Family visit
The biggest part was that I had family to visit for a month and my good friend Rob Waine for ten days. We had such a great time together and did so many fun things I couldn't name them all but highlights were definitely Disney Land, kayaking with dolphins, deep fried oreo's and carpool karaoke!
As much as I love everything about what I do for a living, it's great to do activities I wouldn't normally do and especially to share special times with family and friends and create so many wonderful memories.
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| Chloe - Joshua - Me - Rob |
Wrong Turn Ranch
Angi and Seth have become like family to me and although I'm bringing Arianna back to LA next month, I'm so pleased I will still be working at the ranch a couple of days a week, as life might just be a little boring without the adventures and sketchy young, green or wild horses I've fallen in love with.
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| Cha cha enjoying a rewarding scratch |
It's also such a perfect dynamic because we each bring our own strengths to the table and happily share advice and ideas and use our unique experiences to get the best out of each horse and each other.
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| Working on 'softness' with Hasty |
Arianna
Arianna is going from strength to strength and we are now able to canter (lope) on trail and in the arena. Our first attempts were more like baby bunny hops rather than a proper canter stride but now she seems to have worked it out.
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| Errrr..... that's definitely not cantering! |
All the ground work we've done in the past has paid huge dividends. She is not only strong and balanced in her canter but automatically picks up the correct lead and balanced and fluid in the canter transition. She's going to easily cover the ground cross country one day and yet she is so balanced and naturally pushes up from behind and lifts the shoulder, so I'm hoping the collection will also come fairly easily over time.
We've also had a couple of trail rides. The first was just a walk down the road and back and the second was much more hilly, trotting and cantering up the slopes of the big pasture out the back. Arianna makes some of these steep inclines feel effortless although she does get excited and hot up a little when we head out, but I think she'll calm down once it feels like a more routine activity.
Peroni
Peroni is still growing (slowly) and filling out well. There has been very high temperatures and thunderstorms recently in France and so Chloe has had to adapt their daily routine accordingly, however they live out as much as possible and by the looks of it, the steep hills in his pasture are maturing some strong butt muscles!
I'm hoping to head back to France early next year and begin riding Peroni!
