Magical Pony Club Weekend: Monday

You already know what I'm going to say. BACKWARDS. Oh well. Monday was our last full day together - T flew out at the ass crack of dawn Tuesday, and my plane left midday Tuesday, so we planned to pack as much fun as possible into Monday. While I was flying out the previous Thursday, T and Renate had gone out riding in the hills, so I demanded they also take me up in the hills (because at that point we'd mostly been riding down to the lake - which was AWESOME, but I wanted some killer views). So Monday we planned our day around that. T ended up being a little busy in the morning, so Renate and I planned for me to take photos of her dressage school that morning! Every photo was beautiful - not only are Renate and Vesta absolute baddasses, but the scenery *swoons*. A few of my camera photos at the end! After she wrapped that up and we had an early lunch, we headed for the hills! Renate was kind enough to let me ride Vesta (because she wanted to ride Gatsby). 

Cowboy was living his best life Monday night - after our ride he got to spend some time in Renate's massage pad and eating all the delicious leaves off Vesta's gorgeous hay.

Hills in the background, heading back

Lovely every way we looked

Because the photos are backwards, the ones from the top of the hill will be relatively early on in the post, lol. 

Vesta was more tolerant of my desire to take selfies than Gatsby or Cowboy lol. 

My Garmin said I climbed 130+ flights of stairs by the time we got to the top. Thanks Vesta!

I am not sure a photo adequately conveys some of the climbs haha, but I tried!

My legs actually hurt quite a bit the next day from attempting to balance over Vesta vs making her haul me up as dead weight lol. 

We stopped frequently to give the geldings a break - they are not quite event horse fit like Vesta, but they had a good time!

We rode this little piece of road and I got the most delicious video where the only sound was all the horses clip clopping along - I play it sometimes when I need a pick me up! 

There was still some snow in spots, but since nobody else had been out on these trails, it wasn't too slick and the horses managed fairly well

PINCH ME WHY IS EVERY DIRECTION SO FUCKING GORGEOUS 

I have never actually owned a chestnut, and I'm not sure I've ridden one since Taxi, a big grumpy appendix at a riding camp I attended in middle school - I took more red ear photos this weekend than I probably ever will in the rest of my life combined between Vesta and Gatsby hahahaha. 

Cell phone snap from Renate's dressage school Monday morning. 

Candid from Renate of me and Vesta! Really appreciating all the teal, lol. I checked a bag for the sole purpose of being able to bring my Busse Lavals and my teal helmet lol. 

I can't decide what to stare at, it's a toss up between Renate and Vesta looking amaze-balls, and the beautiful mountains in the background. 

Grey dog <3 

We had a lovely dinner that evening and then we stayed up probably later than we should have. Some of it we just spent sitting in silence, but it was that lovely kind of together-ness silence that you have with good friends, where words aren't necessary, just the pleasure of each other's company. None of us wanted to go to bed because that meant our magical pony club weekend was drawing to a close :( It's still so magical to me that I could have a weekend like this with people I've only met a few times in person but talk to every day.