Thursday, August 6, 2020 – Ride Day, Apollo Much More Energetic!

Hi Darlin',
A great night sleep last night, finally. The air did not seem to go down at all on the other side of the bed, so maybe I've solved that problem. But I must have done something to twist my back getting the mattress in and out, because when I started moving around I was in agony. Breakfast and three ibuprofen later I was starting to feel better. I finished sending links to the videos from yesterday, and was determined to get a ride on Apollo in today, so just after noon I saddled him up and started a circuitous route trying to hit almost every trail we missed on Tuesday. What a beautiful ride! Trail 7 goes through some lovely pine forests, Trail 6 goes along a cattail-strewn marsh, and most of the rest go through truly beautiful woods. Apollo had more get up and go in him than he's had in a LONG time! Whether it's the sandy footing, the alfalfa, or that whatever problem's he's been having has remedied itself, I don't know, but he was walking fast and trotting out fast, with no hesitation and hardly any urging on my part! I might have even been able to get him into a canter if I tried hard enough, but I decided not to push my luck. About 2/3 of the way around I temporarily lost my GPS, the back came off and the rest of it dropped, but I managed to find it after a few minutes. I tied Apollo up to walk on foot, and he whinnied like a mad horse after me. Does he really think that after almost twenty years together I'm just going to abandon him in the woods? Crazy horse! When we got back to camp, he and Flash whinnied at each other the whole way across the campground! After I got him put away, another family of campers showed up at a site two down from me, and they had three horses in a LQ livestock-type trailer, and the one in back was absolutely refusing to come out. I watched for well over half an hour while they tried to coax this horse out. I eventually took pity on them and asked if they needed help, and they wholeheartedly agreed. Apparently this horse is a well-trained barrel horse, but he is usually at the front of the trailer, and just did NOT want to make the tiny turn to get his butt out the door from the last stall. I took my little crop over there and we had a firm discussion, but he was really reticent. Eventually I had one of the ladies pull his lead rope around his back legs to turn him while I grabbed his tail, and we pulled and pulled until he had no choice but to come out. Once he was out, he was fine, you'd never know he was making a fuss, but the young girl who owned him was very distraught, she thought she had done something wrong because the horse wouldn't listen to her. They were all very grateful, which I appreciated, and the rest of the horses came out with no trouble. I went back to my camp and enjoyed an absolutely gorgeous afternoon and evening, had a nice dinner, watched TV, you know, the usual, and now it's time for shower and bed! Good night, darlin'! Love you!

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