October 12th - 8:49pm

Bit of an early morning at the farm today. Opened the gates at 5:30 and started getting horses ready at 6:00. Felt considerable better this morning and now that the weather is warming up, its nice to get started riding early. Today was my day to help Rodrigo with the young horses but since we started early I got rides in on Nacar and Herodes before I switched to longing. Herodes was just a get out to work hack. Go, woah, turn, ect. Martin had me work on Nacar's flatwork some more which is turning into quite a learning experience for both of us. How to teach a young horse to stretch and extend into contact when they are naturally built a bit more upright with their neck. Nacar's learning how to carry himself and Im learning how to teach him. Martin made a point today while I was on him though that I need to give some thought (Im thinking the next rainy day should do). He said that this type riding, the educating a horse, is really an art form. There are a ton of different methods on the books with most being beneficial at one time or another. It is our job as the rider, however, to create a plan, execute and potentially modify what we came up with to best suit the horse and our needs. Martin said it was roughly like a painting. He may want to use the light green, someone else the dark and me the florescent green. All are colors and all have their place somewhere but one color (or a combination of a few) is going to be best for me and my horse. And its an art form to come up with that color. With Nacar the last couple days, it has been sending him forwardforwardforward off his hinds until he reaches into a contact. That could be a workable plan with him for the next month or maybe just the next week or maybe tomorrow he'll need something else. Heck, halfway through the ride his reactions could have told us what had been working just wasnt. That would have required a new plan. I think this part of riding is the toughest for me right now. As Martin reminds me regurally, I tend to get fixated on certain things and ignore everything else. When riding is really more of evaluating, make plan, evaluate, adjust plan, evaluate, ect. Being that methodical and disiplined with what Im doing while maintaining that level of mental flexibility is not easy for me. One more thing to work on in every ride.
After Rodrigo was finished I hopped on Puccini to warm him up for Martin since he was having lessons with Mono. We had the ring set up like a show with a schooling area sectioned off and a course set in the bigger area. Puccini and I ended up having a really good warm up actually (even got a "that looks really good" from Martin!!). I really struggled to ride him when I first got here but now Im figuring it out! With the early start and lessons, everyone was ridden before lunch. Which was good since we had a very busy afternoon with the vet, farrier, shavings guy and neighbors coming over to school the course. As a result, no Petrobras tonight for internet. Its not a long walk to the gas station but its not short one either and since we cant stay long, it has not been worth it to go the last two days. We'll definitely get there this weekend though. Got to let all the families know that we're still alive down here! Not sure why they think we'd just up and die but my family at least always worries.