Baasha's fans, walkingstick people, and a horrible frog

Nice day for a ride, and all the trees are changing color in this land of Mostly Oaks: ) This time I was armed with the GPS device, and did not get lost. Whew!




Before I could reach the big scary woods, we were surrounded by Baasha's loving fans. Just like back home in America, only they were little german girls. They say it differently, in german, they say, "May we stroke your horse?" but they use the word for "caress" which makes it even softer, sweeter. One had a baby in her arms, and kept making the baby stroke Baasha's neck. Baasha's eyes were half closed, maybe having adoring little girls surround him reminds him of home.


I asked one of them to take our pic, with me holding the Garmin up proudly. Average speed: 5 kph. Total distance travelled: 12 km. 4 hours out, 1 hour motionless, I guess. Cute kids, 20 years ago I would have let them sit on him, but life is different now. To be honest, I was not comfortable with the baby being close, even though Baasha was in sleep mode.

We came to a pond and I saw this little Geocache treasure chest symbol on my Garmin, and thought, "oh, OK, let's go find it!" with a little surge of guilt cuz I know my man has been saving the horse trail caches for a time when we can do them together. I found a tiny overgrown with nettles path next to the pond, and it was apparent Baasha would not fit. I tied him to a tree. No, that's not a good one. I tied him to another tree. No, not quite safe enough. I tied him to a third tree. He thought I was losing my mind, it was clear. I asked him to please please be good and don't fuss or try to escape and run home.

He's been known to tie very poorly during orienteering events, winding himself around and around trees and fussing. I went down the little trail a ways, looked back, Baasha was clearly keeping an eye on me, but hadn't budged. Not a foot. I went further, and called to him, "It's OK, I'm just going in these sticker bushes now, don't worry, I'll come right back!" and he was in the same pose. I went further, looked back in paranoia, he hadn't moved, but I lost my nerve. What if....so I ran back to him, giving up on the cache.

Then I led him to the pond's edge and let him graze. I ate my sandwich. Then I looked down for some reason and saw the most enormous, hideous frog of my life, sitting squarely between his front hooves. So huge, he took up the entire space between his two front hooves. I got naseus because the frog's skin was all slimy and warty. I couldn't handle the thought of Baasha stepping on such a thing. I very shakily asked Baasha to back up. "Slowly, back up, slowly please, don't step on it..slowly..."

Caution! Disgusting picture below!
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I warned you!
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I let Baasha look at the hideous thing, and it tried to hop away. I say tried cuz apparently this frog is as old as the hills, and he couldn't really manage a good hop. He kind of flopped forward and landed on his big nasty face. I cringed. He tried again, a slow-motion, flopping hop, that didn't get him but a half-frog length further from us. He rolled his beady eyes up at us, and rested a while, exhausted. I was transfixed. I couldn't leave this freak of nature. Baasha was not impressed, I guess big bumpy-skinned frogs are not new to him. I started taking pictures. You can't tell how big he is, but those are normal sized alder leaves next to him, not tiny minature alder leaves.

I tossed the rest of my sandwich in the pond, and suddenly there was a commotion. These gold and red flecked fish started eating my sandwich! They were beautiful, I'd never seen such fish. No idea what kind.

It was hard to leave that spot, but 30 or 40 minutes later, we finally did. I led Baasha a lot cuz his feet are really sensitive to rock lately, I don't know why, maybe the new medicine, or maybe he passed the breaking point for how long he can stay tough when standing on wet grass and mud all day and night. *sigh* Easyboot Epics are on order.

We were standing near the top of a hill, I was looking down at the view in the valley below, when suddenly this loud clattering sound came nearer and nearer. I thought it must be a herd of galloping shod horses on the gravel. Louder and louder, freaky. Baasha very slowly moved behind me for protection. (so cute!) Not horses. Nordic Walkers. Those crazy european walking stick people! Scaring my horse! That's just not natural.

I wonder what he thinks of the walking stick people. "Look, humans who are trying to simulate animals by attaching another set of legs to themselves!" Clever attempt, but scary result.

All of the walking stick people, all 12 or so, suddenly saw us, realized my horse was in OMGOSH mode, and they very politely picked up their sticks and held them as they passed, which was nice, but I was hoping he could get used to it.

We made it home before dark and I gave him his dinner in his stall. That little jerk pony baby ate half of his tail this week, so I'm applying this "anti-bite" bitter spray to his tail, which makes it sticky, dirty, and horrible smelling. I'm a clean-tail fanatic, but it's better that he have a tail, than have a clean one that's eaten all up. I want those ponies GONE. (They will be, eventually.) I have to admit, when I pulled big half-eaten chunks of Baasha's lovely white tail out and they fell to the ground, a bad word came to my mind. But I don't usually have potty mouth, so I will just say "that little jerk!"

I'm delighted to see that Baasha is not being his normal herd-bound self. Perhaps cuz they aren't especially nice to him, (but that doesn't usually matter!) I don't know. What I do know is he is always happy to see me, happy to leave them and come into the barn. He often falls asleep while I'm doting over him, so I think he really likes this private time of safety with me. And all the munchies. But when I turn him back into the field, he doesn't go running or even walking off to see the other horses, he just kind of hangs near the gate, and browses around for grass. He's not pathologically attached to them! Hello, what's this? My horse is behaving better than ever before. Is it cuz I'm there every other day? I don't know, but I couldn't be happier.