wow usually I'm the one wishing I could be riding a curly but this summer I got to ride mostly a couple of times a week. It was GRAND!!!
Yesterday, however, we did "ground work" and I would be a lot more accurate calling it airs-above-the-ground work. I decided to take Prairie for a walk which I have done before and it's been fun - just give her most of the 15' lead and go for a stroll in the desert so I get my exercise too. After the first 5 minutes I thought she was stung by a bee (no bees out there!!) She jumped straight in the air, i could see the horizon under her belly - feet going every which way, rearing, plunging just being crazy. I tried to walk her but decided it was just not going to happen so we went back to the arena and longed for a bit. She did one more silly bucking spree and settled down to a nice long low canter - which I asked for, with transitions and reversals, for 20 minutes or so - then we tried the walk again with much better results.
She's probably never going to be the kind of horse that you can just hop on and go - she just HAS to get the kinks out and with a crippled failing pasture mate that can't play with her, she doesn't burn off the energy in her pasture - she waits for some stimulation in the form of Mom wanting to do something. I'm just grateful she seems to be more careful when I'm on her but oh my that girl can MOVE!!!
I should have known - when I went to get her and opened the gate, she bowed her neck and shook her head and took off at a bit of a passage with her tail up. Not ready to settle down on a quiet walk!