The arena at the yard is slightly larger than the normal 20x40m affair.<\/p>\n
It’s about a 30x50m oblong, give or take, but it’s still marked out with the usual dressage markers:<\/p>\n
The gate – the only way in, as the arena is bordered on all sides by post and rail fencing – is at the ‘A’ end.<\/p>\n
So where are the dragons?<\/p>\n
Lurking behind ‘C’ – or, more accurately, hiding somewhere between ‘C’ and ‘M’.<\/p>\n
Of course we mortals can’t see these dragons.<\/p>\n
But the horses can.<\/p>\n
Vin’s first time in the arena this week was Tuesday (I gave him Sunday and Monday off for being a good boy at his first One Day Event on Saturday).<\/p>\n
So on Tuesday evening, I groomed, tacked up and sat on and we began working in.<\/p>\n
As far as the H-G-M line.<\/p>\n
He wouldn’t go beyond that.<\/p>\n
Something terrifying lurked the other side of the post and rail just beyond ‘C’.<\/p>\n
I told him there was nothing there.<\/p>\n
He ignored me; stood his ground, eyes bulging out of his sockets, ears about to pop off his head.<\/p>\n
We had kind and gentle words and harsh words and then a smack but nothing could get him past H-G-M.<\/p>\n
I resigned myself to the foibles of Thoroughbreds and schooled in the 4\/5ths of the arena that he did permit himself to be ridden in.<\/p>\n
That was Tuesday.<\/p>\n
Guess what happened on Wednesday?<\/p>\n
Yep, more eye-bulging, ear-popping, rooted-to-the-spot behaviour when he came anywhere near the H-G-M line.<\/p>\n
This time I didn’t even try and argue with him.<\/p>\n
I tried to walk him as close to ‘C’ as possible but when he tried to skitter out from underneath me – putting in a couple of bucks and a little rear just for the sake of good measure – I gave up on the far end of the arena and concentrated on exercises we could ride without going near the dragons.<\/p>\n
And then there was Thursday (yesterday).<\/p>\n
Except…<\/p>\n
When I got to the yard yesterday evening Sue was just walking out of the arena with the grass strimmer.<\/p>\n
Every horse, she explained, that’s been in the arena since the weekend has been absolutely mental about going anywhere near ‘C’.<\/p>\n
So she’d been outside the arena cutting the grass, trying to see what particular kind<\/em> of dragons had moved in.<\/p>\n Guess how many she found?<\/p>\n Yep, none.<\/p>\n So when I’d groomed, tacked up and sat on Vin I thought I’d chance my luck.<\/p>\n Yep, you’ve guessed it.<\/p>\n At ‘C’ he had a good look at the space outside the arena between ‘C’ and ‘M’ on his first lap and then…<\/p>\n Completely ignored it for the rest of the session.<\/p>\n Not even a sneaky peek.<\/p>\n So it looks as though the Dragons might have moved out.<\/p>\n And taken the 25m high sign that says ‘Here be Dragons’ in luminous red paint – the kind of sign that only equines can see though – with them.<\/p>\n Horses… Don’tcha luv ’em?<\/p>\n Bless. \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n B<\/strong><\/em>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The arena at the yard is slightly larger than the normal 20x40m affair. It’s about a 30x50m oblong, give or take, but it’s still marked<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-589","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-stuff","two-columns"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/brennigjones.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/589","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/brennigjones.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/brennigjones.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brennigjones.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/13"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brennigjones.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=589"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/brennigjones.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/589\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/brennigjones.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=589"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brennigjones.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=589"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brennigjones.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=589"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}