A ride the other day, like in March

1 mile of ride! Woot

Testing out my tail lights.  I'm gonna want to make a strap that will go from saddle to the neoprene wrap for security. I've got plenty of paracord to braid something useful.

Selfie shadow

I lunged and then hopped on for a toodle around the arena to see where Gwyn's head was. My plan for today was ambitious and I did not need a horse that wasn't paying attention underneath me. As you can see, she was absolutely wild. Totally unmanageable.

So I hopped off, and lugged my mounting block (a step ladder) out of the pasture and got back on her. Gwyn was curious to say the least. Saffron was displeased we were leaving her behind.

I wanted to see how she'd do by the road, since some of the riding I want to do is across the street and potentially a bit of it will be along the road after riding the polly ann trail. Gwyn did not like the cars. It's a pretty fast road with minimal shoulder, so I'm not surprised. I have an alternative plan for the polly ann trail plan, but I think crossing the road should be achievable.

Happy me! The weather was glorious.

We rode in the drainage ditch along the front of our property and back down the driveway and around the house.

Through the backyard, leaving hoofprints in the wet ground.

And then up the driveway to the neighbor's house and into the fields behind them!  These are lots that are owned by people for houses but they can't get electricity or water back here so they can't build yet. I have permission from one owner so far and I'm still trying to get a hold of the other owners. Barring that, I'm just going to stick to the field edges. 

It'll be a nice perimeter to ride and get long slow distance done on.

Exploration

It's been cold and I've been battling mystery cough illness and some exhaustion. It makes riding difficult. I've ended up taking naps just to get through the day.

Today, I had enough energy to get out of the house while there was still daylight, with Hazel bundled up on my back, to go out and clean the barn. The manure has been building up from midweek. I keep the stalls clean but the runs start to accumulate more than I can get picked in the dark after work or once the poops have frozen to the ground.  Thanks to some freezing rain the other day, the parts of the runs that aren't covered are pretty much an ice skating rink and Gwyn and Saffron aren't going out on it at all. I don't blame them.

Anyway, after getting three wheelbarrow loads of manure out of the runs and getting the stalls nice and clean (note to self, go get more shavings...) I put the dinner hay in the stalls, threw a halter on Gwyn and took her for a walk.

I've gotten permission from our rear kitty corner neighbors to use their property to access the fields behind them. I wanted to see what that access looked like before riding up there, and also familiarize Gwyn to the walk up AND see how Saffron would behave if we just walked away.

Everything went well!  Saffron called a few times, but Gwyn was focused on me for the most part and behaved.  The path to the fields is NOT riding accessible, just on foot, until I can cut back some branches. So my plan with that is to bring up some cookies I made and ask if I can clip them back in that one spot. Yay bribes!

I've also been contacting the landowners of the fields back there to get permission to ride and so far I'm a go!  This is really going to make getting some good conditioning rides much easier to get without the fuss and time committment of trailering out. I'm very excited! It also opens up the possibility of accessing the Polly Ann Trail from home without dangerous road riding.

I found Hunt Country

I picked the kids up from daycare and decided to go find where the Hunt Pace will meet next month (on my birthday!)  If things are close I like finding them before driving there with a horse trailer, just so I have an idea of what to expect with the roads and distance.

We were in for a treat.

Water complex with bank jumps.

Coop jump

The intersection listed on the Hunt Pace. I'm betting we park in this hay field.

Perfect pastures. I'm envious.

Only an hour from Detroit, folks, 30 minutes from the mess of Flint.  And like 10 minutes from my house, and it takes that long because it's all dirt road and you have to go slow to avoid ridiculous washouts and potholes.  

I wonder if they'll let me trailer over there to ride...?


And now I feel a huge desire to really shape up my pastures because my little farm is all raggly scraggly compared to those places and I'm kind of embarrased.

Places to Ride an hour or less away

I'm starting to try and figure out where I can trailer to for some trail access. There's a decent amount of stuff in the area that's horse friendly, it's just me needing to know where I can go and where parking is that's holding me up.

This all was inspired by me looking for a place for Kaylee and I to go swimming that wasn't over 30 minutes away (Stony Creek). We ended up going to Metamora-Hadley Recreation area that's 10 miles away and was perfect, but that's another story.

Check it, any place that is listed as a recreation area is under the umbrella of the DNR and is a state park. It costs $11 annually for access to these parks. FUCK YES.

Anyway, places so far that I've found are:

Polly-Ann Trail
Technically if I trusted Gwyn on the road AND our road wasn't super speedy, I could ride to this trail from our house. We're less than 2 miles from an access point where it crosses a road. Polly-Ann is open to riders, but you're restricted to walking (though I can't find this verbage now on their websites...). From what I've seen of the points of access near me, no one uses the damn thing to even know if I might go faster than a walk. After my last debacle of trying to walk her along a road that had a high speed limit I'm not really interested in trying again until her brain gets rooted a bit more deeply. Especially with minimal shoulder.
What I really want is to make friends with the people who live right by the trail and ask if I can park at their place to ride on the trail. That would be ideal.

I did more research. There is trailer friendly parking down Rochester Rd in Leonard. Just nothing directly off Rochester Rd where it crosses, which is where I've been looking. Doh. Leonard is 10 minutes away. I'll explore tomorrow.

http://www.destinationoakland.com/parksandtrails/trailsoakroutes/Documents/PATMap2013FINAL.pdf
http://pollyanntraillapeer.org/
http://www.pollyanntrailway.org/

The Lapeer PAT group is doing a fall colors tour the day after my birthday in October! I'm SO ATTENDING!!!! Tentative info about the ride leads me to believe I might be able to park at General Squier Park, which is in Dryden itself. Dude. DUDE.  4 miles away. FUCK YEAH.

Pontiac Lake Recreation Area
About an hour away, this place has the most trail mileage available nearby topping out at 17 miles. It also looks as though they have a good loop for big mileage from looking at their map. There's a campground for horse camping and they have a rental stable which might be bad since I've heard some things about avoiding riding when the renters are out and about.

http://www.michigandnr.com/Publications/PDFS/RecreationCamping/pontiac_lake_map.pdf

Addison Oaks County Park
This thing is just down the road. Not riding down the road, but...  20 minutes away. I had no idea it was there until today. (I'm serious).   There's not a lot of mileage, but there's a few separate loops of equestrian trail that I could do. And it's SO CLOSE!! Just under 10 miles of trail, which is pretty good, all things considered!

I might take Kaylee here tomorrow and go biking just so I can scout it all out and figure out parking and get a pass. Since this is a county park it has a different pass system. I wish there was an annual all parks pass for all the counties.
http://www.destinationoakland.com/parksandtrails/mapspublications/Documents/May%202013%20addison%20trail%20map.pdf
http://www.destinationoakland.com/parksandtrails/mapspublications/PublishingImages/AO%20East%20Trail%20map_2012.pdf
http://www.destinationoakland.com/parksandtrails/mapspublications/Documents/addison-connector-trail.pdf

Ortonville Recreation Area
At 25 minutes away (about 20 miles) is this lovely place with just less than 9 miles of trails, but from the look of the map, we'd be able to ride for a LOT longer just by doing mini loops. They also have an equestrian campground. I like that the equestrian trails are very much separate from the main part of the park so there's not really a multi-use conflict.

http://www.michigandnr.com/Publications/PDFS/RecreationCamping/ortonville_map.pdf

Addison Township Watershed Preserve
At 6 minutes away this is the next closest after Polly-Ann. I found it when Kaylee wanted to go hiking but 7 Ponds Nature Center was closed. I had remembered seeing this just down Rochester Rd, barely over the county line into Oakland County. The board at the front had no information about use but upon hitting the trail I saw a sign that said "Clean up your manure!"   Ah HAH!  Horses are allowed!

There's not a lot of trail here, but at 6 minutes away it's hard to beat, especially since there's no fee for use. Maybe 2 miles of trail but some nice hills and all woody with some lake views. And decent parking to turn a horse trailer around.

An article on riding in the park in the winter!
http://www.theoaklandpress.com/lifestyle/20140126/riding-with-a-mounted-trail-patrol-at-addison-watershed-preserve
http://www.twp.addison.mi.us/Portals/3/PDF/Township%20Parks.pdf

Elba Equestrian Complex
Free to day use riders, also has camping available. It's also 25 minutes away. I can't get details on length of trails, but it's got over 1000 acres of trails available. I'll need to investigate further before bringing Gwyn.

http://www.geneseecountyparks.org/images/contentImages/file/2015%20Elba%20Map%20and%20Rules.pdf