I find myself sitting in the truck at the Lynton horse trials, gazing out the window at a very orange coloured moon. A lot has happened in the past six weeks and things don't seem to be slowing down.
Firstly Blenheim ... Well Virgil didn't want to play in the dressage, he had his cranky face on and stuck his head in the air into and out of every movement. Very unlike him but he seemed quite chuffed with his performance and couldn't quite understand why no one was giving him pats and carrots!
Cranky face - Virgil
He had his game face on for both the show jumping and cross country and produced a lovely clear round in both with only a couple of seconds over the time cross country. Not a bad effort on a day that only Chris Burton made time. Virgil picked up the prize for most improved after dressage from 51st to13th! So Shane jumped straight on a plane back home to get ready for Equestriad and Virgil and I headed back to Burto's for a couple of days of rest.
Unfortunately Virgil had other ideas and knocked one of his legs playing in the field, nothing serious but would need a couple of weeks off and that didn't fit in with the gallop plan for Pau. So the decision was made to head home with no other events for Virgil to do. I packed up and jumped on a plan leaving Virgil in the capable hands of Rachel and Sophie Evans who grooms for Alex Townsend and will be flying back with the ponies. She informs me that Virgil is behaving himself but only if he can see his new found girlfriend Pie (Parodie).
It was straight back to work when I got home. No time for jet lag with plenty of eventers and young horses to bring back into work. I'm sure they were all enjoying their holidays as quite a few large bellies would suggest. Within the first week we had them all looking like respectable steeds with pulling manes and trimming them up. We then loaded up 11 horses and headed off to Wallaby Hill for the weekend.
Capone and I at Wallaby Hill - are his eyes really closed?
I'm sure you are wondering how we managed to get 11 horses to an event. Whilst we were gallivanting around Europe we had a new trailer made. It takes another 5 horses plus a small living area at the front of the truck for the grooms. It's very fancy and they have thought of just about everything you could possibly need.
The ponies were all well behaved and Shane finished 1st, 2nd and 3rd in the Pre Novice as well as successfully defending his Exhibition Eventing title on Supey Rupee also known as APH Rusalka. Poor Rupee didn't know what had happened when he came out of the arena after his clear jumping round, it had all happened so fast. He will contest the final at Equitana in November before heading to Adelaide for the 2 star.
Rupee puts in a great jump over one of the Exhibition Eventing fences
No sooner had we arrived home and unpacked from Wallaby Hill we were reloading and getting ready for Goulburn. Now the last couple of years we have had to contend with snow but not this year. This year it was bush fires. While the event itself wasn’t under attack, there were some major road closures on the Thursday night so we had a couple of overnighters at Bimbadeen until we were given the all clear to head down. We arrived at lunch time on Friday and everything was clear if not a little warm.
After a fresh night, we awoke to a smoky haze everywhere but fortunately no flames or driving winds. Shane's horses all performed well in the dressage and show jumping. In particular Henry (Fantastic Mr Fox) having his first one star start did a good test and jumped clear to be lying in fourth place. CP Qualified also did a lovely test to be currently 2nd in the 3 star and Shanghai Joe is in 7th. Both these horses will hopefully head to Adelaide in 3 weeks along with Taurus. So plenty of work in the next couple of weeks. Fingers crossed the boys all behave themselves tomorrow for cross country!
(To find out how the Bimbadeen Horses went at Lynton take a look at the results by clicking HERE)
