Sunday, February 20, 2011

Backyard riding

Jess and her friend went out riding in the backyard today. It was a bit muddy but they were just messing around. I happened to be filming when brownie spooked and gave Jessie a little scare. You can see on the video he was showing us his usual charming personality afterward! "What I didn't spook, I wasn't scared at all!"

Thursday, February 17, 2011

Kids, Horses, and Chickens oh my!

Yes my kids are obsessed with chickens. Here is the latest thing they have decided to subject them too. Zach started it so of course Jess had to do it too.

I am so proud of Dewey!

zach and chicken

zach chicken two

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j chicken f

Jess chicken

j chicken final
Dewey is giving me the "Do I really have to put up with this?" Look.



Bit-less Brownie...........NOT!

Brownie has been doing so well lately, he has been in an "Indian hackamore" and seemed to enjoy being bit-less. Well today he blew it! We were riding in the neighborhood, Zach on Tango, Jess on Brownie and I was on Dewey. We got about a mile away when Brownie acted up so bad, pulling Jess around and just being Brownie on his worst day. I of course was yelling at Jess, "Use your loud voice." "Pull to one side, shorten up the reins!" none of it worked.

This is where I figured that I would get on and show him a thing or two. Boy was I embarrassed when he acted even worse and took off back towards the house! I did manage to turn him but I had had it! Back to the house we went and Brownie was quickly fit into a Tom Thumb.

This was what he thought of it!



Just so that Brownie isn't hogging the blog, here are the other two..

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Look how small Brownie looks 


Zach and tango
See Brownie, Tango is making a nice face


Friday, February 11, 2011

Linear Trail (Banks to Vernonia)

Zach and I both had the day off so we decided to go out on a Mother and Son ride :) Anyone who has pre-teens can understand how excited I was.

We decided to try out the Linear trail. It is a very easy straight forward ride with some nice views. We started about 3 miles into the trail at the Manning trail head and road about 13 miles of the 21 mile trail. I would defiantly ride it again when I am looking for something relaxing.

Those who are acquainted with Dewey will be happy to know that he calmed down after about 8 miles and walked at a normal speed. I am hoping a bunch more miles under his feet will teach him not to use all his energy at the start of the ride.

Zach said this was Oregon in one picture

Some new friends coming to check us out





 For all the train buffs out there it goes right by the Buxton trestle.  Here is some history about it.

http://www.brian894x4.com/UnitedRailway_OregonAmerican.html








I would have loved to ride on the trestle but it is off limits to horses 


Thursday, February 10, 2011

A picture is worth 1000 words

stubs Zach on dewey
Zach's first ride on Dewey

Zach liked Dewey before but after he rode him last night, he loves Dewey!

Tuesday, February 8, 2011

West Valley Trail

The West Valley Chapter of OET has been trying to make a trail system near Mac. Rachel and I decided to check it out. Let me say first of all it is not ready to ride unless you are very adventurous.

Looking ahead on the "trail"

Here are some examples of the condition of the trail at this point. Some areas are OK but others you can't even tell there is a trail if we didn't see the flags.








The trail at this point is very steep and has a creek crossing. These pictures were trying to show how steep some parts of it were. Rachel and I are two of the most adventurous riders I know and even we got off and walked our horses a couple of times.





Two very tired horses after 2 hours of trail blazing! I was so proud of them both. We had several hairy situations but Brownie and Tango handled it all.






Introducing Dewey

I have to apologize I have not been in the mood to update my blog since we lost Drover. He was Zach's and it was just hard for me to let him go so soon. Because he was Zach's the decision was made to keep our eye out for a new horse to replace him.

So far we have been really lucky, all our horses have fit in great and I was a little nervous about starting over again. Since we are looking at the cheaper side of the market we have had our share of misleading adds and interesting trail rides. I should say Rachel has had her share of interesting trial rides :) Rachel has been very kind to try all the horses first since she is the most experienced.

Dewey was found on craigslist. His ad had the worst blurry picture and he didn't seem like a great prospect but since he was a Tennessee walker we thought it might be fun to go take a look anyway. After we saw him Rachel and I both thought he was meant to be ours. He is a little over 16 hands and nice and sturdy. Since he hadn't been ridden for several months he was a bit excited but we could both see a diamond in the rough and we quickly decided to bring him home for Zach.

Rachel and Dewey at Forest Park



Zach

Many of you who read the blog know I have a son but he doesn't appear here very much. He is a 12 yo camera shy boy. I did get him to come out with Rachel and I to forest park the other day. He loved it! It was his first trail ride so he road Rachel's horse Tango.

Tango is confused, is his colour red, blue, pink???

Forest Park is one of our go to places. It is about 45 mins away and can be ridden almost any time of the year. There are easy forest roads or more difficult single track trails. It is heavily used by bikers and hikers so make sure your horse is comfortable with other traffic.