Sundance's Recent Outings

Little Sundance has had three outings the last three weekends in a row. I've been riding him 2-3x per week all summer to give myself something else to do than TC's rehab stuff. And so I decided to bother him with some travel. 

Who is that tiny pony in the warmblood
sized trailer??

Three weeks ago I took him over to our local trail facility, mostly because I hadn't hauled my rig in a long time and didn't want my first haul in all that time to be hauling the four hours to the vet and back in one day. 

Sundance LOVED it and actually tried to delay getting into the trailer to go home. He and I just did this paved bottom loop which, because he's barefoot, he got to walk in the middle of. He was passed by joggers, cyclists, and even some people walking (he is the slowest walker) and didn't mind. He even let me bring my binoculars and look at birds while we were out there. 

Happy pony!

The following weekend, I decided to bring him over to my niece's riding lesson since I knew my mom would be there and I could bully her into riding him. I participated in the lesson on him ("racing" my niece from one end of the arena to the other) and then shoved my mom on him. She walked all over the property and trotted in every arena! Pretty good for a woman who has declared several times that she is DONE with riding. 

It was super cute to see my mom and my nieces riding together (the little one got to have a pony ride). Maybe next year I'll bring both TC and the pony over and we can have three generations riding at once. 

No pictures from that, so here is one
from this last weekend

Then this last weekend, I decided to stuff the pony in the trailer again and take him over to the ranch competition. Now, TC has done this competition several times and performed very well. It got to the point where I'd just arrive after the practice commenced, walk the course on foot, and then go get TC, do the course cold, and still win. 

If there's two things TC likes, it's people and obstacles. And playing with obstacles in front of a crowd of people, all ooing and ahhing over how large and impressive and bombproof you are? His ego has never been bigger than when he has done these ranch competitions. 

Meanwhile this is what we do at home

Sundance on the other hand... is still bothered by normal things. Like he didn't like the pool noodles touching him. And the plastic bags flapping wasn't his favorite thing. And the fact that the bridge was up on a pole so it thunked down as he crossed it caused him to leap off of it. 

I felt bad comparing him to TC because he genuinely did SUCH a good job for a pony who was pretty skeptical of my antics when we met. He made it through the noodles, and he survived the plastic bags. He did walk over the bridge with some clicker training help. And outside of those, he backed through the Z of poles, he let me carry a flag all over, he actually walked through the plastic bottles, and he even let me drag a bag of cans from his back which I was not expecting he'd tolerate. 

And we did it all bareback! 

All the plastic bottles, and he walked
over them!

Buuuut I opted not to compete. First, I had already been on him for an hour when practice was closed and we had to leave. And then it was going to be a full hour before we even started competing. I had other things I had to do that day so decided to pack up and head out. Plus I will admit, TC has completely spoiled me. 

It was a great day though! This weekend I'm out of town, but once I'm back, I think I might keep up the weekly travel sessions with the pony. It's been good to remind myself of what I'm working toward with TC. And it's great for the pony to get some outings in, he does seem to enjoy them even if this one wasn't his favorite.