Sunday’s ACTHA Ride

 

Before I went to bed on Saturday night, I had resigned myself to not being able to ride in Sunday’s ACTHA ride. I figured I would just drive down Sunday morning and just spend the morning and afternoon hanging out with Apache, maybe walking her around and letting her graze on the grass around the base camp.

When I woke up on Sunday morning, something inside of me told me to just go ahead and dress to ride, so I threw on my breeches, half chaps, and Ariat riding shoes. Then I refilled my water bottles and packed a few snacks and sliced up some more carrots for Apache and said a little prayer for strength and health for my Apache mare as drove down to Estancia.

Before checking in on my mare, I first stopped off at the campsite of my friends Britt and LuAnne, as they said they were going to keep an eye on Apache that night. Britt told me that Apache looked pretty good in the morning, but she still gave her a small dose of Bute, about a half hour before I arrived. I thanked them profusely and went to go hug my Apache mare and see for myself just how she was feeling.

Would she up for a 6 mile ride that day?

After spending a little time with Apache and not noticing any stiffness or lameness, I went over to the check-in table and signed up for a ride time.

On Saturday 35 riders had shown up to ride. On Sunday there were only 32 riders. Most everyone had signed for a ride time the night before, but since I wasn’t even sure we were going to be able to ride, I waited until Sunday morning, which left only 2 time slots: 10:45am or 11:00am. Oddly enough there wasn’t anyone signed up for the 11 am ride time, so I went ahead and signed up for the 10:45am slot that already had 3 riders. Which made me happy because I saw that my friends Anne and her husband Matt were in that time slot and even though I’ve been to ACTHA rides with Matt, riding Anne’s Clydesdale Prince, Matt rode as a Safety Rider. So I’ve always wanted to just ride with them, and this was a great turn of events that I would finally have the opportunity.

While waiting for our ride time to start, some friends of mine asked me to take some photos of them dressed up for the group themed contest. They chose to be the Rat Pack and had some very cute costumes.

 

I got my mare groomed and tacked up by 10:30am and then rode her around the base camp. The 10:30am group was leaving as I rode by, and I took note that several of my old Walkin N Circles Ranch Horse Rescue friends were in that group, two of them riding gaited horses, which caused me to have a wistful feeling, wishing my horse could keep up with them so we could ride together. Oh well. It is what it is, I told myself. We would ride our own ride and just enjoy ourselves today, even if we had to ride all by ourselves.

Which was starting to seem like it was going to end up that way.

Those 15 minutes between the last group leaving and then waiting for our 10:45am time slot to begin, seemed interminably long. The base camp seemed so deserted, so quiet. Was my horse and I all alone? Where was Matt and Anne and the 4th rider in our group?

I sat relaxed on my mare’s comfy back while she nibbled grass and just reveled in the silence and peacefulness. I happened to glance up and noticed the beautiful cloud formations against the bright, blue sky highlighted by warm sunshine. (And of course, I took a photo *grin*)

I just knew it was going to be a good day. I could feel it in my heart and deep in my soul.