What special times have you had with horses, that stand out in your memory?

[Tiffani_B]

Wow you guys, some of these stories brought tears to my eyes!

I have a special memory that I treasure to this day. I was 18 and had just moved out of my parent’s house. It was right before Christmas and I was at the barn doing night check. For some strange reason, I decided to go for a late night trail ride.

My horse at the time was a spunky 4 year old Saddlebred show horse. She wouldn’t flat walk to save her life - she always had somewhere important to be. And I HATED trail riding (it’s still not on my list of favorite activities). So trail riding was never something we did for fun, and certainly not something we did well. But that night, I don’t know why, but I saddled her up and headed out down the road.

The barn leased part of a pasture to a cell phone company. That night, it was snowing lightly, and the red lights from the cell tower turned the falling snow (and everything else!) a lovely shade of pink. It was like riding in a Disney movie! Pink snow falling, pink mounds of cotton on the ground, pink tinged trees, even the clouds of breath coming out of my mare’s nose were pink. And it was absolutely silent. I couldn’t even hear her hooves on the ground. Just… silence… and pink.

My usually hot mare just moseyed along quietly, enjoying it as much as I did. I remember letting her have her head, since I couldn’t see the ground, and just looking around me at the sheer beauty of it all.

The wonder of that night has stayed with me all these years.

[Sparrowette]

I remember another day, when I was a kid… Like I’ve said before, we used to hang around the stables. My sister was in a mounted Girl Scout troupe that rode out of the place, so we tended to get the better horses when we came out.

One afternoon my friend from school came to ride with me, my sister and her friend, who was also in the troupe. I was on a leggy quarter-type and my friend was on a fat little black and white pinto. I’m sure he had some Shetland in there somewhere, but he was about 14 hands, or so. So not small, but not as big as the guy I was on. On the way out, we all got a fly up our noses and decided to go on a short run. There was a spot that you could do that before you hit the trail area and couldn’t do speed any more. I thought my guy and I were going pretty good, and then I looked back at my friend on the pinto.

My Gawd! That fat little guy had a stretch to his stride that would put Secretariat to shame! The image is still in my mind. He was going flat-out with his legs totally horizontal to this body, and keeping up with the bigger horses who were not Really working that hard. He was just FLYING!

I had a lot more respect for that little pinto horse after that! He was a game little guy! Before I saw him, I had no clue that a horse could stretch out that much!!

(I call him fat, but he wasn’t really. He was just built stocky.)

[shadytrake]

My first show after cancer recovery and last show with my gelding. We got Champion and then he moved on to partner with a Jr rider needing a steady eddie 2’-3’ to bring her up the levels.

I had owned him from a yearling (he is 12) and he will always hold a special place in my heart. I follow him on FB through his new owner. They have already started racking up the ribbons. Got their first 1st place at a rated show in November. I was so proud.

[Ponyclubrocks]

About 18 years ago I was doing a late night full moon ride in the dead of winter. The snow was deep and we were just walking along. I stopped at the edge of a fairly large lake and was watching the moon light on the water as it looked kind of funny, and I kept hearing a very high pitched zinging noise that was coming from the lake. I couldn’t trace the origin of the noise but my horse was not the least bit concerned so I didn’t worry about it. It all seemed surreal and magical.

The next day I was discussing the experience with some scientists at work and one of them told me the sound I was hearing was the sound of ice crystals forming on the lake surface. He explained that as sheets of ice were forming they were emitting the zinging sound I heard. The sheets of forming ice also explained why the reflection of the moon seemed distorted to me. I still carry that experience in me in vivid detail…

[Sparrowette]

[QUOTE=Ponyclubrocks;7335090]

The next day I was discussing the experience with some scientists at work and one of them told me the sound I was hearing was the sound of ice crystals forming on the lake surface. He explained that as sheets of ice were forming they were emitting the zinging sound I heard. The sheets of forming ice also explained why the reflection of the moon seemed distorted to me. I still carry that experience in me in vivid detail…[/QUOTE]

That is so neat! I never thought that a lake freezing over would make any noise at all!

[Sparrowette]

Sorry, Double post…

[clanter]

there so many… one of the funniest was the first time we had our Morgan mare entered in a competitive trail ride (NATRC)… she had been one of those “show horses” in her first life.

Her first P&R (pulse and respiration) vet check where all the true NATRC horses were dropping their heads and holding their breath in order to lower their heart beats and respiration counts our show horse though it was a show class line up… she squares up, head up ears forward… everyone just looked at her… what’s she doing? oh she thinks this is class line up and she believes she is the winner

She didn’t win that ride, but she did later

[Bluey]

I had this little cowhorse that was my main working horse at that time.
He was a bit of a pest, always into things, didn’t want to stand around long that he was again pestering someone.

One day a friend’s little boy wanted to learn to rope out of the box, so he got to ride him.
After a couple of runs, I guess the mother thought he was not leaving fast enough, got on and whipped him out of the box and the little horse gave a couple of good bucks and dumped her right then and there.:eek:
He knew exactly what he was doing, had never done that before.:yes:

That was good when it came time to work, he taught himself to untie, walk over to the cattle working snake and push the next calf into the chute for me, just from watching what I was doing.
I only had to let one out and open the tail gate and he would have the next one coming in already, then walked himself back to where I tied him and stood quietly there, until the next calf.

Well, this one time we were gathering steers off the canyons and I had about 22 in a bunch, got to a corner of the pasture, tied the reins around the horn and got off him, walked around and thru the fence, walked back to the gate and opened it.
All that time he alone, on his own, worked the steers to keep them in that corner and not running off and, once the gate open, drove them thru and stood there while I closed the gate and then got back on.
That is just who he was.
It was a pleasure to work with him.

[Sparrowette]

I recently had occasion to look at one of these posts again. Then I went back and re-read the thread.

Nice. These stories still hold up. I enjoyed that.