Today we had to drive to Vanderbilt in Nashville to discuss with the surgeon what Hubby’s options are for a new dialysis access site. The graft on his right arm that we had been using clogged up just before we left on our trip, and they had to put in an emergency catheter in his lower neck which we’ve been using to dialyze all last month. Now it looks like another graft in his right arm, or if we’re lucky, a fistula, which will make access a lot easier for me. Anyway, when we got back, the rain was heading our way in a hurry, so I put Flash in the paddock with Apollo and watched them interact. Not surprisingly, Apollo tried to bit Flash’s rump a few times, just to show him who’s boss, but they settled down a bit after I stood between them at dinner time. I’m sure things will thaw in a bit, Apollo’s just a little territorial, especially since we had so much quality time together in the last month. Just have to keep an eye on them!
Archives for 2018
Thursday, May 3, 2018 – Hubby Gets His New Horse!!
Well, after spending more than a week searching various sites on the internet, the same horse came popping up, a Paso Fino gelding named Smokie. At first, he showed up on craigslist by a woman about two hours east of us. Then I learned that he was coming from a place about an hour east of us, on consignment. A little bit of research and I was able to find an older ad on another website for the same horse, and even though the ad expired, the site manager was able to point me toward the contact information for the same folks on a different ad entirely. Anyway, make a long story short, we headed out this morning, first to a quick doctor's appointment to finally check on Hubby's cataract surgery, and then off to Smokie's farm, where we met his owners, Joe and Connie, and spent some time getting to know the horse. They had said in their ad that Smokie was "about 15 hands", larger than most Pasoes that I know of, but he was actually much smaller, closer to 14.2, which should be perfect for Hubby. He's white with black flecks, not actually dappled, but flecked, and not actually grey, really. It was clear after working with him in the paddock for a while that Smokie had forgotten how to listen to people. He was very disrespectful, crowding my space all the time, though he was very friendly in the way he did it. It took time to get him to just run around in a circle on a lead, he kept trying to face me all the time. Eventually, he got the idea, and it became clear that he was an intelligent animal, he just hadn't had to use the thinking side of his brain for a LONG time. It looks like his gait will be nice and smooth, and even his canter seemed gentle, so in the end, we paid the required price, got him loaded into the trailer (which was accomplished rather easily, he only hesitated for a few moments, then stepped right up,) we got the paperwork on him, and off we went! The sellers agreed to let us have two weeks to make sure he was fit and to see if he gets along well enough with Apollo, so I'll be taking him in for a vet check as soon as I can. When we got back, I started to do some research on him. His registered name is Coloso's Relampago. Coloso is for his sire, Ponderosa Coloso, who apparently was a Grand National Champion in the Paso Fino circuit! Relampago is Spanish for flash of lightninng. On his old Coggins, his previous owner had called him Ghost. We decided we didn't really like Smokie (because he really isn't grey!), and Ghost didn't do anything for us either, so we took a few hours seesawing between Lightning and Flash. In the end, we decided on Flash, because he has a very showy gait that could be described as flashy, and of course, for flash of lightning. It just described him better, we thought. When we got him home, I put up a highline just outside the paddock fence so that he and Apollo could look at each other for a while. There's rain forecast for tomorrow night, so I'm hoping to put them tomorrow evening so that Flash has some shelter in the run-in shed once the rain starts. I hope he and Apollo get along okay! I'm sure it will be an adjustment for him, but he's just going to have to get used to it! Fingers crossed!
Wednesday, May 2, 2018 – Dottie Rehoming Day
Same as yesterday, with the notable addition of finding Dottie a new home. After long and hard thought it had become clear that Dottie is just too much for us. She has chewed up so many things, and I spend so much of my time trying to prevent that, chasing after her when she runs off to the neighbors to chase their chickens (or off to the ranger's station in Wrangler's campground), and just generally trying to keep her in line, I've found myself wasting a lot of valuable time on her, without having anywhere near enough time to actually train her. We had to keep her in a kennel in the bathroom in the trailer, and there really isn't any room in there, but if we let her out, she would inevitably get in trouble and I'd be yelling at her all the time. So, I put an ad on craigslist to re-home her, and within 24 hours, I had a response from a disabled veteran who was looking to replace his service dog. He had spent eight years with the 8th airborne, served in Afghanistan, and wanted a constant companion, which is exactly what Dottie needs! So with some reluctance, but assured that she was going to a better home, to people who would spend a lot of time with her, she moved on with her life, leaving us to move on with ours. Bye Dottie, we'll miss you, but with us, you were the Devil Dog. I trust you'll be a little Angel in your new home!
Tuesday, May 1, 2018 – Started Work on Trailer
Now that we’ve had a month to experience what life is like in our LQ horse trailer, we know what changes need to be made, how we need to reorganize, and finally, now that Hubby is feeling better, to do some touchup painting, cleaning and organizing. He started the day by doing some sanding on the few small rust spots that were on the front end and putting naval jelly in other areas for the same reason. Very glad to be finally seeing Hubby do a little work! He’s glad, too, and even though he gets tired after 3 or 4 hours, that’s A LOT more than what he’s been capable of in recent months! I spent the day doing the usual mundane things, laundry, computer work, etc.
Monday, April 30, 2018 – Travel Home and Acupuncture Day
Packed up early and headed out in plenty of time to get to Hubby’s acupuncture appointment in Murfreesboro in the afternoon. His only real health problem now, other than being on dialysis, has been the pain in his lower back. He’s convinced that when we solve that, he’ll be fit enough to resume riding. He’s been a little jealous of me going out on my own riding, and hates the feeling of being without a horse. We may solve that problem this week, though :-). The treatment did help, but we’ll have to have a few more to see just how effective it will be in the long run. Finally arrived home, unpacked the minimum, discovered the waterbed in the house was cold (Dottie had chewed partially through the electrical cord weeks ago, so it was only working intermittently), so we ended up spending the night in the trailer anyway. Driveway camping, yay!
Sunday, April 29, 2018 – Final Ride at Wrangler’s Camp
Saturday, April 28, 2017 – 2nd Ride at Wrangler’s Camp, Not Fun!
Okay, so I know that a lot of people really love this place, but frankly, I'm not getting to like it any better the longer I stay here. After a good night sleep and a good dialysis session for Hubby, I was saddled up and ready to go before 1:30. I had a plan mapped out, but once again, I couldn't determine exactly where the trailhead began. The trail map shows approximately where the trailheads start from the camp, but it's so small it doesn't really make sense, and the campground map has arrows pointing to the various trailheads, but don't mark WHICH trails they are the trailheads for! So once again, after struggling with Lola on a leash (they're very strict about leashes in camp, so even riding through requires a leash, which is very ungainly, and to my mind, pretty dangerous, but I understand that many dogs aren't as well trained as Lola, so I get it-don't like it, but get it!), we reached the riding barn, which according to the map, was the beginning of the trailhead I wanted. What it DIDN'T tell you is that the same trail numbers got out about 100 yards apart from each other, but you have to go all the way to the sign before you realize that, and since it had the same numbers on both signs, there's no way of knowing you're taking the wrong trailhead! So I once again headed down the trail in the wrong direction. Which is fine, I decided to take the trail backward. Until I got to the first intersection, where once again, there was confusion. According to the map, to take the loop I wanted to take, backward, I needed to make a left turn on trail 5. So when I reached an intersection that showed trail 5 going both left and right, I went left. Half a mile of struggling up and down muddy hills, passing another unmarked intersection and guessing which way to go there, I quickly realized I was headed straight back into camp! What the heck?? It turns out the first left wasn't really at the loop, I needed to turn right there, then make a left later! By now, Apollo had made it clear he was fed up with all the mud and gravel and was exhibiting distinct signs of exhaustion from yesterday, so I decided enough was enough, I wasn't going to torture us both any more. We headed back down the same boring county lane by the barn, where I hooked up Lola on a leash again, and headed through camp struggling with her. Hubby was surprised to see us back so early (me, too!), but it just wasn't worth the aggravation. Hopefully Apollo will be better rested tomorrow and we can take a longer ride, or I may just decide to take another short ride, hopefully by the lake, which I hope will be more interesting, though I assume it's a popular trail, which means the hundreds of horses traipsing it will likely have left it even muddier than the other trails I've been on. Sigh. I really wanted to like this place more, but it's not happening. I will say that if you have a gaited horse and want to ride 20+ miles a day, this is probably great for you. If you prefer buggies or wagons, there are plenty of trails for that, too. But for MY kind of riding, single track through the wilderness, this is definitely NOT my cup of tea! Got back after less than three miles, though it took us nearly 90 minutes, and spent the afternoon relaxing with Hubby, which was a nice change anyway. I can't WAIT until he has a horse and gets his back fixed so he can come with me! So it was a disappointing day, I'm sorry to say, considering this is the last weekend out for awhile, though we have a couple of horses we're going to try to take a look at next week, hopefully Hubby won't be horse-less for long, and naturally, I'm already starting to plan our next trip, as soon as possible! We love this life, even in a smaller-than-we-like trailer, it's still the way we want to live!!
Friday, April 27, 2018 – First Ride at Wranglers Camp
Got up early to dialyze Hubby, and downloaded my plan for my ride this afternoon. Got everything wrapped up (including having to retrieve Dottie from the kennel at the main gate, she somehow managed to slip out of both her collar and the new harness I bought for her last week!. Such a slippery girl!), and was saddled up by 1:00. I had double-checked at the gate about dogs being on the trail, and evidently that's fine, as long as they're leashed in the campground, so Lola was able to come with us this time. I headed out the trailhead at the foot of our loop, and promptly missed the opening of the trail I had intended to take. By the time I realized the trail I was looking for didn't run into the trail I was on, I was too far along to turn back, so I kept going, revising my ride as I went. Unfortunately, the trail I was on was only a couple of miles long, and before I knew it, I was heading right back into camp. I looked at my GPS and reckoned that if I followed the utility line for a bit, it should take me to the back end of the original trail I had intended to take, and then I could do it in reverse. Turns out there are a LOT of trails out here that aren't on the trail map, and the one on the utility line quickly became a well traveled path that did, indeed, take me to the trail I wanted. I had no more trouble following the trails and map after that, though I'm a little surprised as how few trail markers they've put in, essentially only at the intersections, which are few and far between. No tree markers, not even a paint splotch occasionally to give one reassurance. If you miss a marker at an intersection, there's very little else to go on. I ended up doing a bit over eight miles, and I have to say, even though I love being on the back of my horse, this was a pretty boring ride. There was maybe a quarter of a mile of single track trails, all the rest were at least ATV width, some were full-on forest roads, and there was even a paved road or two that became part of the horse trail. Not my idea of interesting riding. There was a lot of deep mud made worse by the hundreds of horse hooves that had plowed through them, and there was a honeycomb of alternative trails in many places, all trying to avoid the muck. That didn't last very long, and was replaced by some heavily graveled areas (thank goodness I had put my horse boots on before leaving camp!), and a lot of roads that circled around fields. It felt like I was riding on someone's farm. Not my favorite kind of riding. I'm hoping tomorrow's ride will be a bit more interesting, with maybe some more single track, wooded trails, but I'm not holding my breath. After a beer and dinner, remarkably, after not having a cell signal all day, it suddenly popped into one bar of 4G if it was left sitting in a chair outside, enough to start up Netflix and watch a few more Longmires before the battery on my phone crapped out. That was it, bedtime!!
Thursday, April 26, 2018 – Travel Day to Wranglers Campground, Land Between the Lakes
Woke up fairly early again this morning, got everything packed and ready to go in no time, had a quick bowl of cereal to save time, and headed out on the road for another uneventful 4+ hour drive to Wranglers Campground in KY. This was the very first place Hubby and I every camped with our horses back in 2001. We knew absolutely NOTHING back then! We had no idea how to picket from a highline at the time, so we ended up paying extra to put them in the barn, just because we didn't have any of the items necessary to do anything else. What a crazy memory that is! It looks like they've done some work here, expanded a bit, made it quite organized, and there are plenty of trailers already here, as this is one of the most popular places in the Midwest. We got checked in in no time, found our site #16 in Loop E back on the farthest loop out (away from the madding crowd, the way we like it) and got settled in no time! No doubt it will be full here this weekend, the forecast is for beautiful sunny skies every day, with temps tomorrow in the low 70's and upper 60's the rest of the weekend. Looking forward to doing some great riding, hopefully every day! Only downside here is the cell phone signal is really weak, and we're having a hard time getting Netflix, though we did manage to see a bit of Longmire before it crapped out on us. To bed early. Then, reading and catching up on my diary, so it was time well spent!
Wednesday, April 25, 2018 – Ride Day at Lou Yeager
This is one of those places that always make my mind say, "If Only." If only a local group of concerned riders or just regular citizens wanted to make this into a really outstanding horse camp, all they would have to do is... In this case, although the horse camp itself is pleasant enough, with electric on every site, water between every other site, a bathhouse with hot and cold running water and a shower in each bathroom, easy back-in sites, etc., what's missing are trails that are well-marked (which they're not), and horse-friendly (which they're not). The only trail map I could find on the internet was literally hand-drawn. Granted, I forgot to ask the camp host that checked me in for one (nor did he offer), but I got the impression from the hand-drawn map that the camphost was the one who made it, though I could be wrong on that. In any event, after dialyzing Hubby in the morning, I was saddled up and ready to go right after 1:00, with map in hand and my GPS programmed in with a plan that would cover most of the park, as best as I could make it out. Unfortunately, there's a bit sign at the trailhead saying No Dogs on Trail, so I left Lola back at the camp, though I wished she could have come along. Apollo was on his best behavior, happy to be back on the trail, at least in the beginning. We had had some rain yesterday, so I knew the trails would be slick, and they were, but nothing too bad. What made it tough was that, first, there were no trail markings. I mean, occasionally I would see a paint splotch on a tree, but very seldom, and there was nothing on the map indication what "color" trail I was supposed to be on. There was that. Then we began running into some very steep grades, with no real switchbacks, just straight up and down. With all the rain, they were so slick that more than once Apollo was literally sliding down with his legs out front, mule-style. I had to make him go back and forth switch-back style on several occasions, just for safety's sake, but I hated going off the trail, not knowing what dangers might lay in the woods. Next, there were the downed trees. Dozens of them. Many had obviously been down for a long time, and alternate trails had been carved around them, but there was no excuse for someone, park-affiliated or otherwise, not to come and clean up some of these down trees. Some were in quite dangerous places, going up and down on steep slopes, which made it even trickier. Once we got further south, though, the terrain got a bit let slope-y, but the downed trees got even worse, especially through what would have otherwise been a nice pine forest. I got lost so many times it got old in a hurry. My GPS track wasn't even close to my plan, but I continued weaving back and forth trying to cover as many trails as I could. I ran into several people along the way; a group mushroom-hunting, and a fisherman along Shoal Creek, which Apollo and I forded in order to go see the birdhouses, which didn't really turn out to be much. At least on the other side of the stream the trails were a bit more reasonable. In the end, I did manage to cover just over six miles of trails, which, even though it wasn't every trail, it pretty much covered the park other than a few crossovers through the woods. Towards the end of the 3-hour ride, Apollo started getting a little tired and cranky, reluctant to do the hard grades on the north side again, though it was the only way back to camp except the road, which I didn't want to do. He was a good sport in the end, though, and did everything I asked, without any tantrums, just a little hesitation, which I truly understood. He's nowhere near as fit as he used to be, and he was obviously tired, but we managed, yay! Got back to camp just after 4:00, got him cleaned up and put away, and stowed as much gear as I could for our early start out tomorrow. If Only... A saddle club or citizen group would clean up the trails of downed trees, created some alternative routes that included switchbacks instead of straight up and downs, marked the trails better and made a nice map, then this would be a really great place to spend a few days riding. Otherwise, I'd be hard-pressed to want to come back again. After a beer at the picnic table, explaining how Hubby would have HATED this ride, we eventually settled down for the evening.