Phebes did go hiking today and some ground exercises...

thrown in to boot! The air is a little crisper, and a pretty good breeze blowing today as I led her out to the neighbor's field where we get into our woods. She kept trying to walk past me, and I'd circle her around. At one point she attempted to push me, and when that didn't work took a swipe at me with her back foot. I was pretty aggravated with her, as it is always this way if she gets a day off. So we just stopped right where we were and started working on lunging, turning on her haunches, and reversing. She squealed a couple times and had herself a hissy fit, but fits are free...when she would stand a few steps behind me and back up like she was supposed to on the lead line, we went on out to the trails I'd worked on today. My plan initially had been to take her with me while I got the work done, but I'm glad now that I didn't. There was a lot of brush to be moved, and then I raked the trails on another loop. She would have seriously slowed down my progress. Phebes did alright out in the woods other than trying to eat everything in sight. I took her down three different hills leading just a step at a time to impress on her mind that this is how we go down hills. It never occurred to me that she wouldn't know how to handle downhills, until someone asked if she had hills in her paddock??? DUH! The horse has spent her youth on three flat acres, no wonder she couldn't carry me down a hill. So when I take her out on her lead line we try to work things like this to build her confidence. It does look like I need to continue spending one evening a week on ground handling lessons, otherwise she is going to challenge my leadership. I'd sure like things to ever get to be all warm and fuzzy, but we sure have some issues still. Once you line her out she does well, but in the interim she is one brat horse. Tomorrow I'll work on trotting patterns again, at least a three mile workout (thank you Garmin Forerunner), and cool down. If all goes well we will go back to the Versailles State Park on Sunday. ~Endurance Grannny