Two-Day Streak

Here is how much I like the folks at the round barn, you guys: when they invite me to hack out in company, I say yes.  Even right now when I have had it up to my eyeballs with socialization and would like nothing more than to curl up with a dog and a book and speak to no one ever again.

In other miracles, what had promised to be a weekend of start to finish disgusting rain turned instead into a dry and pleasantly warm Saturday followed by a Sunday of mist.

Yesterday we hacked over the mountain and into, quite possibly, Narnia.  The temperature dropped ten degrees as we reached bottom on the far side and while we never did find the lamppost, trotting along the dirt road on good horses in six inches of near-perfect snow was about as magical as it gets.

Also we jumped a pair of fallen logs and when Tucker landed bucking after the second, I am pretty sure some benevolent otherworldly force must have counteracted physics and gravity in keeping me on top...!

My first wacky demo endurance saddle was waiting when I got home from the barn, so today's project was putting it on top of the horse and then me on top of the saddle and seeing what we thought.  This is a treeless saddle, and not one of the common endurance models, but I figured that if I am going to ask a pro fitter for her opinion I might as well try what she recommends.

First impression: weeeeeeeeeeeeird.  Feels more bareback-pad-y than I'd hoped, but is better-balanced than the last (and only other) treeless saddle than I've ever sat in.  Stability was fine, albeit we only rode figures in the indoor which is not exactly a severe test.  I have no idea how people use these saddles on those wide table-topped horses; this made Tucker feel wide -- not uncomfortably so, but the Tuckmeister is not a broad-backed creature, so I can only imagine.  Also, getting a girth on the first billet holes while all that foam is uncompressed without said girth being way too long to do its job once the rider is untopped is maybe an acquired skill?

Speaking of all that foam, here is something that I didn't think through: the implications of adding significant padding to a horse whose ribcage narrows sharply halfway down his sides.  Getting my leg on was.  Uh.  Interesting?

But Tucker went awfully well, which was cool, and as I got the hang of it, I was happier than expected with how the saddle let me sit and ride.  I'll keep playing with it and we'll see.  (The Skito pad that came with it is super-sexy, though.  I am unreservedly in love.)

Finished up at the same time as barnmate, so I pulled the saddle off and we headed out into the mist along -- more magic! -- a relatively newly-cleared trail that I've had a little trouble following at one end but that was somehow perfectly clear in the snow.

I drove into the rain going home.

Current plan is a little more ringwork tomorrow evening and then Tuesday is a half-day at work, so I will be at the barn with light enough to try the demo saddle out on trail.  And every day, a little more light than the day before.  But I am betting there are a few more moonlight snow rides ahead of us yet.