Lemon and sweating like a carrot.

Just checked my blog and realised that I hadn't posted for a whole week. So where are Charlie and I in our master plan. I have had to read back on the euphoria of hacking as far as the barn.

Well as ever life with Charlie is never straightforward. The track to the barn and down the field is becoming an extension of the school. We have had one diabolical ride down the track swiftly followed by a stress free hack all the way down the track and back up the road.

Last time however we were misfortunate enough to meet two ladies who shouldn't have been there hacking towards us and our little pootle went very 'naughty'.

So being analytical he will hack confidently when he is feeling secure and when he isn't it all goes pear shaped probably as he doesn't get the sort of reassurance from me that he requires.

This tells me several things:

NEVER GO ON A 4 HOUR HACK its a long walk home.

My hacking needs to be an extension of my schooling

I have to learn not to be a nervous lemon when he is naughty.

If only my anxiety smelt of carrots.

We had another lovely lesson on Tuesday moving our schoolwork up a notch doing counter shoulder in and leg yield into trot etc all trying to get the boy supple between leg and hand and active from behind.

The result of this is twofold my legs were aching like crazy when I got off and a little lie down was not on the cards until I had made a bed filled Haynets topped up water and brushed and tucked up the boy for the night.

The increased work showed a very mild flavour of Charlie being stuck and worried when he didn't understand which wasn't helped as I was pretty confussled too.

However it does make it abundantly clear that whatever goes wrong in the school is multiplied 100 fold on a hack so hacking down the track has to become schooling not hacking.

So where to now watch this space!!