Settling In at the New Location

So, when I toured CF I suspected Phantom would have issues with one end of the arena. It has (gasp!) large open doors with views outside and (eek!) bleachers and (argh!) arena access doors. Sure enough. He doesn't want to have anything to do with the "open end" of the arena. I've only ridden him twice in the arena thus far, and he settled down to work at the "far end" or "closed end" of the arena.

It will be a process of gradually expanding his comfort zone so we can work the entire arena.

Today Genevieve and I rode our guys outside on the galloping track. Zorro and Phantom did pretty well during our first circuit. There are a mess of jumps and a small dressage court set up on the grass in the center of the track [ :-) ]. And a couple of jumps partially on the track (barrels and a cool half-round made from wood slats). Phantom ogled the adjacent nursery with (oh no!) sheets of black weed barrier with flapping edges, he skirted around the barrels and half-round, and eyed the jump grids and courses.

After completing the circuit we reversed direction and all went well until we were halfway around near the blackberries. Both horses suddenly just about jumped out of their shoes and would not go anywhere near the blackberries. We finally realized the farmer who had bailed his hay on the adjacent property was driving his tractor next to the wall of berries. So we gave our sissy boys the benefit of the doubt and went back the way we came.

Until we encountered another tractor on a different neighbor's property. I jumped off Phantom before he got too silly. Zorro continued on without a problem. Without warning Zorro did a Fred Astaire tap dance and, like Ginger, I was going backward -- with a black equine butt coming at me. It seems a "killer" log jump had leapt out from its grassy hiding place to flash its fangs at Zorro.

At this point Genevieve jumped off to make Zorro approach the log. He promptly snatched a bite of grass. *sigh* So we walked our horses back to the barn. This time, in addition to the sheets of black weed barrier, one of the nursery workers was (ack!) watering plants in one of the hot houses. And then (hubba, hubba!) the mares came galloping up to the fence to check out the guys.

We couldn't help but laugh at the frazzled brains of our horses. Man, these boys need to get out more. As I told Gen, Phantom must be a liberal arts major because he's definitely not an aggie!

Settling in at CF will definitely be an adventure. Talk about a goober boy!