Joey Day20

Ok this started out well and ended well. I think. I just wanted to go slow and soft with him. So saddled him and lunged him to warm him up. We did the normal exercises and worked on yielding sideways, also transitions up and down. He did real well. I took him out in the yard and got on and worked on the softening exercises then took off down the road. We cantered and trotted. Did lots of circles. I got to the place where I want to cross a ditch with lots of water in it, but he didn't want to cross. So I worked him as I would to teach him to load, only I trotted down the road, did a half way roll back and then back past the spot, stopped, did another half way kinda roll back. We did this several times then let him stop in front of the water. Then we did some circles, disengaging, shoulders over, etc. then came back to that spot and let him rest. We did this probably a half dozen times. He would put his face down to the water, almost put a hoof in. But we did not get it done today. We ran out of time and I still had to ride 1/2 mile back. We crossed paths with a consumers power truck, which he handled real well and several other cars. When we got back I had him doing collected circles and backing up with softness. Then we quit. I hope to work him tomorrow in the a.m. before I go to the clinic again this week. We have accomplished all the goals we set out to do in my training setup. So now it is just refining everything. See ya next time.