Traverse Creek Ranch

An ordinary hot saturday in July at Traverse Creek Ranch

Trigger

As some of You already know I have a dream about completing The Tevis Cup Ride on an Icelandic Horse. My original plan was to buy an already trained horse, spend two years of conditioning the horse and getting synchronized as a team. Since all my efforts to find a suitable, trained horse didn´t exactly work out as I planned, I made some adjustments to my plan. I actually like this new plan even better. Especially since I found a horse that I really believe in. The fact that this horse isn´t started under saddle might change the time schedule, maybe. On the other hand I got the horse that I want and he doesn´t have any baggage when it comes to having a rider on his back and fears on the trail. Everything is new and up to the two of us to explore together. I really like that! It´s of a much higher value than anything. He got the conformation, perfect age to be started(6)  and good natural gaits.

He is still in his old home in Oregon. The Coggins and health certificate is ready and I hope that I will be able to go and get him soon. Everything depends on the little Girl in my belly and what she decides to do the next following days ;)

While I´m waiting I made some preparations for his arrival. I ordered the right kind of minerals that he will need to stay healthy and strong. He´s moving from very high altitude to 2200ft at our place. On altitudes over 2400ft it´s very uncommon with summer eczema, below that it´s better to do everything in one´s power to build a strong immune system before anything bad starts.

I found this excellent website that carry organic minerals for horses and other animals. They have specialized minerals for Icelandic Horses.

 http://myfineequine.com/

 I also started to think about our training. How I´m going to plan everything, in which order, what kind of tack I´m going to use (I want to start him bitless and barefoot), where I will do the first basic training (I´m borrowing a round pen from one of our neighbors) etc.. In the end of course everything is up to Flaxi, the horse. He´s going to have all the time in the world to get comfortable in his new home and with me but I like to have a plan. The major ingredients in my plan is: time, love, consistency, variation and to have fun. Nothing is more important than a good foundation. I´m very eager to start bonding with him. He´s going to live on a pasture near the house so I can have some kind of interaction with him several times every day.

I´ve started to write a book about Philip´s and my dream to ride The Tevis together, our efforts to get there and why I choose to ride an Icelandic horse when it would be so much easier to just buy an Arab and ride like everybody else. It´s all going to be about “Icelandic Horse Power”. I already have the first two chapters of the book. The introduction; from now on it´s going to be about how Flaxi and I start from zero and how we have a lot of fun exploring the trails together. If he think it´s as much fun as I hope he will the book will end with the two of us completing The Tevis together. I will provide the training, care and partnership that is needed the rest is up to Flaxi. A happy, healthy horse that enjoys our time together is most important to me…but it would be awesome to do something like The Tevis..

I spent the morning working on my book and when it got too hot inside we all went to our pond.