[Chewbacca]

Because I know how much you all love watching them

http://youtu.be/ARy4YJYz8FM

[RMJacobs]

Very nice! He sure seems to be calm about traffic. Salt is, too. My new neighbor was in a panic the other day because her husband was on the way in hauling a backhoe, and I was out with Salt. As expected, Salt didn't even twitch an ear at the truck, trailer and backhoe. We have two neighbors with eighteen wheelers, and he doesn't mind them either. He will even tolerate the air horn going off nearby. Aren't these calm horses wonderful!

Rebecca

[Chewbacca]

Aren't these calm horses wonderful!

Beyond a doubt.

This was actually only the 2nd time I've taken Chewbacca up to the side of the highway, which is 2 miles from the barn. He doesn't mind it one bit, but I don't go there often, of course. I've also had the hackney up that way, too. He's perfectly fine about the traffic, but there are other things he's not so sure about.

I love utilizing the roads for my driving, just as much as I enjoy working in the arena or on the trail. I'm thrilled to have horses that are perfectly capable of working in all 3 scenarios, too. I feel very lucky to have them.

[JustJet]

I love your video's!! Your horse is such a steady-Eddy I love him. My QH is broke to drive, but I'm not sure he'd be that reliable in traffic. Good job and keep them coming!

[RMJacobs]

If I didn't drive on the road, I wouldn't be able to drive at all. But the roads I drive on are mostly dirt and mostly very quiet. I can do an hour's drive some days and not see a car, although that is rare--usually we see one or two. Then we'll sometimes get a whole bunch of weird vehicles in a row--fire trucks with lights going, road graders, garbage trucks. Salt is pretty good about all of that, and Crackers, who was very spooky, was surprisingly good too. It was the mundane stuff that got to Crackers--newspapers, mailboxes, squirrels. He was such a nut.

I forget which horse I had out one day when I had a helicopter land right near us. I thought that would be a challenge, but it wasn't. I think it must have been Salt. Both of them were/are good about military jets screaming overhead because they were living near an air force base when I got them.

One time shortly after I started driving, Crackers and I were going up a paved road and ended up with a line painting truck right behind us. The paint was hissing and the motor was very loud--the thing was huge. Crackers was actually OK with it (although I worried if he could have seen it he would have freaked). I was so mad at the guy driving it that I called the county to complain when I got home. Supposedly the guy had horses and should have known better to hang a couple of feet behind my cart all the way up the road. I held our position because I was afraid if we went off into someone's yard to let them by, Crackers would have a melt down when he saw it. But you never know--I might not have given him enough credit.

Rebecca

[greentree]

What a great horse! How fun to watch.

Could you do me a favor? Please put that phone in your pocket. It won't do any good if you hit something with a wheel and get pitched from the carriage.

My public service announcement for the day....

[Chewbacca]

Greentree... good point. I don't trust it wont fall out of my pockets. I either put it in the dash, or... well, sometimes I put it in my bra for safe keeping. lol.

[RMJacobs]

I always keep my phone on my body somewhere--in a deep pocket or in a secure holster. I keep a small pack attached to the cart for sunglasses, gloves, etc., but the phone is never in the pack--I always worried about being separated from horse and cart (I shudder at the thought) with my phone running off with the horse. It's never happened, and I sure hope it never does, but I'm paranoid!

Rebecca

[greentree]

Thanks for backing me up on this!! A good friend got tossed out of her carriage when it hit a root. If her phone had not been in her pocket, she would have bled to death from the compound fracture of her leg.

Her horse did not leave, but she could not have gotten up into the carriage to get to the phone!

Nancy

[RMJacobs]

Holy cow, Greentree! I never thought about a situation like that. Thanks for making me feel like I've been doing the right thing all these years!

A funny side note (although it wasn't funny at the time). I have mobility issues due to rheumatoid arthritis, so I always have my phone on me, even at home. One day I took a very short walk just to get some fresh air after being cooped up due to snow, and slipped on a patch of ice. I landed on the pocket that had the phone in it, and hurt myself badly enough that I couldn't seem to roll over enough to get to it. Luckily the phone didn't break, and neither did I, but I really struggled to get to the darned phone. By the time I reached it, I felt good enough to get up and walk home, so I did. Silly, huh? But at least a horse wasn't involved! That would have complicated things for sure.

Rebecca