Hacking

Again, as the weather has been so wet, the ground is soggy and muddy and very slippery we haven't been able to do very much. On Monday me and Santana went into one of the flatter fields and did some large circles. Managed to get a decent canter around the whole circle on both reins. He's much better on the left rein than the right. He's still very heavy in my hands when turning. He'd much prefer to go in a straight line!


Today four of us went out for a hack around the roads because, guess what ... it was raining again! Me on Santana, Angie on Mysti, my daughter Jasmine on Catrin (see pic) and Angie's daughter Holly on Terry, all went out together. We started off with Mysti at the front, the two girls in the middle and Santana at the back. Half way round we swapped over and Santana went at the front. I was very pleased with him - he looked at things a bit but didn't spook or do anything silly. We also undid the gate to the farm when we came back. Soon he'll be opening it by himself! Roll on summer!

How time passes!

I hadn't realised how long it has been since my last post. Due to the dark nights I haven't been able to ride Santana as much as I would have liked, I have managed about three times a week, but have had gaps of up to four days in between. This is obviously not good for Santana's training as he goes back a little if there is such a long gap. This last week hasn't been so bad though, and yesterday we even managed to get a little jumping practice in.

First of all we had a little whizz around the block. which was fine. Then we went into the cross country field and had a go at a couple of the smaller jumps. First of all he just trotted over it as if it wasn't there! Not the idea at all. So we followed my daughter on her pony, Catrin, and he managed to lift himself over it, woohoo!

Then we tried one a little bigger which I thought would leave him no choice but to jump. Bless him, he didn't really know what to do but he didn't try to refuse and went over.

That was enough for one day as he is still finding work really tiring. I was so pleased though, he is very honest.