Packing The Trailer

[goodhors]

Getting ready for Metamora CDE this weekend. Rounding up all the stuff, getting it organized, then remembering where I put it! Ha ha Double checking myself is best.

Husband drove twice today, so now he can clean harness and bag it up. Horses get time off until we reach the competition. Been getting horses used to leather harness again, which we only use for Dressage and Cones. He said they acted a bit goosey the first two drives, then fine the last few. I am sure it felt odd to them, more weight and not the same flexibility as their synthetic harness. We did change saddles on the synthetic harness, but no issues there during a drive. It is a newer design than our old Zilco saddles, with wider curved sides and sits higher on their backs. Hosed them at the end of work, no hopping with the cold water, so I guess they remember Vet check from other CDEs in the past. Both carriages washed, ready to load tomorrow.

I did some sewing to get pole cover neat again. Cleaned the LQ of trailer so we can load it up. Still have to get my clothes around, get helmets in the trailer and all the spares stuff. Vests and raincoats already in.

Had a bad Friday doing a pre-trip with the horses. It was more to practice loading, backing into stalls, since we don’t use that trailer much. Killed the AC and fan belt in the truck about 3 miles from home! Let truck cool off, then ran it a mile, stopped and cooled it again. Radiator sounded like Old Faithful when ready to blow when we stopped! He turned the motor off on the downhills and coasted!! Thank goodness for truck being a manual!! Took about an hour and a half to get back home with the stops to cool off. What a trip!! Horses said “Why we are back home again already?” Both horses got on and off well, quietly. They remembered how to swing over, back into stalls.

Husband got the 2 fan belts ordered and replaced both fan belts, “just to be safe.” He was glad, after seeing the wear because the second belt was starting to go! They did have a lot of miles, so their time was up. I feel safer with new belts, less likely to have problems traveling.

With everything packed by Wed evening, all we need is to wash horses Thursday AM, load them and leave. Looks like nice weather, but I will pack my wading boots anyway. This is Michigan, weather changes every few minutes some days!

[DiamondJubilee]

Glad you were able to get the kinks out before the show! No fun with truck issues (been there, done that) and happy to hear you were able to fix it so quickly.

Hope you had a good time at Metamora!

[goodhors]

The CDE was kind of a disappointment. We did the CT on Friday. Alyss jumped sideways while waiting between Dressage and Cones. She hit into Hawk who got a bit “aerial” and then hung back, breaking the false martingale. I jumped off, found the strap broken at the hole, can’t fix it. Ungirthed to get martingale off, refastened both girths, removed Yankee breeching from crupper (no anchor point with martingale off), flung everything into the carriage and got back on. Whistle blew for Cones. Went towards hay wagon with officials who had backs to us, to salute. Who to salute towards ?? Husband asked who was Judge, an arm waved, someone not visible, so he saluted and we entered. Horses are pretty zippy, though going well then we missed a set of cones, got the whistle for E. We definately were not at our best! Going to blame the broken harness part for losing our concentration! It was pretty startling and then having to move fast to fix it. My story and I am sticking to it! Ha ha Headed on back to the trailer, put everything away, went to walk hazards.

Saturday we were ready for Dressage but both horses were quite “up”, so lots of calming walking. Went up and did the test. Hawk would not settle, counterbent, trying to canter. Head Judge talked to us after final salute. Wanted Hawk checked for gait irregularity. We went on to do Cones, but Hawk continued his antics and hit cones by being crooked! There was a Vet already coming for someone else, they could do the check. Vet could not see any lameness in harness or jogging in-hand, but Hawk did react when flexed. Looking back, we figure Alyss hit him with a hoof in her spook. So we were done. No Marathon for us.

It rained overnight, adding much humidity to the heat Sunday. Hazards had longer routes to entertain the spectators. People made route choices I had NEVER considered, saved them a lot of time. With all the hazards in close proximity, it made spectating easy for the visitors, only needing to move little distances to see various people do all the hazards. New log hazard was deemed a big success, lots of options, ramps were easy to use up or down, very visible to watch. And they FLEW thru it!!

We had a good time being there, just disappointed at our performance and laming Hawk. He was slightly visibly lame Sunday, even being poulticed and wrapped. Good thing the Judge caught it, saved hurting him worse because he doesn’t quit, just acts up. Some time off, wrapped, being stalled for quiet (he is NOT happy with that!) and he should be fine.

Met a bunch of new-to-us folks competing They were fun to talk to, lots of laughing around the trailers each evening. We figured it was just “show luck.” Things will be better next time out.

[DiamondJubilee]

I’m so sorry to hear all of that! Glad your guy is ok now (though unhappy with being inside, if only they knew it was for their own good!!).

So tough when you have a rough start with an issue and then try to concentrate to show. I totally know the feeling!

We were supposed to compete there with our pair but our one pony was giving us some issues at home and we wanted to work on it before we brought him back out to a show. We made a really last minute decision to just bring a single. We have been practicing all year as a pair so our poor guy was missing his buddy!

The cones was odd as the judge turned around on the wagon to salute you before you went in. Very odd and I’ve never seen that before so my hubby was a bit confused on that one as well!

We luckily had a good show and ended up winning the Prelim single pony with the Overall best Dressage score and then won the Overall Prelim Championship as well.

Marathon was wet and slick in spots and our pony slipped a few times on the bridges and on the grass so we did change routes as soon as we hit the first hazard as we didn’t want any more slips. He did pretty well but I will be putting hind shoes on him next reset! I thought he would be ok , but his hind end slipped on the first hazard and it was not a sharp turn, but the grass was wet as it was raining…

It was a tough course with lots of hills, especially at the end! What a big hill to climb after doing 10km of marathon. But he did it and recovered really well so we were pleased.

Now off to train and work on both ponies as singles and put them back in the pair at some point to see how they do together (one is working too hard and pulls the other around. He then gets pissy for being held back and crooked so we think more single work will benefit him).

Planning on entering Garden State but as a single again. Hopefully work out some kinks with the pair as hubby much prefers driving a pair than a single.