Day off and a hack day

February 22, 2024

Lyric got yesterday off as she's been working hard. And today we just went on a long hack. I figured she deserved a lighter ride. We met up with Sharon and Baylor this morning and headed out.

We tried to hit the hills today and since Baylor doesn't mind creek crossings, we hit all the creeks too! Lyric was power walking today so we led most of the ride. There was some times where Baylor led but mostly, he was content to stay behind as she was marching. We headed out to the lake and then crossed the dam. The geese were at the waters edge and went into the lake right as we went by. Lyric stared and snorted a tiny bit but was pretty brave and kept marching. So then we turned right and went to the creek. I wasn't sure if she was going to cross it or not, but I gave her the chance. She marched up to it... stopped just long enough to poop, and then calmly walked through it. GOOD GIRL! Baylor followed us and then we headed on down the trail. We got to the second creek crossing and she stopped and tried to turn back. Okay... that's fine. We haven't done this creek as many times as the other one. I asked Sharon to go first and Baylor was silly and did a circle around us before he headed down. As soon as he started down the hill to it, Lyric was close behind. He got one foot in and then wanted to stop and drink. Lyric was impatient and just pushed past him and crossed it. We were laughing... "You go first... this is scary... wait.. you're doing it wrong.... boys are stupid... I'm going without you". Ha ha. So then we marched along and did some of the hills on the perimeter of the property. That led us to the little creek, which she just marched right through! Then we hit the halfshire field and did a little trot.

I opted to go through the schoolhouse path because that had more hills and so far, we had done a few but not a ton. Of course as soon as we got into the woods and headed down the first hill we heard the kids at recess. Oh... yeah, I forgot about school. Lyric was like "NOPE" and tried to stop. I let her stop but then she was trying to turn... then she froze and stared. Then her little heart started to beat faster and faster. Sharon was able to get Baylor ahead of us and get him moving so eventually Lyric followed. But she was nervous! We managed to get mostly past them and start back up the hill and then Baylor spooked at something and spun. I thought for a second that he was going to bolt, but luckily Lyric had stopped and stepped back and sideways a bit, so when he started to spin and run, he basically ran into her butt. Which was in the woods now, so... he had to stop. Luckily she didn't kick or panic and he didn't keep panicking, so we were able to regroup and carry on. Lyric went ahead then because she was now leaving the scary kids behind so she was motoring. She was jigging a little bit but not too terribly bad. Eventually she took a breath and by the time we got past the green lake/human lake and back to the pastures behind ashland, she was pretty chill again. We finished the ride on the buckle and both ponies were back to their normal selves.