ridecamp@endurance.net: Gelding Bashing

Gelding Bashing

Karen Steenhof (steenhof@cyberhighway.net)
Mon, 29 Sep 1997 06:52:31 -0600

OK. I have to step in on this one. My gelding is better than any compass
I've ever owned. Over the years, he has gotten me out of more situations
than I'd like to remember. Unlike the mares many have mentioned, his
strategy is to find the way he came in and follow it back. He never misses
a turn, and he has never left me at the edge of a cliff!

One time we were riding in the Owyhee canyonlands country when it started
raining. The fog was completely disorienting, and the cold was approaching
levels that cause hypothermia. I was with my friend who is an expert at
mounted orienteering. She consulted her maps and plotted a route back for
us. My gelding, who is usually as herd bound as any horse, refused to go
with the group and insisted on his own way back. What a dilemma for me! I
had no idea where I was: should I trust my friend's map-reading skills or
should I trust my horse, who had never let me down? It turned out they
were both right. My friend wanted to take a more direct route (that might
have lead to unmapped features like fences, locked gates etc.); my horse
wanted to find the trail we had come in on. After a few miles, our paths
met up, and we made it safely to the trailers (albeit wet and cold).

Now, my gelding gets this disgusted look on his face every time the "women
get their maps out," as if to say "Here we go again, they are going to get
themselves lost again, and I'm going to have to save them again!"

Karen Steenhof
Boise, Idaho
steenhof@cyberhighway.net

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