Cat's gone riding: December 2015

This is a blog about horses, people and places and it cannot come any better than when they are interesting friends, their horses in a place i call my home!

The Fens is a naturally marshy area in East Anglia spreading over parts of Cambridgeshire, Lincolnshire, Norfolk and a small part of Suffolk with an overall area of 1,500 square miles.

In his acclaimed book Waterland, Graham Swift wrote~

“Realism; fatalism; phlegm. To live in the Fens is to receive strong doses of reality. The great flat monotony of reality; the wide empty space of reality. Melancholia and self-murder are not unknown in the Fens. Heavy drinking, madness and sudden acts of violence are not uncommon. How do you surmount reality, children? How do you acquire, in a flat country, the tonic of elevated feelings?”

My answer to Graham is get on your horse and ride the Fens!

...and here comes the XXI century Adventurers. From right to left are Mary, Mouse, Paul, Jo & cat

Meet these 5 lucky XXI century Adventurers on this 28^th of December 2015 ~

Mary comes from the Midlands for some flat land therapy with her stunning, fit 8 year-old Friesian mare. Amongst other disciplines, they both compete at level 3 Trec so today’s 20kms ride was a walk in the park. For the occasion, Mary and Xara wore their matching Xmas hats which made the occasion even more special.

Mouse, just seen in the background, has a wealth of experience and abilities with horses. From managing a racing yard to driving she has worked it all. She is a true horsewoman whom i always enjoy riding with.

...Mouse is riding Jake, a 23 year-old Dales pony

which she also drives regularly... Philippa is standing in the background.

...Mouse's paw just seen under

the unavoidable tray of shortbread.

Paul joined us all the way from Suffolk with his 14 year-old Warmblood. i recognise savvy when it is never a big deal when a horse spooks at every bird flight, every rabbit fart, every wave on the shore, every leaf flying by. Jo is lending a helping hand.

Jo is used to riding TB ex-racers so when the opportunity presented itself to ride Pagosa, the not so forward bolshy pony, also affectionately known as cat’s pony, she relished the challenge and made a great job of it. It was great for me to see them having fun and to see Jo riding my pony very well indeed. Philippa & Pag look like they are both lending a helping hand to adjust Jo's stirrup leathers.

Pagosa, 11 years old.

i was the 5^th Adventurer riding Autan,

my 5 year-old forward-going Camargue pony.

Kate, the 6th Adventurer, could not make it after all but came to see us off!

Off we went from Welney along the Wash of the Old Bedford River, up to Salter's Lode, passing Denver Sluice and pumping stations and back to Welney. The 14 mile-long hack is totally off road, surrounded by big skies and flooded fields thriving with birds and wildlife. And apart from roe deer and a seal, we saw nobody else on dry land.

There were a lot of savvy and experience between the 5 of us enabling the ride to be fun and exhilarating. We rode at all 4 paces. At one stage Paul and i were cantering side by side then we galloped for a long while, not anymore side by side as my pony does not have legs as long as Paul's horse has. It was brilliant!

We tested ourselves with the gates. Mary showed us a new way to open gates in the wind, bottom pushing the gate first. Excellent!

“That's the way it is: life includes a lot of empty space. We are one-tenth living tissue, nine-tenths water; life is one-tenth Here and Now, nine-tenths a history lesson. For most of the time the Here and Now is neither now nor here.” ~ Graham Swift, Waterland