Tenth Lesson

Lots of pictures from this week, I'm not going to post them all here, so see them here instead.

I got to ride Gretsky today. The woman who normally rides him showed up when I was just finishing off, and Anna told her she could ride Domino instead. Today was mostly about getting used to riding a horse other than Kaibab (who was picked up at 1:30 am Monday morning... or does that still count as Sunday night?). Gretsky is very curious about what is going on around him. It's a little hard to keep his attention, as he'll see a couple walking their dog down in the river bed, or Pia in a tree, or someone taking pictures, or a bird, and forget to listen to the person on his back.

Apparently I'm quite lucky, as Gretsky only just got used to Pia climbing trees. Although I guess it was her coming out of the tree that really concerned him (it's raining dogs!). He was wary of dogs and trees, especially in close proximity to each other, for weeks after Pia's first tree climbing adventure. I believe the tree climbing pictured above occurred before Pia got to finish off Anna's coffee (that's right, the dog climbs trees, drinks coffee, and even climbs into buckets to sit in the water when she's hot).

The box from last week was still there, though this week we didn't try to do anything other than walk and trot through it.

Speaking of trot, Gretsky's is a dream compared to Kai. He's actually so smooth at a trot, I was noticing I had to work to keep posting. With Kai, your butt hits the saddle, and he's so bouncy, you're half way up again before you realize it. With Gretsky, I think I could have comfortably sat his trot the whole time. Almost no bounce at all.

No lesson next week, as Anna will be gone. Guess I'll have to find something else to do at 6:30 am on a day off... maybe even *gasp* sleep. :)