Endurance.Net Ridecamp Archives

From: Rae Callaway <tallcarabians@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>

> Kat - you ride in a more?mountainous area, right?
> ? So, your view of single track trail would consist
> of drop offs on the sides?
Single track trail around here doesn't always include drop offs (but often it 
does in which case not only is it not safe to get off the trail sometimes it 
isn't even safe to get off your horse), however, even when it doesn't include 
drop offs getting off the trail someimes includes boulders, cactus, or even 
California Chapparal (which is defined as dense undergrowth for which the best 
way to get through its is to get down on your hands and knees or on your belly 
and slither like a snake).? 

It is possible to find safe places to get off a single track trail, less 
possible to find a safe place for three people to get off the trail.? But if I 
have stopped at one of these places, then the people behind me can pass me by 
going by me, they don't have to "go around" (as was reported in the original 
story--which may just have been a poor choice of words on the part of the story 
teller). 

Whether this was the right thing to do or the right thing to say for me depends 
on whether it was a good place for three people to stop because a bleeding 
mouth isn't a good enough reason to stop in a bad place.? Around these parts 
there are certainly lots of single track trails where it would be a bad place 
to stop.? 

Some of them are such bad places to stop that NOBODY would dream of stopping 
there.? This, obviously, wasn't one of those types of places since riders 
behind WERE able to get past.? But there are other places that I would describe 
merely as "inconvenient" places to stop (such that the only way for other 
people to get by is to get really close to my horse), and I wouldn't consider a 
bleeding mouth a good enough reason to stop in this kind of "inconvenient" 
place either (as the chances for mishap when unfamiliar horses get really close 
to each other are serious enough that I wouldn't want to take that risk).

If I am going to stop to do an investigation of my horse's mouth, there has to 
be room for me to get WELL off the trail (especially if two friends are going 
to stop with me).? If I want to check my horse's mouth,?I am going to have to 
be up by my horse's head, and, as a consequence, have little control over what 
my horse is doing with its hind end, and if it has a serious wound in its 
mouth--and if it doesn't they why am I checking it--then it is probably going 
to "fuss" about my inspection, in which case, my non-ability to control the 
horse's hind end may cause some problems for any people who might go by on the 
trail unless I am sufficiently off the trail that my horse's hind end is of no 
concern to people on the trail.? Having to "go around" on a single track trail 
the uncontrolled hind end of a strange horse that is fussing....


...well, let's just say that _I_ could see myself, in this situation,?saying 
"it isn't as if there were anything that could be done about it now anyway." 
Although I would probably preface it by "You know, this isn't really a good 
place to stop to check that."? And I would try to say it in as inoffensive way 
as I possibly could (which is what I am trying to do now), but it might not be 
perceived that way.

Yes, the welfare of my horse is important, but not as important as the welfare 
of other people and their horses, so if by stopping at an inconvenient place I 
am creating a situation that increases the risks to other horses and riders, 
then that inconvenient place is the wrong place to stop.? And yes, a goodly 
number of the single track trails around these parts meet this description of 
"an inconvenient place to stop."? Even more of them meet the description of an 
inconvenient place for three people to stop.? I simply don't know if the place 
in the story in question met this description (but the fact that a more 
experienced endurance rider than me felt compelled to make such a comment 
suggests that it might have).

kat
Orange County, Calif.
:)

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