A checkup and an adventure

Tonight, Barry and I went on a ride to see what is the deal with HaidaGirl, or if in fact she even has a deal. Maybe she was just being a pain in the ass for no reason, that is what I suspected.

The first thing we notice is that she is COVERED from the legs up, in bug bites and hives. Barry tells me that Madison noticed them last nite, but no one mentioned it to me. I do not recall seeing them when I put her in the trailer yesterday morning, but I probably was not paying attention.

This may explain why she acted out of character on our trip. Or not.

In any event, off we went--we rode the back of the farm, over the railroad tracks (which Radar did not like despite having crossed two other sets in recent weeks), to parts of the farm that we have not ridden in years. Man how things change! We went Gatoring back there once this spring, but the visits have been few and far between lately, which is sad as it is really pretty. Now that the crops are out we will go more, I hope.

One thing that was kind of sad to see was how the drought has effected so much. The top photo is normally a pretty big pond. You can see just from the dry area what it used to look like. The bottom picture is not clear, but this is normally a full creek. Not only could Barry ride through it so that the sides are almost over his head, but it is so dry that the footing was solid.


The verdict on HG--undecided. There is nothing wrong with her. She was a little wound up when we started but who would not be after being stalled for three days when you are not used to it. She did not give Barry any grief to speak of, and we got distracted from trying to push her known buttons by exploring all over. One cool thing about her is that she will do ANYTHING--climb steep banks, crawl down them, sink herself in deep mud....she is a brave and bold chic, so we got to see parts of the farm that we have NEVER investigated. One of the downsides to riding there is that the horses are usually pains in the butt about calling to their friends, and it is sometimes difficult to get past a certain point without a fight. HG and Radar were not like that at all- they were more than happy to explore all over and blaze some new trails, which was really fun. I think her boldness rubs off on Radar some. although he is pretty tough on his own, she is in a whole other class, and if he is ever to balk at something, I had him follow her thourgh and he just be bopped along.


By the time we got back, the sun was going down. It was a nice night.