Wednesday, March 28, 2012

Wednesday in San Juan

Today was another lazy day for me here in San Juan Capistrano with the boys. Most of the dressage riders arrived today, creating a bit of chaos in the barn area. Everything in the stabling area is pretty packed in, so it doesn't take much additional activity to create a major traffic jam. Not that this feature is unlike the rest of Southern California. Mayhem and traffic jams go with the territory down here.

The CDI arena was all set up today, complete with flags all along the "C" end, little potted trees (that kept falling over in the breeze), little plastic plants around the letters, and a row of tables (with flapping tablecloths) along one long side. San Juan has a perpetual breeze, so we seem to have quite a few scary flapping objects at any one time. All three of my guys were great, they all seemed very much at home in the arena. Other CDI horses weren't so settled, in fact, one rider got off their horse because he was being so unruly.

It is quite a trek from our stalls to the dressage competition arena. I clocked it today using the stopwatch on my phone; it is about 6 and a half minutes one-way on horseback. Quite the walk! Not only is it long, but it also goes directly by the lunging area, so you have to walk by a bunch of nutty, leaping horses as well on the way. I'm definitely going to be putting that into my warm-up time.

Tomorrow is the in-barn inspection and the FEI jog. It'll be a busy day, between getting everyone out and ridden in the am, braiding, getting the FEI vet to look at my passports, getting the horses prepped for the jog, etc. Ernie got in tonight just fine. It will be nice to have one more person to help.

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