Sunday, April 24, 2011 - Ride Day along the Canal

After spending the last few days resting and getting ready to leave, my brother and I enjoyed our last ride of the season together. The horse trailer is still full of hay (we’re slated to move it over to the back of the pickup tomorrow, when he has some help coming in to do some other chores around the house), so we opted to just ride around the neighborhood. This time, though, Brother wanted to go across the street to a wilderness area that he used to ride in back when he had horses. The weather was warm, but not as hot as it has been, and there was a nice, albeit warm, breeze that helped keep it from being stifling. After leading the horses across the busy road, we discovered the area he used to ride in was fenced in now, but there was an actual trail sign pointing down the length of the canal, so we headed south down there. It was like a regular nature tour, where we saw lots of turtles and all kinds of birds, with a keen eye open for alligators, as it’s supposed to be mating season. Brother wasn’t sure they would be coming in this far, though, because the water levels were pretty far down because of a lengthy drought they’ve been having here. Never saw one, anyway, though we heard a baby one on the way home (at least according to him :-). Stayed out quite a bit longer than I expected, I guess he wanted to make the most out of it since it will probably be the last time he rides until we come back next year. Followed the canal back, probably 4-5 miles, before finally turning around and heading back. We stopped a few times to stretch our legs, so we ended up being out over 5 hours. We mostly walked, but on the way back he did start speeding up, we managed to get a good number of trots and canters in. A lovely ride, and a great way to end our time here. Will spend tomorrow getting ready to go, giving Brother some last minute lessons on his new/my old computer, moving hay, and generally packing up. Ready to get back on the road again!