top or thermals and jumper?

You may wonder why we English are obsessed with the weather, but when we go from one day getting sunburnt whilst poo-picking, the field rapidly turning into a dust bowl around you and not a single blade of grass in sight, to the next day of howling gales and horizontal, torrential rainfall (...in June!) ...you can maybe understand our obsession. You think its safe to stash your thermals away for a few months and slap on the suncream instead and the next day you're dragging them back out again.

Well, on one such day we thought it would be a great idea to hack 6 miles to the local show. Okay so it was starting to drizzle a little when we left but no matter, surely it would stop soon - the previous day had been a lovely warm and sunny day. We are in the middle of summer after all! No. The weather had other ideas and by the time we arrived at our destination the rain had settled in for the day and the wind was getting involved too. We arrived wet and cold and I was all for turning straight back home again but it was only polite to wait until the others had done the classes they had gone there for. Jas did a 1'9" clear round with Sonny - it was the first show she had ever been to and seeing several jumps all at once rather than the one or two she was used to came as a bit of a surprise. She got round them all though and only demolished two!

I haven't jumped for ages so I wasn't brave enough even for 1'9". Besides I was so stiff with cold that I could hardly move by this time. I had to get off when we arrived, before my legs went completely numb. We had a cup of tea and a burger from the van in a vain attempt to warm up, but after waiting a couple of hours for our companions to jump their classes my bones had seized up. Getting back on Santana with no mounting block was ...errm, interesting! Lets just say I got up there eventually, much to Santana's dismay, and we set off back home - at last!

Needless to say we will not be attempting this again unless we have guaranteed wall to wall sunshine!

We've arrived! Can we go home now?