My first bareback ride on Mia

After taking time off, I am finally finding time to ride again which is really nice.  It started in January when the Arctic blast came in and it wasn't above single digits at night and then SO and I went on a mini "vacation" to volunteer at an auto racing event for 4 days.  We were in charge of equipment and were super duper busy for 2 of the 4 days.  We had a good time and the event really appreciated our help.  It looks like we will be in charge of equipment next year too with how good of a job we did this year, fun!

When we got back on Sunday, the horses were all cared for and happy but also sassy.  I could see all 3 of them running and rearing and bucking in the winter pasture and I suddenly didn't have as much of a desire to ride a horse haha!  With everyone having so much extra energy I figured if I wanted a shot at riding I should probably lunge first.  I grabbed Mia and tried to put her to work and she wanted none of it.  Walk?  Eh, not so much.  Listen to slow down?  Nope.  Halt?  Nada.  With her running around like a fruit loop we were getting nothing accomplished so I finally got her stopped, threw a surcingle and side reins on her and brought her out into the main pasture.  It hasn't had anything through it so the snow was still a good 17-18 inches deep, plenty deep enough to make a frisky mare work!  Off she went and around and around and around she went, every time she sped up I would make her run through deeper snow and when she slowed down I would bring her into the path she had made.  Oh that mare.

She started by refusing to walk, only jig.  I let her go to try to blow off steam and then the jig went from jig to canter with no trot in between.  After about 40 circles she finally started to slow down as she was blowing and was getting sweaty, finally!  She then decided she most definitely did not, under any circumstance, know how to go to the right.  It took a lot of convincing to get her to go to the right, she would immediately spin and face me as soon as she had enough room in the line and would then back up and prevent me from getting beside her to push her forward.  Oh mare!

It took a good 35 minutes before she finally settled down enough that she finally gave consistent work.  I got some good transitions and worked on halting (a lot) before calling it a day.  She was very sweaty and I was too, I was wearing my full snow gear and wasn't prepared for running around in the snow!  We went back to the barn and she got to stand under the cooler for a while before I figured I should walk her around.  Since I really wanted to ride a horse, I figured I had a tired horse that needed cooled out, I should ride the horse!  I threw my helmet on and put Mia's bridle back on and with a little coaxing got her next to a step and hopped on.  Bareback!  We walked around the driveway, said hi to SO, walked through some snow, walked out to the road and back without her having any qualms.  No spooking, no shying, no calling out for the boys, no looking for the boys, it was so nice.  After about 10 minutes we called it a day and she got to sit in her stall for another 10 mins under the cooler before everyone got dinner.

I am really happy she wasn't concerned with me riding bareback and that she didn't do anything stupid.  Luckily I would have had 17+ inches of fluffy snow to land in if she had been stupid but it didn't come to that.  She feels so different than the boys, she is very broad and flat across her back where both boys are more peaked and sloping.  That will definitely require an adjustment on my part, it is like riding a small tabletop!  I made plans to ride on Monday and Tuesday, let's see if I can do it.