11/5/2011

The past few days have been a lot of fun.

On Wednesday, Mr. Schleypen decided to have me ride a new pony who had just come the day before. She is older, around 15, so we all thought she’d be an easy ride. We were so wrong.

I got on her and she immediately took off into a crazy fast walk and I struggled to hold her back. When I picked up the trot she was better but very resistant in her poll. I flexed her and bent her but she wasn’t giving to me at all. Reinhart had Katrin come in and help me. Katrin had me let her go more forward (I was holding her back) and she became a bit softer in the mouth but she was still very stiff I didn’t feel comfortable on her, so my equitation was all over the place. It was a mess. But I felt we had made some progress. The pony was surely one of the hardest horses I had ever ridden. She wasn’t dangerous, just terribly resistant in every way.

The next day Katrin helped me again. Now that I knew what I was up against, I felt more confident but we still didn’t make as much progress as I would have liked. The pony still threw her head in the air and ran away any chance I gave her.

Then yesterday I tried riding outside because it was a nice day but the pony wouldn’t have any of it. So I headed inside where Reinhart was riding. He watched me and I could tell he wanted to help me. There were some other people in the arena who spoke English and he had them translate some but I was still not clear on what he wanted me to do. So finally he showed me. Turns out he speaks English just fine. We were able to work things out with a mixture of English and German and he told me that instead of letting her go forward like Katrin wanted, he wanted me go nice and slow with her. He then had me walk on a circle and leg yield in and out of the circle with lots of flexion until she softened. This seemed like a better solution for the pony.

I’m glad Reinhart is still letting me ride her. Although she is a challenge, I feel like I can fix her with time.

Today was my day off. I slept in and then set out to explore Neuss some more. I biked for 40 minutes until I ran into a big shopping center. It was like an outdoor mall with tons of shops and stands. There was a guy playing an accordion for tips. It was busy and people watching was prime. There were countless clothing shops, cafés, fresh fruit stands, bakeries, and other assorted stores. It was a really neat place.

After wandering around for awhile I noticed it was starting to get dark so I biked home and hung out in my apartment for the rest of the day. Tomorrow, it will be a nice easy Sunday. :)