I just wanted to do a quick post to update everyone on how things are going, for those who don't know I'm back in Florida training for three months over the winter, this year I brought a lovely group of horses with me, Dominic my GP horse who is now into his third winter down here, Landino who I've been working with over the past year and is showing huge talent and progressing rapidly and a lovely PRE mare named Ocita, I want to say a huge thanks to all of their owners (Susanne, Konra and Shawneen) for their confidence in me as a rider and trainer, it means the world to me and is what makes this all possible. I also want to say a big thank you to everyone who supported our 2013 calendar fundraiser and in particular our monthly sponsors (Konra and Don Young, Shawneen Jacobs, Leslie Cockerline and the Hollies Executive Golf Course) as well as Elizabeth Toth for the amazing photography featured in the calendar.
Our journey south started on the 28th of December, I had a quick holiday season at my brother's place in Nelson with the whole family and then zipped home on the 27th for the last minute packing and hit the road the morning of the 28th (special thanks to Shawneen, Joanna and Larisa for helping with the huge packing process!!). We crossed the border in Washington that morning and overnighted at Tulip Springs in Kennewick Washington which was a lovely facility for the horses and a great guest house for us to stay in, the second night we were on to Salt Lake City in Utah with the horses spending the night at a fantastic barn called Riverbend Ranch Equestrian Center, we grabbed a hotel for the evening a couple minutes down the road, the third night we were into Albuquerque, New Mexico, we were thankful for good roads on this part of the drive as there are some very steep mountain passes, it was very cold through the mountains so I was quite glad I'd waited to clip the horses as there were parts where we got down to -22! In Albuquerque the horses stayed at the Broken M Ranch which has some nice oversized stalls for the horses to relax in overnight, we were surprised to wake up to a skiff of snow in the morning in Albuquerque but luckily once the sun came up the roads were clear and we were moving along, the fourth night (New Years Eve) we got into Wichita Falls in Texas and Legacy Equestrian Park which is a great facility with wonderfully accommodating hosts, at this point we were finally able to change the horses out of their winter blankets into some lighter sheets, though it wasn't exactly warm but at least into the plus digits!! Our last evening we were in Mobile Alabama at a really neat little overnight called the Rocking A Ranch, I would gladly recommend any of these facilities to people traveling with horses as overnight stops, they are all great spots, very horse and trailer friendly and at most places you're either able to stay on site with the horses or very close at a hotel minutes away. We pulled into Florida late on the evening January 2nd, we were rolling along pretty well and at our very last fuel stop before getting into Jupiter I checked the tires and found one of them had lost half a tread (looked like a defective tire) so thankfully we were able to put the spare on before it blew and continued our trip into Jupiter. So now after a few days the horses are all settled in at the beautiful Lady Jean Ranch (http://www.ljrelite.com), the first few days were dedicated to unpacking and setting everything up (getting hay organized etc.) and giving the horses a few days to rest after the journey. Yesterday I had my first little school on the horses, all were good and feeling quite fresh and eager to get to work which was great so today I had my first short lessons and will start to build up from here. I have to say I'm very much looking forward to getting back into a lesson and training program myself for a few months and I also want to say how appreciative I am of my clients back home who are patient and understand that this time away to further my education gives me so much more information and tools to apply to my teaching and training when I return back in the spring, I've always felt that a coach/trainer who doesn't continue to further their education is not doing their job to the best of their ability, and on that note I'll be looking forward to getting back home in the spring and sharing everything with you all and wishing everyone back home good weather and happy riding, will try to keep the blog updated with information as much as possible with all that is going on and to everyone back home feel free to email or message me at any time for anything!
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