Bay Area Blogger Trail Ride

This week of seeing bloggers obviously needed to include the most amazing blogger meetup just after I arrived back in the bay area.

When we found out that Jen was coming into town again, Olivia posted on our bay area blogger facebook group that if we wanted to, we could come out to her barn, hop on some horses, and head to the winery with her and Jen.

I don't think any of us expected that ALL of us would want to do it (though who wouldn't want to do a trail ride to a winery and have a picnic?! Olivia knows how to throw a party). And it wasn't even all of us. Olivia, M, Figure, Kate, and I, who are all local to the bay area were joined by Nicole from further up north as well as Jen of course and we had a blast! HUGE thanks to Olivia for offering up her barn as a location, her horses, and wrangling a few other horses from her barn. And also a massive thanks to Kate for bringing me my favorite Ginger pony and her new pony Flounder to add to the group so that all of us could go.

She's the cuddliest, Fig got this awesome picture!

I'd met Levi and Eugene at a horse show but hadn't met Nilla yet, and actually had only seen Flounder from a distance, so I was super excited. I'd met all of the bloggers, though not spent tons and tons of time with some of them. I hadn't met Jen yet, as the last time she was in town, I was moving and couldn't drag myself away from that whole ordeal. So I was VERY excited for this. 

Once as we were all there, we started getting all the horses ready. I claimed my Ginger pony and we all headed to the small arena to get on and get situated. After a quick wander around the upper arena, we headed out to the winery.

Nicole and I had a nearly immediate laugh thinking about how TC or Murray would be on a trail like this. We had to walk down the road, being passed by cars and bikes, then over a few logs to get to a narrow and steep trail. Now, I actually grew up on these trails- not these in particular, but at a barn really close to Olivia's that had very similar trails- so you'd think I would be used to them. And for the most part I felt pretty comfortable, but let me tell you that I was VERY happy to have the Ginger pony rather than TC. Not that he can climb hills like that, but he would definitely have spooked at something and accidentally stepped off a cliff.

Yay! I was still so jetlagged, gah

Could see the reservoir from way up in the hills

We made it to the winery and tied our horses up. They were all SO GOOD to hang out tied. I also had a moment of reflection remembering that I needed to leave TC tied more often. He's fine at home, but if you leave him in a new place tied, he will eventually start rearing over and over again to entertain himself or get attention or whatever. His half sister does it too. It's completely obnoxious.

Olivia and David had brought a TON of food, which they got ready while the rest of us went in for some wine tasting. I'm not much of a wine person but it was a warm day and white wine sounded really good. We got three tastings of five done and then headed out to eat.

It was such a fun lunch. We mostly talked horses, of course. It's always so fun to hang around this group, we never run out of things to talk about. After we ate way too much food (and there was still some left over!) we headed back along the trail. Ginger was eager to get going, so we had some trotting to catch up a few times before we started heading back down to the road.

Pony ears! And David on Dijon and Fig on Eugene

After getting back, we kept Ginger, Flounder, Nilla, and Levi tacked up and headed up to the arena to play. I rode Ginger around some jumps and Kate reminded me to keep my eyes down and my leg off and to lean forward at all the jumps. Or maybe it was the opposite...? Ginger gave me a nice run out at a cross rail like she normally does, she also refused to walk over a ground pole because I was looking at it. I love her, she calls me on my shit (she thinks I deserve it because I call her on her shit in the dressage).

After Ginger, I played with Flounder, who is SUPER fun. He's young but gives such a good feeling. I couldn't help but to play with putting him on the bit. He's Kate's lesson horse and he's four so he's still figuring all that out. It was SO fun to have the same feelings that TC had when he was that age and learning to go on the bit. Lots of inconsistency but then suddenly he'd get it. Aaaallllllmost makes me want to do another young horse. Maybe I'll just borrow my friends' horses when I feel that way instead.

I absolutely had to get on Nilla, of course. Nilla is pretty much the exact opposite of TC, so I felt like I really struggled on her (I refused to jump her lol I jump the pony and that's it!). But she was super fun and oh my god those ears are the best.

EARS

Olivia got this- Nilla is so huggable! 

It was all over too soon and we all parted ways. I really want to do this again soon, it was a blast to see everyone. Even though I've met most of these ladies (and David) before, I remain so impressed at how easy everyone is to talk to. I feel like in the last year since we had our blogger meetup, and in the last two years since I met my first blogger (L!), I've made some really amazing friends.