A great start to the year - riding Alex Townsend's Bendigo in the CNC3* CT at Wallaby Hill
I got an email from Debbie at the beginning of the month about blogs…from which I drew the alarming conclusion that I’ve actually not written one for a year. Not such a good strike rate, I will try harder in 2015.
As such I have summed up 2014 by month in what is hopefully some manageable and readable pieces.
JANUARY
Rain. Horses feral.
FEBRUARY
Rain, fell off Barney cantering a circle, nearly got run over by several crazy people whilst hacking very fresh horses, more rain.
MARCH
Weather improving, horses still feral from being cooped up inside, rider still dizzy from trotting circles.
APRIL
Gus the ginger gets let out for two days in the paddock and comes back in injured, to my immense disgust. I spend a maddening week driving circles in Swindon to get my British HGV.
MAY
Eventing. Barney leads the Open CNC* at Chilham with a 26 in the dressage, showjumps clear and then gets far too enthusiastic cross country, screeches past a skinny despite much undignified hauling on the right rein by me and comes a disgraceful 10th. He redeems himself (slightly) at Aston CNC** with a reasonable dressage and showjumping then rips around the cross country and makes it feel like pony club. I get overly excited and enter Saumur CIC** which required the presence of Mummy Wallace as Chief Navigator. She navigated beautifully, the French didn’t like my dressage and Barney didn’t like the French ground on the cross country.
JUNE
Snap my girth on Barney at Salperton whilst on track for a super clear cross country and we both go out the side door. Girth binned. Dan makes his eventing return with his usual verve and makes the cross country feel ridiculously small.
Barney at Salperton, pre-tack failure
Pats for Dan as he backs it up at Eridge a week later and jumps another beautiful clear over the jumps that don’t fall down. Sylvia makes her debut at Eridge and I revisit my pony club days of kicking, whacking and clucking.
JULY
Headed off to Barbury with Barney, spent 20 minutes hacking to dressage which was clearly the way to go as we get our best CIC mark yet. Saved from my incompetence by the lovely Derek Pascoe who drives us miles to pick up two new gas bottles. Barney decides the scary showjumping arena isn’t for him and I drive home in a huge strop with 90% of the Barbury sand in my eyes. Alex Townsend makes a good case for a road trip to Camphire. I take out another loan to pay for it. In blazing sunshine Izzy Nowicki (the best freelance groom ever and now Head Girl to Andrew Hoy) and I take three horses to Brightling, I manage to get one through the flags (Barney), get ditched off one backwards (Sylvia), retire the other (Dan) and we decide that we might just forget this weekend.
AUGUST
Get off Barney after a particularly satisfying jumping lesson to find he is on three legs. Pull shoe off, out comes an enormous abscess. Shove foot in ice, panic, load and go to Aston with him in the CNC*** and Dan in his first CNC**. Confidence at this point is not high. Barney surprises me with an astonishing first CNC*** test for a 35, miles ahead of several very flash horses in his division. He then starts limping again and we can’t jump him.
Dan at his first CNC**
Dan on the other hand does a respectable test, runs green in the showjumping and then jumps around the cross country in a manner that belies his lack of experience, though unsure that taking strides out in combinations is the recommended way to tackle one’s first CNC**. So happy with him that I nearly cry, Izzy manages to breathe again and it seems I have found my next (as the English would say) “proper” horse. Camphire – fun trip, scoreboard bad, company great. At least we had a balanced weekend. Aston (3) – Dan has a jolly around the CNC**/*. Gus still stuck at home, now a grumpy red horse.
Great scenery on the trip to Camphire
As a result of the Aston success I enter Blair CCI*, and off we go to Scotland. Mum and Dad turn up to watch Dan at his first international where thanks to dressage coach Lisa White he gets a personal best on the flat, is sensational cross country, improves his showjumping and we all go home happy.
Dan at Blair Castle
SEPTEMBER
Went to WEG. Had a great time with lovely people, scores less great no matter which Southern Hemisphere country you support, organisation even worse, enough said about that. Took Dan to Goring for an easy outing, he is alarmed by the llamas by the dressage, jumps his best showjumping round yet and cruises around the cross country. I need to learn to go faster is the moral of story as time faults ruin my top 5 finish.
OCTOBER
Season seems to be over. I decide a change of environment is in order and move to Surrey. Dan makes his hunting debut and is ridiculously good at it. After jumping 5’5” hedges I really think he could probably manage a CNC*** next year, which is equal parts exciting and alarming! Gus is back in work and I rekindle my relationship with my neck strap for the first two weeks.
Dan goes hunting (left) and Gus is back in work (right)
NOVEMBER
This was an interesting month. After much deliberation I decided that whilst living in England has been a great experience, I want to relocate back to Australia. Cue the packing, paperwork and mild panic. Turns out getting dogs, horses and half a household home is quite the organisational challenge.
DECEMBER/JANUARY
Went home for Christmas and helped Mum and Dad shift into their new house – which is amazing. Then flew back to the UK on the 28th, put Ziggy on a plane, multiple trunks of gear on a boat and two horses into quarantine. I managed to excel myself by driving the horses to quarantine on New Year’s Day morning and still make it back in time to go hunting on one of Alex Marsh’s lovely horses.
Skipping over the boring packing stuff and the excess baggage fee (which we wiggled out of) I made it home on January 22nd. Ziggy got out of quarantine on the 23rd and the horses came home on February 7th.
Also on February 7th I had the great privilege and pleasure of catch riding Alex Townsend’s lovely Bendigo in the dressage of the 3* combined training at Wallaby Hill. I cannot thank Alex enough for allowing me to ride him, it was such a nice experience to go out and have fun doing an eventing dressage test on a beautifully schooled horse.
I haven’t quite come up with a competition plan for my boys yet but in the back of my head I have Albury as their first start. Now I just need to locate my neck strap for getting on Dan after his 9 week holiday!
See you all soon at an event…somewhere.
Laura x
PS - There are far too many people that have made my time in England such a great experience to list them personally…so a huge public THANK YOU.
