Mendon Trail Ride

Took advantage of 60* day in January to load up and go to Mendon for a solo trail ride. He didn't want to get into the trailer at first, but once I got the long whip out and moved his haunches around with it he got on. Took all of three minutes total, if that. Once at the park, he hung out quietly at the trailer eating from his hay bag and stood like a statue while I got on.

there was, of course, still side eye to be had

Started off across the road in the woods. Wasn't planning on a long ride since there was a limited window to get on and get back before it started raining. He was super spooky and stupid about every singe person we ran into on the trail, even though to a person everyone had great trail manners--doggos with perfect recall (which never happens here) and runners taking a break to step aside on narrow trails. He finally settled down when we passed a couple with a tiny child strapped to the guy's back. Dopie loves children because they without fail shovel candy into his face, so despite thinking he was going to be extra spooky about the double headed person, that was what calmed him down.

Once past them we got to do some trotting. Came back down to a walk every time we passed a dog so we didn't get them excited about running prey, and he quickly learned the program of: trot, see dog, walk, pass dog, pick the trot back up--all on his own.

the woods were surprisingly dry for how much rain we've gotten

Out of the woods, we crossed the road again and immediately saw another horse come into the field we'd just entered. Turns out it was Farrier! Opie was greatly relieved he got to join up with a horse he'd never met in his life his soulmate. We didn't do any solo trail rides at the park last year because BM was able to go with us so often. While it was good for Dopie to get out and about on his own, and he was being a good boy about it, he was much happier with a friend.

Farrier doubled back to go to the boat launch with us which unfortunately had just enough ice on it that neither pony was able to play in the water much to their mutual disappointment. We started to keep going in the opposite direction of the trailers, but the skies finally opened up and started raining on us. Dopie picked up a floppy reined trot while Farrier's 20yo started porpoising about. That's hands down my favorite thing about this horse on trail rides. He never, ever feeds off of someone else's stupidity. He's capable of getting stupid himself, but a friend's antics don't faze him.

While Farrier's horse avoided any large puddles on the way back, Dopie kept stopping and trying to play in them because he gets so sad when he can't do swimmies. His desire to keep up with his newfound bestie prohibited him from getting a full splash party on though.

Of course the sky was clear over the trailers by the time we got back, but we called it quits anyway. It was getting close to the predicted time of the heavy rain and I still had to drive back to the barn. Farrier and I let the horses graze for a bit while we talked new places to go trail riding this summer s hopefully between the two of us and BM we get in some fun adventures this year.