Hey Babe!
Had yet another storm come through just before bedtime last night, so dust will definitely not be a problem here at Otter Creek for awhile! It was a beautiful morning, though, and it seemed like it was going to clear up, though it actually stayed cloudy most of the day. I only took one of the light fishing shirts with me on my ride, and was wishing I had worn my denim Red Rock Ride jacket instead! Anyway, after spending the morning doing some computer work, trying to work out my routes for the next month and straightening out my health insurance, I finally saddled up Flash and headed out around 12:30. I had planned a ride and downloaded it onto my GPS, which I have to keep comparing to the Avenza map just to make sense out of it, since there are SO many trails out here that just keep crisscrossing each other, but eventually had to abandon it and reconfigure my route on the fly. That's because I had planned on taking Erie Canal trail down to Blueberry trail, and the map seemed to indicate a bridge, but in fact, there was no bridge, though there were pylons for a bridge that was long gone. Considering all the rain, you can imagine that the "creek" was not a raging river, dark and deep, and there was no way I was going to attempt to ford it! I may be brave, but I'm not stupid! I remember fording this stream another time, and it was clear as a bell, you could see every rock, but not today! So we had to turn back and invent another route, which is really made so much easier with this Avenza program, and thanks to the Geotagged map I was able to download from the DEC website. They had some terrible storms come through about a week ago, and there were a lot of trees down, which I photographed and pin-dropped so I can send it on to the DEC. Only a couple of trails were a problem, most of them were great. The route was a bit loop that included Streamside, which was gorgeous, and Ridgetop, Erie Canal, Icicle and a whole bunch more. It ended up being close to fourteen miles, which was almost as long as my original plan anyway, so it was all good! Other than feeling a bit chilled, we had a wonderful ride. Even with all the rain, there wasn't too much mud, the sand here drains quickly enough, at there's no dust or bugs at the moment! I've always considered Otter Creek one of the best horse camps and trail systems in the country, and this visit has reinforced that opinion. There are still a lot of trails out there I haven't ridden on yet, though this is the third time I've been here! Thoroughly enjoyable ride, and Flash seemed to enjoy the challenge, too! Got back around 4:00, hooked up my hose and rinsed him off, filled up my trailer tank as well as my neighbors, then settled down for the evening. Another fantastic day in the life! The only spoiler was coming home and finding Lola had crawled up into my bedroom (I didn't fully puppy-proof before I left, and she took advantage!), so I'm expecting I'll find sand in my sheets tonight. Anyway, time to go. Good night, my love!
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