Sorry, I didn’t see this until just now. It’s been a busy month, moving across the world and all. I am training with Noah Tillman-Young, he is about 20 minutes South East of San Antonio.
Updates on my training so far! I’ve had a couple of lessons, the first two were most focused on tacking up and putting to. I think another lesson or two and I’ll be pretty solid on harnessing up and adjusting the harness and putting to safely and properly. There is a lot more to it than throwing a saddle on and making sure it’s properly placed and snug. Traces and shaft length/positioning and where does the breeching sit and how snug should the holdbacks be and hook up in a precise order and make sure you bring the lines back on this step. It is just going to take a lot more repetition for it to become second nature.
I like the place I am learning from well enough, nice well trained and well cared for horses with a professional atmosphere. I did kind of get set loose on my last lesson, with a well trained horse in a confined area. Was my first time driving alone and I worked on steering at the walk, (with a bit of trot thrown in because apparently, when you turn towards home on this particular horse he gets a bit of pep in his step, easily contained pep, but pep none the less.) The actual driving part felt pretty easy, just like riding, without my leg aids. Trainer says he’ll set me loose in the big field soon. Should be fun.
There is a navigator clinic in Houston weekend after next. Husband and I are going to make an overnight trip of it (he found something to do in the city related to his hobby.) There is another clinic in March in Houston that I’m thinking about going to, but I don’t know. I don’t have my own horse and I don’t know how much use it will be. I may just audit it. It’s with Louise Fox. What do you say COTH? Go and audit if nothing else?
Now, I met a woman on Facebook when I was originally looking into driving in Texas and she’s very active in the community, she has been very helpful in answering questions and encouraging me to attend events. She’s offered to let me drive her mini’s when I get a few more drives under my belt, to get a feel for a smaller horse. (Trainer only has full size horses.) I made the mistake (or not) of mentioning that I thinking of eventually looking for a large mini small pony. Well it just so happens that she heard of a 14 year old 10hh gelding currently owned by a vet who is looking for a new home. He’s well trained, and spent some time giving lessons to beginner drivers. He’s only an hour or so away. She gave me the owner’s contact info but I haven’t reached out yet. She even put me in touch with the person who trained this pony to drive, so I can ask about his background. He comes with his cart, but no harness, for a very reasonable price.
Oh, final thoughts, this gelding popping up had me researching costs of horsekeeping in Texas. Holy reverse sticker shock, what would have cost me $600 a month in Hawaii will cost less than $200 a month here. It’s so affordable!!!
