Things are finally settling down after my last trip of the season.

I headed to Galway Downs on Halloween to cover the CCI divisions. I flew into San Diego and headed north to Temecula for a quick interview with Gina Miles on Thursday and pretty much crashed at the hotel after that due to some jet lag!

Friday was dressage day. The facility is really beautiful, albeit a bit dusty! It’s nestled at the base of some mountains and the dressage rings are set right near the cross-country course. In fact, one division galloped through the arenas and to a water jump right on the edge.

The cross-country course at Galway is pretty much on a dirt track. There’s a training track with stables and a polo field in the middle of the track. The course started on the polo field and crossed out over the track onto dirt. It was pretty flat except for parts where the course went up onto the track again, then back down into the polo field. I thought it was quite strange that they actually drag the course before.

The CCI*** was quite small, which was unfortunate because I didn’t get to see much of the course as I was shooting, but I talked to some nice people and thought my coverage came out well.

Here’s a link to my coverage.

My flight back on Monday got delayed in Denver for 4 hours, so it turned out to be a

longer day than I’d expected.

On Wednesday, which also happened to be my birthday (!), I went to Morningside to cover a William Fox-Pitt clinic for the website.

His ideas weren’t earth-shattering, but served as a good reminder of the basics. I was reminded of a few things I can work on with Oh So once he’s back jumping to keep his footwork up to speed.

I’ve had a couple of lessons with Bear since my last update and he’s progressing really nicely.

With Nicky, we decided to build a round pen out of jumps in the corner of the ring because he was turning in to the circle a lot and I was having trouble staying behind him and keeping him forward. The round-pen definitely helped and we were able to put both side reins on and have some nice work on the circle.

It was kind of neat when he did come round a bit and I could see glimmers of what he can be a few months down the road.

We worked a little bit on making circles by opening the inside rein and applying inside leg. Towards the end of the lesson, we walked up at an angle to the fence line and asked him to step over a little bit in a mini-turn on the forehand.

He seems very willing to take on each new task so far, but when we ride at night, sometimes things are too interesting to put his head down!

I took him to his first off-property lesson on Sunday. He was a bit tough to get on the trailer since he’d slipped the day before when we practiced, but we figured out a way to keep him from slipping on the ramp, and with the help of the lunge line behind his butt, he finally got on. Once he was on, he was fine, but he’s a little apprehensive to step the whole way on.

I gave him a tiny bit of Ace for this first time off property, but he seemed to act pretty much like he usually does.

We walked around the arena at Maresfield by hand, and he neighed a lot looking for the other horses. Once I got on, it was kind of the same story, but he still did what I asked of him, so that was a good start.

We trotted over three poles in a row, which he didn’t seem to care about, and then Lisa decided it was time to canter (!!!). I was in my dressage saddle, so I was a little worried that my leg wouldn’t be out in front of me if he put in a buck, but once he got going, he was just fine. His canter is actually pretty comfortable and feels ground-covering, so I’m excited for him to gain some more strength.

He got on the trailer a little better for the ride home and settled back into his stall, probably pretty tired!

I tried cantering at home tonight and he was much quicker to pick it up, but he didn’t get the right lead every time, which is understandable. Lisa wants me to start working him on some small hills to strengthen his stifles and I’d like to start taking him for short hacks with my mom, but she won’t be home this weekend so that will have to wait a bit.

Oh So continues to be an ass on stall rest. He really does want to make my life difficult! He got extremely upset when I was putting tack on the trailer on Sunday and started running circles in his stall. I did get on him for the first time since the injury over the weekend because the vet said I could start doing some walk work to keep his mind busy. We’re only doing 5 minutes right now, but he seemed happy to be doing his job again.

No cocktail of drugs seems to work for him for small paddock turnout. He nibbles some hay, then takes off bucking and screeching to a halt– everything he’s not supposed to do.

I’m at the point now, since it’s getting so cold and dark and he’s becoming more unruly, of just letting him go and hoping he settles down when he’s out with Sam. Trying to put him in a small paddock just makes it worse, and the paddocks are only going to get muddier as the winter wears on.

He’s not due for another ultrasound until Christmas, when he’ll be walking under saddle for 24 minutes a few times a week. I’m just torn. Do I let him go and be done with it, possibly undoing the healing we’ve achieved so far, or do I continue on with the plan and possibly get my teeth kicked out and freeze to death every day twice a day?

I’m fine if it takes him an extra month to get back into real work if he goes out now, but the problem is that whenever we turn him out, be it tomorrow or 3 months from now, he’s still going to run. The vet just wants him walking more so the leg is stronger before he gets real turnout. She’s fine with him in a small paddock, but that’s obviously not working.

Thoughts?