In which Donk has a bit of a moment
This evening I thought it would be nice to take Zorro out for a little ride through the newly fixed-up valley trail and on the path around the fields on the other side. We thought it would be nice for sleepsy_mouse to come along with the Donk as well - it's much the same route we went around at the weekend, a quick circuit around the field and back should be doable before sundown so we tacked up briskly and off we went.
The valley was a lot easier with two horses- Zorro was quite happy to follow Donk past the scary new beech posts and up the scarily level and easy ( if very steep ) trail on the other side. We set out around the field with Zorro mostly managing to match Donk's very forward walk along the trail. Then suddenly Donk decided it was time to go home. He span and set out to leave. sleepsy_mouse put him on a tight circle and Zorro and I put ourselves in the way, at which he crashed into us. We managed to get in the way several times before he pushed past us ( nearly dropping us off the edge of the path that drops away into the steep valley ) still spinning tightly and came to a stop. sleepsy_mouse decided this was a wise time to hop off and lead him for a while and I thought we might as well go on as we were close to half way around and I didn't want to create the idea that this point was somewhere that a horse could decide to go home. Zorro and I lead on but when we reached the point where Donk had his morale failure Zorro decided he couldn't go forward towards the whatever-it-was that had bothered Donk and started backing up, straight into sleepsy_mouse and Donk. Normally when he does that I just push on with my mecate, knowing there's a chance he'll go forward flat out, but this time I was reluctant because sometimes he goes backwards faster before he goes forward and if we did vanish off into the distance that probably wouldn't be good for Donk and sleepsy_mouse. As it was, neither was backing into them because she's a bit nervous of Zorro's back end at the best of times ( she's seen what it did to me this time last year ) and having him squashing her into a big, dense, anxious warmblood was not a confidence building exercise.
That's a real shame because aside from that Zorro was a proper hero horse what with blocking Donk and then going ahead for the rest of the trip ( we had to stop a few times to stare sceptically at the forest but we got around ) he did a really good job and if we'd managed not to terrify sleepsy_mouse that would have made him pretty much perfect cob. I'm still pretty proud of him to be honest, he's certainly the perfectest cob I ever rode.
The valley was a lot easier with two horses- Zorro was quite happy to follow Donk past the scary new beech posts and up the scarily level and easy ( if very steep ) trail on the other side. We set out around the field with Zorro mostly managing to match Donk's very forward walk along the trail. Then suddenly Donk decided it was time to go home. He span and set out to leave. sleepsy_mouse put him on a tight circle and Zorro and I put ourselves in the way, at which he crashed into us. We managed to get in the way several times before he pushed past us ( nearly dropping us off the edge of the path that drops away into the steep valley ) still spinning tightly and came to a stop. sleepsy_mouse decided this was a wise time to hop off and lead him for a while and I thought we might as well go on as we were close to half way around and I didn't want to create the idea that this point was somewhere that a horse could decide to go home. Zorro and I lead on but when we reached the point where Donk had his morale failure Zorro decided he couldn't go forward towards the whatever-it-was that had bothered Donk and started backing up, straight into sleepsy_mouse and Donk. Normally when he does that I just push on with my mecate, knowing there's a chance he'll go forward flat out, but this time I was reluctant because sometimes he goes backwards faster before he goes forward and if we did vanish off into the distance that probably wouldn't be good for Donk and sleepsy_mouse. As it was, neither was backing into them because she's a bit nervous of Zorro's back end at the best of times ( she's seen what it did to me this time last year ) and having him squashing her into a big, dense, anxious warmblood was not a confidence building exercise.
That's a real shame because aside from that Zorro was a proper hero horse what with blocking Donk and then going ahead for the rest of the trip ( we had to stop a few times to stare sceptically at the forest but we got around ) he did a really good job and if we'd managed not to terrify sleepsy_mouse that would have made him pretty much perfect cob. I'm still pretty proud of him to be honest, he's certainly the perfectest cob I ever rode.