Year of summer

It’s hard to believe it’s almost Christmas. Listening to christmas music in 30 degree weather just doesn’t have the same feel to it as drinking hot chocolate at the ice rink or your train being delayed because of the snow. And I do love Christmas, the cheasier the better. But I must say it is nice to still be able to walk around in shorts and sit outside in the evenings. It’s different.

I’ve had a busy week with lots of trail rides and horse riding lessons. I’m happy the trails are a bit busier now, I’ve met so many interesting people, I love hearing everyones stories. And I went riding with Stefanie! Even though we ended up riding in the rain (felt just like home), we had a lovely ride and chatted the whole way. The riding lessons went great as well. I’m teaching a ten year old girl named Ka’tia. She just loves being with the horses, adores Tshoks and she’s doing great with her riding. She went from being nervous about riding without me holding the horse, to trotting around the arena over one lesson. After just three lessons she already knows how to do a rising trot and she’s even cantered. She is so excited about everything and very eager to learn. She made me the cutest card saying I am the best riding teacher ever, so sweet! Both Meghan and Evan have also come by for a few riding lessons and they’re making great progress. 

Even though I love working with the horses, it was really nice to get away from everything for a bit as well. I spent a weekend at Heleen’s, in the park. It was by far one of the best experiences ever. We saw so many rhino, elephant, giraffe, zebra, antilope and what not, we spend almost an hour looking at lions sitting about three metres from our car, I got the chance to see cheetah and wild dogs (they’re so beautiful, I loved watching them interact with each other). I also got the opportunity to work with three horses of which nobody knew anything, not even their ages or breed. The park had acquired them to use in the field but they didn’t have anyone to train them yet so they didn’t know if they were even ridable. One of them couldn’t even be caught at first. I worked with him for two hours and after that I was able to ride him around the paddock. It was such a rush to realize I had given him that trust and a very rewarding experience. It gave me some confidence in my abilities as a trainer.

  

I made some progress with our own horses as well. After training Bullet with the bitless bridle on the trails and training him to ride without a bridle in the arena I decided to take him for a ride around the property with just a rope around his neck to steer him. He was amazing, it felt no different from riding him with a bridle, he still responded perfectly to my steering and I could stop him just fine. Since I’m possibly insane, I decided to then try it on a proper training ride in the plantations as well and it went amazing! We even cantered without a bridle, made me really proud. Meanwhile, Lancelot’s training is going very well, Daphne and I started riding him at the beginning of November and he’s been very good. On some of the rides, he bucked during trotting but on my last ride with Mariette he was perfectly fine. I think I’m going to take him on a guesttrail this weekend, it’s just walking so that should be fine.

As for my plans for next year, I’m pretty sure about what my next destination will be. It’s something horse related but it’ll be in a very different environment, about 30 degrees colder for one. Any guesses on where that’ll be?