Autumn's Arrival

Our barn driveway today!

Autumn is probably my favourite season, not least because it's my birthday (I'm a whole year older as of yesterday) but the colours of the leaves make it my favourite month - the horse-related downsides are shorter days and hairier horses...you don't want to see what a fuzzy fuzzball Miss Kika is after my 2 week holiday!

Speaking of my holiday, it was amazing although I left wanting more! Feels like we barely scratched the surface. We spent two days in Rio de Janeiro, 2 days exploring Iguazu Falls (a day per side), 3 nights in Salta with a daytrip to Cafayete, 2 nights in Purmamarca and the Painted Mountains - GORGEOUS! Then on down to Buenos Aires for 2 nights before a night in Colonia, Uruguay then back to Buenos Aires for two more nights before getting home yesterday. Man is BA - London a long flight, over 12 hours! I have so many photos thanks to the lovely camera I got back in July, I shall hopefully share them with whoever wishes to see them when I get them uploaded onto my "photography" blog - I use inverted commas as I'm no photographer!

Outdoor arena - LOVE the colours!

You'd be forgiven for wondering what the lovely Kika was up to while I was off enjoying myself in South America - well she was in the best of care under the Guru L's supervision. They jumped the day I left (Wednesday), then she had a few days to chillax in the field after the farrier's visit on Thursday. L rode again on Sunday and was very happy with her, she was really looking forward to putting some work into her in my absence as she said she was a pure joy to work with - although she couldn't do as much as she wanted due to earlier mentioned hairiness - poor Kika was lathered after 30mins.
Unfortunately however, boot camp was not meant to be as L became ill. :(
Sad Times - but thankfully it's nothing serious, she just has a poor(ish) chest and as soon as she get's a cough it gets well stuck in and becomes bronchitis.

However this does not mean Kika lazed about for 2 weeks getting fat off hay and fresh air!

L is super smart and came up with the idea of leading K like a packhorse as she hacked her mare in the woods. Unfortunately her girl has hurt her legs due to a poor round of shoeing last time her farrier visited and can only hack in walk - which suited L with 2 horses to work, 2 dogs to keep exercised and feeling under the weather herself.
Turns out Kika is a natural follower (tell me something i didn't know - ginormous chicken that she is! :p) and the 5 of them (2 horses, 2 dogs & L) had a great time exploring the woods together - she paints a funny picture as she says she got weird looks from joggers and other people she met in the woods, teehee.

So that's what we've been at since I last updated, I arrived back yesterday at about 11am local time, having left BA at 1pm their time (so 6pm here) and not having slept on the flights...what can i say my body clock was well and truly confused!
I went to sleep for a couple of hours when I got home then went to the barn around my usual time (7pm) to see Miss Kika and catch up with L. Gave the muck monster a good groom and heard all the above stories. Came home and crawled back into bed at the reasonable time of 9.30-10pm.

I woke bright eyed and bushy tailed today to head back to the barn and see what Miss Kika thought of tack after our holidays. As you might be able to tell from above photos, we're having a lovely mild and most importantly DRY Autumn weekend - yippeee!
It was actually pleasantly warm today, 22C in fact - so poor hairy Kika (and unfit me after 2 weeks without riding) were well sweaty after 30mins work. Turns out I needn't have worried about going away and convincing myself that the sh!t would hit the fan, that Miss Kika would somehow stop being the pleasure she had been to ride of late and would morph back into the she-devil.
As always she loves to prove me wrong and was a right pet for our spin today! Gave her a good hose down afterwards and we walked for almost an hour waiting for the heavy winter coat to dry out so that she could be turned back out.

I couldn't be signing off without a little snapshot of the main woman herself ... however only a headshot though as she really is an awful hairy monster! The 1st of November & stabling cannot come fast enough as that means time to clip!

With L's horse being given the weekend to see if there is any improvement in her legs, she has asked to take Miss Kika for a hack in the woods tomorrow (Sunday) - who am I to say no to that! :p
Might be greatful of the day off after my return to the saddle today - guarantee my legs'll be at me, weak creature that I am!
:p