Our Saturday makeup session turned out to be somewhat of a marathon. Training began at 0800, but it took the students 90 minutes to put their saddles on. That is okay, at first, as you want to make sure everyone knows what to do. Sometimes the quickest way to move a herd, is slowly.
After we finally got into the arena, we practiced column movements to get the students used to moving from a single file to a column of twos and back again. We also practiced "left to a line" and "right to a line" from a column. The students were having a little more luck with their horses, this time, as their self confidence and understanding of cues improved.
Unfortunately, while practicing column movements, Cochise kicked Charlie in the right leg. The kick landed on the inside of his upper leg, near the stifle joint. Charlie was limping, so I turned the class over to the other instructor so I could tend to Charlie. I asked the other instructor to have the students remove their saddles and try bareback for a while.
I didn't see much of the rest of the lesson, other than a quick peak while they were trying to mount bareback. That is always a funny scene. I can't jump as high as I once did, but some people can't jump at all. From a distance it looked like some of them weren't able to jump higher than about two inches. Some, however, were able to get up without too much trouble. Eventually, everyone got aboard with a little assistance from the instructor.
The training went on for about four hours altogether with about two hours of that spent on horseback. The training was good and the weather was good. The students seem to be really getting into it.
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