Wizard Ride 105: Full Moon Fever

Sunday, 10/4/09

My grandmother rode horses for decades and she has some fantastic stories about it. One of her stories is of a moonlit trail ride. I’ve ridden Alibar in a moonlit field but I’ve never set out on the trails for a moonlit ride.

Mary the Morgan’s owner and I decided that we would give it a shot on Sunday night. Before we tacked up, we walked to the trailhead and walked on the beginning of the trail.

Hm. It’s pretty dark.

Like, really dark.

Hm.

But the moon is up…

Hm. We took the horses out of their stalls and groomed. I walked Wizard to the front of the barn.

Hm. Pretty dark.

Since we both were feeling the same thing about the darkness, we decided to just do a quick ride in the indoor and save the moonlit ride for another night.

Feeling inspired by the George Morris clinic I attended (more on that in a new post), I worked Wizard in the indoor arena. We started on the longe. I asked him for a walk in each direction, about 4 rotations. We went to a trot, about 4 or 5 rotations in each direction. I clipped on a set of side reins on the loosest hole and asked for a trot in each direction, about 3 rotations in each direction.

I mounted up and rode Wizard at the walk for about 10 minutes, alongside Mary the Morgan. The company of another horse decreased Wizard’d ear-pinning a little bit, but he still pinned them and bunched up his topline several times. I ignored his behavior and continued the ride. We did figure 8s and a large oval. When he gave me a relaxed walk with no fussing, I dismounted and gave him a pat. On to bigger and better.