Oct. 8, 2008

Wednesday and Thursday October 8, 2008- October 9, 2008
From hanging out with friends the night before and having one last ice cream get together to finally getting home late the night before and doing some final packing, I believe I got a total of 2.5 hours of sleep before the big day. That was my fault. Maybe I’ll learn one of these days to prepare better.
I was very cool and relaxed about the whole thing this morning. I was very ready and I was only trying to remember last minute things until the transport came and the chubby old man missing his bottom four front teeth arrived much earlier than said and he rushed me. That kind of got me out of sorts but I handled it well with Beth and Mez’s help. We got all trunks and loads of baggage in the trailer and then I was preparing Roode who was so cool about all of it. I think he was the best he has ever been with preparing him to load and travel. Maybe he was just so surprised about the whole rush that he was just totally aloof to what was happening. And then, Roode loaded and all ready to go, I went off and completely forgot his fleece cooler. It was the nice one that I just bought last winter. What a bummer!
The Trailer ride to JFK was smooth and not to mention we arrived an hour early. The whole time there was surveillance in the back so that I could see Roode from the front. That was cool. The driver and I shared a little philosophy on on-time matters. He said he doesn’t like the guys who like to arrive the minute that was planned. He thinks you should always be at least an hour early. He said, “If you’re early, you’re on time and if you’re on time, you’re LATE!” I agree but not by an hour…maybe 30 seconds. We actually drove right off of the farm property to the minute he was just supposed to be arriving. Humph…
Once at JFK, we had 6 hours of quarantine. It went very well and it was boring. There were 9 other Arabian mares that were all in foal being shipped to Morocco. They were terrible when it came time to load and go to the tarmac. The first mare left and then they really started screaming. I thought Roode might start getting concerned and do the same but he turned to the far corner and pinned his ears as if to say “Please make it stop”. My ears were hurting too. Then he loaded fine with a trailer to himself and I went to meet him at the tarmac. I waited and waited. The other horses were there, getting loaded in their boxes and still no sign of Roode…hmmm. So, I took pictures of his box (I will post) and I waited some more. By this time I was sort of checking in with myself, ‘I should be exhausted, but I’m not…must be adrenaline’ (It was). It turned out that the holdup was getting through security. Some security pass card declined and then that is a very big deal. Anyway, so to the cool part, I got to load Roode in his box and he marched right on. He was a champ. Locked in and ready to go, I then took cool pictures and the “handsome for older men”…Dutchmen vet/grooms checked him out and I went to regular check in for the flight and loaded with the regular crew and went to the back and anxiously stood by the cargo door. By the way the flight was a KLM half passenger half cargo plane. That was very cool. Through the tiny back emergency door window I watched them load the horses. The lifts that they used were so incredible. It’s really hard to describe but the platform lift had these roller like things and they would pull the box on and put it into place and then it would lift to the height of the cargo and then roll the box on and then the same little roller things were in the plane and they could move the box directly where they wanted and then the box locks on tracks and then it is clamped on the bottom all around. Usually he won’t eat at all while traveling, but by this time (I believe it was 11pm), he was starving. Once all cargo was locked down and it was safe for me to go back to him, I climbed in his box with him and he was munching away at his hay and I stood there with him until after takeoff. I think I was more weirded out for the take off than he was. He didn’t move a limb. He just was a little wide eyed, and I think my eyes were wider. He went back to chewing hay and I watched us fly beside NYC thru his little window. The city lights were amazing from the night sky and then the plane turned and I couldn’t see anymore. Way to kill the romance huh? So, I went to my seat in the passenger area and I was out like a light. I got a little less than 6 hours I think and all I remember is waking up to the intercom saying prepare for landing and it was very bright outside.
October 9, 2008
I looked out the window and saw the beautiful Holland and I went back with Roode who looked like he may have had a good snooze too. The landing was just fine and relaxed. No biggy. I unloaded myself and almost had a little panic as I thought I might never find the horse hotel. But, the cool and logical part of me kicked in quick and I found it just fine. It would not have mattered if it would have taken me all day anyhow. I had to wait another 6 hours because of some missing papers on one of the other horses so I couldn’t leave either. I did a good job embarrassing myself in the meantime though. I thought I would just sit on this little ledge in the middle of the horse hotel and rest my eyes, but I fell asleep and woke up falling to the ground. I caught myself fine I wasn’t hurt at all but everyone saw it and chuckled.
I felt sorry for Roode having to stand in that box for the far more than necessary hours. But, I was eventually able to unload him and I walked him around until he looked a little more relaxed to load into a trailer again and then get to Germany. The drive to Germany was fine and uneventful, though it seemed like forever. At about 10pm on the 9th, we finally arrived to Fleyenhof. Roode was very happy as was I and he rolled and had his first meal since noon yesterday, the 8th.
The family I will be staying with came and picked up me and all my things and I went to sleep at 1:30am.

Flight Oct. 8th

So, this Wednesday is the beginning of a very big Journey for Roode and I. We fly to Germany Oct. 8th to begin our training at Fleyenhof with Hubertus Schmidt. I will keep posts here for the remainder of the year and the coming year '09. This will be a dedicated spot to journaling all entries for the experience ahead. I hope you enjoy them and ask anything you like.
The following entries were from previous months and have nothing to do with the big move.
Auf Wiedersehen!
Katie and Roode

Roode is doing very well! He got his highest score yet at the PSG at a show two weeks ago in Mystic. He got a 68.750% with a score of 72.750% from the judge at C. It was awesome and here's just a pic of him for a photo that was needed for The European trip I'm going on in 3 weeks!

Robert Dover

Last Weekend(May 17 and 18th) Roode and I rode as a Prix St. George Demonstration for auditors with Robert Dover. It was incredible to say the least. I've learned a lot. Roode was not super great but I'd rather him that than perfect with nothing to work on. He was basicly figity in the mouth and Robert helped with gaining that connection through leg driving aids and building Roode's confidence. He also helps with me gaining a real understanding of the quality of canter in which Roode must go! And boy, Roode was jumping. He was working harder than anything he had done in a while...we both were.

Before I even arrived to Massachusetts for the symposium, getting Roode ready to go was wild! After I gave him a bath and pulled some mane, he knew something was up and he turned into a very naughty, fire -breathing dragon. Then, he just almost couldn't contain himself once on the trailer but once moving he calmed. It was pouring rain when we arrived and finally my saddle came and we were able to get it fitted while there and it was super through the weekend. All 8 horses in the clinic were geldings and they all were very content all weekend. And it also stayed dry for the weekend and then started to rain again when leaving on Sunday. : ) and Roode was fine for the trip home...completely fine.

And then this entire week we've just continued with the same work and Roode just keeps getting better. Tomorrow, sat. and Sunday, We are having a Henk van Bergen clinic here at the farm and I am very excited..more to come. 5/24-25/'08.

Hot Stuff

Today, Roode was alright. We started work in the field and I think he was a little overwhelmed with the nice weather and working outside again. soo... he was a little had to contain and he wanted to just kind of blow through me and I had a tough time getting my half halts to really go through his body. But he got better and with all his energy, he became better with his HOT attitude. We then went into the arena to finish work with half steps and canter work. Roode did very well with the half step work. The issue there is only that he has an extreme talent for it but the rider has to be very correct. My half halts sometimes give the wrong message when I'm asking for collected walk or the passage. But, all in all he really sat down and gave a lovely passage that transitioned with the hind leg and ended nicely.

The canter work was a little frustrating. His shoulders get down hill and he stops moving his neck with the motion and the tempo can lose 3 beat. But we ended successfully. I'll add the positive...only I get frustrated when I cannot explain this problem and fix it.

Saturday

Yesterday, Sat., Roode was better. We did lots of canter work which put him in a big sweat. The focus was increasing his impulsion and drive. He tends to skate out from underneath the rider by becoming hollow in the back and not using those muscles to his advantage. and then with that he does a lot of leg movement in an incorrect way. I didn't think it felt so great because I didn't feel at close enough contact with his body. but Beth said it got better and better. So, today, Sunday I'm going to ride him again. Usually he gets Sundays off. But I think he needs a motion feild day! So I'm going to work him all around the feild in hopes to rock his world with soem more fun stuff. Because I decided that maybe he's just bored with everything that we've been working on because he was really nervous about the work yesterday...I think he was taking me for granted and thought I wasn't serious...well, yest. he figured out that I was. :) too ta loo...

First Day back to work.

Today was Roode's first day back to work. We were just playing around with getting him to move his hind legs quicker. Beth and I had discussed how we've been so adament about training him to wait for me and wait for me over and over again and in a way it has trained him to slow the legs. But this can be good in both ways. The top horses run away with their riders and so it's just the same with him. In my frustration, I think a day like today is not so good because he felt like he was not using his body as best he could. Granted, he did have four days off. So, I'll give more credit to the both of us. As well, he was successful in increasing the tempo of his gaits. Only, the rythm was inconsistant as well as the height of the neck. Today he was powerful but not strong. The great thing about Roode is that he may not do something well the first day trying but the next he has picked it up fine. He is also going to quit his daily wormer because I think it is just not so good and I've heard that it can contribute to lack of muscle development which is exactly what he does not need taken away from him and we're going to start strength training with cavelletti.

So, I think this is pretty much it for today. Oh, and he also had a very long turn out. First one in three days... that's stinky, but I took him on a lot of grazing walks which were actually better than the paddocks.