Dressage Horse's Day Off

Sunday afternoon/night we got a lot of rain here in Western PA. A lot of rain with a lot of lightning. Since Sunday, we've had another day of a lot of rain. Basically, it's pretty darn wet over here.

I went out Tuesday afternoon to ride anywhere that was dry enough to ride on... I doubted the outdoor would be dry enough to not be slick. I was going to investigate it... but I never got that far!

Dressage Horse's Day Off: Ford a pond like it's Oregon Trail!

There's a pond on the property that's usually small and we barely notice it.

It overflowed just a little. The cat tails mark the normal border of the pond. Where Mikey and I are walking is usually grass.

The pond expanded into one of the fields, and made for nice deep water on top of good solid footing. Trainer took all her babies through it this week as water jump practice.

These pictures are courtesy of Trainer's 8 yr old step son using my phone. There were many pictures that come out with fingers, but he did a good job!

Walking through hock/knee deep water. It's apparently belly deep closer to the cat tails, but I don't remember the lay of the land under the water well enough to go more than 5-10 feet from the fenceline.

Cantering through the pond in a less deep section. 

Splash!

Back out in his field, clean and almost dry.

I had a blast and Mikey seemed to have fun. Every time he'd go through I'd give him a pat and "Good boy!" I only rode for about 10 min since going through deep water has to be tough. By the time we got back to the barn, Mikey was obnoxious because he'd gotten so much praise and then horse cookies. Oh well, he's earned it!