One thing for sure, Hunters/Jumpers and Dressage sure isn't my thing! Dressage will definitely put me to sleep! Give wife and I: Reining, Cutting and rodeo. Perhaps a little Sorting or Team Penning.
I used to go to the races at Charles Town, West Virginia quite often. I've also been to harness racing in Maryland. Charles Town is (was?) beautiful. I've not been in a while. Out in the middle of nowhere, there was nothing but greenery and mountains beyond your view of the track. You can drive through Harper's Ferry if you take that route. They've built casinos since the last time I was there. My first race, I went with a friend who was explaining how to bet as we ran from the parking lot just in time to catch the 3rd race. I bet $4 (boxed a $2 Exacta), and won $124...my very first ever bet at the track! I bet on Canned Heat and another horse whose name I can't recall. I did not give it all back (and bought us a great steak diner), and over the course of other outings there, won similar amounts on $4 boxed Exactas (I always bet a long shot and one that was favored and limited my bets to $4.) It's such a nice way to spend the day. Races are 20 minutes apart. You can go down to look at the horses as the ready for the next race. You can walk around. You can people-watch. And even if you lose, you're not spending that much money...you can only bet 3 times an hour during an afternoon.
Any horse questions here welcomed or pictures really anything welcomed here I have a lifetime around horses and livestock. , She could really be a handful when on a cow, also could do poles and barrels if need be a real all around mare that is so darn dependable, after a workout I would at times just take halter off her loose and say get in the trailer and she would load by herself, me being proud was an understatement.. Cutting on her at church
View attachment 45684 In the cutting pen here just an all around mare she is branded Bar B Bar a Cajun mare from the Broussard Ranch in LA
@Tex Dennis You say you bought your mare at 8 months old, but I don't see when you bought her (unless I just plain overlooked it.) How old is she?
14 YO, we managed to get her in a barn with feed in a stall and never had a halter on before backed trailer in barn to attempt to load and she just walked in! 1st time ever loaded. I knew I had found a real mare, just so easy going .
Wow, @John Brunner, I had a very similar experience at about the same age. I grew up in the suburbs of St Louis, which at the time was nearly way out in the country. At the entrance of our subdivision was a large stables where many show horses boarded, along with the Budweiser Clydesdales when they came to town for parades, etc. Kids in the neighborhood who were horse obsessed like me, but who didn't own a horse there, or at all, were allowed to hang around the stables IF we would do some of the least pleasant chores like keeping the tack room straightened up and muck out the stalls. If we showed reasonable dedication to paying our dues, we got to exercise some of the more well behaved horses whose owners didn't mind. Well, one day I was allowed to exercise a big Morgan gelding. You really had to earn a lot of privilege points to get to ride him, and the stable hands had to feel confident in your ability to handle him, as he was a blue ribbon show horse. The stable had two riding rings -- one that sat parallel to the stable itself so it was completely within sight of anyone there, and the other that was set up with a jump circuit that was down a hill at the end of the stable, on the other side of the stable owners residence and where hands had to leave the stable to see the ring. And that's where they sent me with the Morgan. Oh fun, the gelding thought as we entered that ring. And off he flew, going into his habituated routine. I hung on for dear life. While I'd had a lot of time in an English saddle and double bridle, I'd only had one previous experience jumping -- on a much smaller horse over a single baby jump not more than 2 feet high, and probably less. I wasn't strong or experienced enough to get the Morgan out of his routine. I thought for sure I'd be on the ground before the end of the circuit, or worse, that I'd cause the gelding to stumble or miss or injure himself. He didn't, but it was terrifying. And thrilling. And the last time I ever rode a jumper. I think that dern horse was smirking when I took him back to his stall. as if thinking Don't play with me, little girl, I'm too much for you.
My niece had a sweet horse that was the only one I'd ever ride. Riding Goldie was like riding your granny's old rocking chair. You want to amble along the trail, taking plenty of time to take in the scenery? Goldie was jake for that. Want to trot for a while? Well, Goldie was game for it, as long as you didn't want to do it for too long.... Gallop? Really? Why would you even think of doing something that...well...tiring? My niece used to rack up points at horse shows for having Goldie "under control". What the judges didn't know was that it would take a burr under her tail to get her to skitter around like those silly other horses in the ring, acting like idiots and nipping at each other (Horrors! Who knows how long it had been since they had last been washed! There are certain things a lady just doesn't do, y'know....) Because of her funny expressions and her amenable personality,, Goldie was later sold to a "talent scout" and ended up as one of the Mr. Ed's at Universal Studios in Orlando. Yes, MR. Ed was sometimes MRS. Ed.
I never used a hackamore in either of my horses. This horse had one on. I used a medium port grazing bit on both of my horses.
Actually, for Christmas 2019, I bought a pair of mucking boots to clean the snow off of our vehicle and our boat. When we had our 30" blizzard a couple of months ago, they sure came in handy in the deep snow.
Kilgore is only about ten miles from Longview. I have cousins in Longview, so am familiar with that area, somewhat.
Oh yes both towns were very close by each other, she if I remember correctly had a barrel racing school there, positively the same person for sure. If I also remember her place was on the left after you went under the Interstate heading to Kilgore and had the racing school sign out front she was not actually in Kilgore about half way in between .. Real close to them was Billy Leach who made calf ropes of hemp I still have 2 of them 21' ropes I think. Hand made.
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