Autumn joy

My daughter has taken the photo above.

I think it is such a beautiful autumn picture; the clear azure-blue sky, and the yellow leaves.

It is so beautiful outside now, and we have had some sunny days.

The temperature has dropped though.

On my trail ride last Saturday I rode in a t-shirt. Now, I have had to find my chaps and thick jackets.

After two days of intensive dressage traning, I took Fame out on a relaxing ride today in the beautiful weather.

Tomorrow the weather forecast says sleet, so we better take advantage of the nice weather while it lasts.

The disadvantage with many horses around is that the soil is washed away, and the stones creep up.

Fairytale forest, don't you think?

(Cabruze - no bugs, just moose!)

Calm and low water in the creek.

But on Wednesday and Thursday we worked hard!

Jimmi, the Danish trainer is here again.

On Wednesday he scolded us as he found Fame tight in the topline.

That is something that I always have to watch with her. She likes to work in a too high form which renders her tight in the back if "left alone".

I am aware of it, and work a lot with supplying exercises, keeping her in a low and round form.

But we had not done enough apparently!

He helped us through it, also riding Fame for a short while.
At the end of the lesson, she was much better.

She has been a bit more "antelope-y" lately though, I thought about it when hacking out today.

As I was riding bareback it was extra obvious...
I might have to adjust on her hard feed.
It is nice to have some energy, but if the energy is directed into spooking for about all and everything and getting tense instead of working, maybe the octane level is too high.

I will set her down a bit on the pellets and see what happens.

When we started out day two she was much better right from the start.

We continued with supplying exercises, and Fame felt good in the contact and with an improved hind leg activity. The trot in particular felt better than normal, and I was happy with the work.

Jimmi is a good trainer.

The things he comments on always feels right, and I feel Fame is working better.

The trainer can say nice things, deserved or not, but the horse never lies.

Now I am looking forward to two more lessons during the weekend.

It is very nice to get such an intensive training once he is here, as it will be a month or more until he returns.

My daughter also had a lesson this morning.

I had to act as translator as she has problem to understand Danish.

In the afternoon Siri and Hjalmar also had sessions.

And Jimmi was so lucky as to ride on a quality horse!