Riding the Greenway Trails

Cathy and I camped at the Florida Horse Park this past weekend and were able to get in three different trails we've been wanting to.

Friday was dreary and rainy, so we delayed heading to Ocala until 1pm. No sense in hurrying up to set up camp in the rain. By the time we arrived around 3 pm, the rain had stopped with just an occasional mist. We got the horses comfortable, set up camp and met the other folks who had come up from South Florida Trail Riders and were camping in the same area.

Saturday morning was overcast but perfect for riding so we headed West through the FHP trails towards the I-95 Landbridge trail. After crossing over I-95, we enjoyed the section called Christmas which took us to the 49th Ave underpass. Since that was a 2 hour journey, we headed back towards the park for a total 4 hour ride. After having a nice lunch back at camp, we set up our chairs to watch some polo. There was also a horse show going on in the park for pony jumpers. (Ponies that jump - not people that jump over ponies:-)

Sunday dawned crisp and clear and the plan was to break camp and trailer the horses to the Shangrila trailhead which is only a 15 minute drive from the park. We found the Shangrila trailhead being well used, with about 6 trailers there ahead of us. We decided to head back East and ride the Shangrila trail back to the 49th Ave trailhead where we left off the day before. We really enjoyed the Shangila trail the best. It had a lot of winding single track trails with some gentle hills. (There are more challenging trails and hills available on some loop trails that go off from the main yellow trail that we followed). The ride with a quick rest stop at 49th was right at three hours.

We plan to get back sometime this fall/winter season and hit some more of the sections available. We'd like to go east from the FHP and ride to the Santos trailhead as well as continuing west from Shangrila and going to Ross Prairie.

Here are more photos of our rides. PICS

Time to de-stress

Do you ever feel like there's just not enough time to get everything done? I'm trying to simply my life by prioritizing , doing what's important and cutting out the crap. My work has really been stressing me out lately, seems like I don't have a spare moment anymore. Don't get me wrong, I'm very grateful to have a job that allows me to have most Fridays off, pays well and affords me 4 weeks vacation a year..... but sometimes I wonder what it would be like to just go to work for Target as an hourly employee - no decision making, no deadlines, no stress.........

So Saturday, a couple of friends and I joined a BIG benefit ride and had a wonderful stress free day riding our ponies, meeting new people and riding new trails. You can see more pictures and a narrative of that ride at my other blog First Coast Trail Blazers. You won't believe some of the trailers that I saw and the horses.... beautiful ones, fugly ones, fat ones, skinny ones, old ones, babies that shouldn't have been ridden....... you get the picture. With 160 riders you get to see everything.

Marilyn & Spirit

Traci on Tucker & Cathy on Busta

Sunday started off great - went to church and then lunch with my husband and mom. Dropped Mom off at Wal-Mart while Bobby and I headed home to meet our trimmer. We were trimming every 4 weeks, but this time we held off until 6 weeks and he was very pleased with how both girls did. He barely had to nip anything, mostly rasped and cleaned up their bars. That's good news, our diligent work has paid off and I think the venice turpentine has helped toughen up Stylin's soles. Bobby power washed the horse trailers and I slung poop and did some chores around the yard. At 4:00 my phone buzzed and when I looked at it, it said "W&O Party". OMG! I had forgotten all about a company get together that I couldn't miss and it was a good hours drive away! Thank goodness I put it in my phone calendar and set the reminder with enough time for me to get ready and drive out there. The dinner was actually good and I got to catch up with our national managers that I only get to see a couple times a year. So that's been my weekend..... how was yours?

Friday Beach Fun

Cathy played hooky from work and we loaded up the ponies and went to Mickler's Landing in Palm Valley/Ponte Vedra Beach.

We took our time... no agenda, no pressures, even packing some brewskis for after the ride. The day started out grey and overcast, but the sun came out and it got pretty hot while we were riding. We didn't manage to get the horses in the water, but we did get them comfortable riding right near the edge. Stylin and I did lots of turns towards the water to keep her thinking.

Because of the front, the surf was rougher than usual (the surfers were diggin' it) and it was crashing kind of hard. Our horses performed some lovely side passes a la Merlin the Bullfighting horse. :-) The coquina sand was soft and Stylin and Busta hard to work a little harder than usual. At least we didn't have any crazy kites attacking us this time.

I think after a few more times we'll have them cruisig thru the surf with no problem like the rental horses we saw while we were there.

Here's the rest of the pictures I took........ PHOTO ALBUM

New Addition to the Family

Zambito Oaks has a new family member..... Scamper the kitten. (name subject to change :) I've been thinking about a new kitten since one of the barn cats came up missing about 5 months ago, but I really wanted an inside cat. Last week, a friend at work came to me with a sad story about a little kitten that had been found in someone's pool skimmer. I came home, asked my husband what he thought and then decided to go ahead and get the kitten. Well.... he turned out to be an adorable Siamese cross and when I took him to the vet this weekend, he was pronounced a healthy 13 week kitten. The vet gave him a shot, some drops in his nose and eyes and said as soon as he gets his permanent teeth we can get his rabies shot and get him neutered. The dogs have adjusted to him and I'm sure will succumb to his playful nature soon.

I participated in a Poker Ride at Princess Place Preserve on Saturday and we couldn't have ordered up a nicer day. The group that was hosting the ride did an awesome job of keeping everything organized. There were 70 riders and no accidents! You can see more pics of the ride HERE. The pic above is Cathy on my horse Dixie and Michelle on Cathy's horse Busta. Michelle has been tuning up Busta for Cathy and yes, adults can have fun too !!