Horsey Weekend Away

Two weekends ago, I escaped to Vancouver for a mostly horsey weekend. Traditionally, this is our girls weekend away, but there was low interest and availability from the others this year, so I brought my husband G instead. I'm lucky, because even though he's not horse crazy,  he is intrigued enough by the whole crazy horse world that he's easily entertained and quite fun to have along.

He randomly texted me this yesterday, which I take to mean that he visited Bridget and she's doing fine. I can't say enough how supportive he is - he's an animal lover, but would never have chosen horses as his 'thing'. Sidenote: I'm feeling super organized right now because I got up early and picked up some hay to take up there on the ferry later today. The logistics of west coast living - 5 bales at a time only on the ferry, any more and it's considered dangerous goods!

We started out by going to The Mane Event Expo for part of Saturday. I was disappointed in it this year - the other girls may have been on to something, because there were far less vendors than normal,  noticably fewer attendees, and a clinician line up that was decent,  but missing the really huge names they normally bring. Everyone I talked to felt the same - prices for vendors and attendees keep going up and quality is going down. Disappointing for sure - it's been a fun event for over 10 years now but I won't be back if it stays like that. Our big goal was to check out horse trailers, but there weren't even any dealers there.

That being said, we watched a clinic with Mette Rosencrantz and I loved it - nothing life altering being taught, but she has a fabulous way with words and her descriptions of basic dressage principles were so well thought out. G was totally into it, because she was very good at comparing correct riding and training techniques to other sports and real life situations. Her description of how weightlifters use their bodies had him asking me some relevant questions about how horses should use their hind ends. I also loved her positive, forgiving approach and sense of humor. Too bad she's not local, she seemed like she's be fun to ride with.

We followed that up with a CDE demonstration/clinic where a pair of friesians stole the show...amazing how quickly and accurately the horses and driver can navigate a complicated course of gates and cones. G is convinced we need a friesian now.

The shopping was nothing to write home about, but I did manage to find a quarter sheet marked 50% off for Midge. It possibly ticks all the boxes, being waterproof, fleece lined, and reflective. It's the reflective part I'm not 100% sure about, since the labels are written in Dutch and Google translate doesn't help. It's got shiny thread woven throughout so either it's supposed to sparkle in the sun, or it's reflective...I'm hoping for the latter with all the evening roadside rides to and from the arena coming up in our near future.

From BR Equestrian

On Sunday, I broke my credit card at all the fabulous tack shops in Langley. My happiest purchase was a new show coat that will be a huge improvement over my poorly fitting wool hunt coat. It was marked down to $200 from $488, so I basically HAD to buy it. In addition to a few boring necessities, I also found a dressage show pad that fits B and a new dressage girth for her shrinking waistline. Also, G is now a fully trained chauffeur as far as planning routes and locating all the tack stores, yet another important reason to keep him and treat him well ;)

This one is so pretty, but I got a boring white one. For anyone with a smaller horse, these BR Event dressage pads come in cob size!

From Asmar Equestrian. These coats might fit big. For mine, at least, I went down a size, and there's still room to have it tailored in at the waist and through the sleeves

Sunday afternoon we went to the race track for the last day of the season. As is my way, I fell in love with a super cute chestnut gelding in one of the lower end claiming races they had at the end of the day. The very happy ending to a happy day was that later on that evening I saw on facebook that a local professional rider picked him up at the end of the day with an eye towards eventing him. So not only was I like "See G, I have awesome taste in horses!" but more importantly cute gelding is going to have such a great second career and owner. I have no trouble with how the horses are treated at the track - honestly all the ones we see there all look like a million bucks and look happy to be out doing their thing. We're not super fans that are there every weekend, but we do go a couple of times a year, and start to notice and follow certain horse's careers.  I admit to wondering if they all land in good homes after their career is done, so I'm always happy to see their faces popping up in the local horsey scene after the race season ends. I'm particularly happy when a favorite horse of ours ends up with someone we know...even if it's just via facebook updates!