White Horse Pilgrim

Odd things

It was a day of surprises.

An old aeroplane with more than the usual number of wings flew across. This isn't bad for an image blown up from a speck on a photo taken on full zoom with a pocket camera. It's the tail-end of the air display season and almost every weekend I see aeroplaces from the Second World War flying overhead. However the likes of a triplane from the First World War are very much rarer.

Out on the trail I was surprised to see an official sign closing the route. Meanwhile a printed notice pinned to a tree told me what I needed to know - the problem was a fallen tree. That would not stop Brena and I. However I expect that it detered plenty of hikers who were directed to walk along a highway instead. How that could be any safer I fail to understand! But officialdom had deflected liability from its tree so someone must have been happy.

Here is the culprit, now cut into pieces. Isn't it amazing how the nanny state seeks to "protect" people from the slightest thing that is out of place. This spot is a couple of miles from the nearest car park therefore beyond the range of rank-and-file day-trippers. If someone could not step across the fallen tree, there was plenty of space to walk around it. Back in Transylvania we crossed such fallen trees on almost every trail. Once we spent a merry hour getting through a newly storm-ravaged wood where literally hundreds of trees lay fallen in a jumble one after another.

Then it was back to the trailer for Brena to graze and me to drink coffee as our shadows lengthened. I sat on the grass contented at the end of a pleasant ride. We'd walked, trotted and cantered nicely, though I had learned that my hip is not quite fully healed - to my surprise one trot diagonal caused a slight twinge of pain. The other diagonal was fine. Whilst I sat and thought, Brena mowed a semicircle of grass down to its roots. Each of us was happy, and I'd have liked to stay longer up there. But I needed to get home: ironically to mow the lawn. Now if I could contract that task to Brena.....

 

Weather impact

I didn't get to ride because of the weather. Not so much because it rained during the evening - in fact the weather dried up nicely - but because the railway between work and home was struck by lightning. That knocked out the signals, which led to delays until repairs were made.

An airport control tower was struck too, which stopped operations for a while forcing planes to divert. In other areas flooding has been reported. I am just glad that, for the most part, this country is not hot or dry enough for wildfires to break out.

In a now dry early evening the two horses enjoyed their dinner. Whilst they ate I pulled ragwort from the field. This poisonous plant is becoming quite a nuisance. As budgets are cut, it spreads along roads and paths, infiltrating farmland.

Their neighbour is around forty years old and has little in the way of teeth. She cannot graze - though she tries - so lives on a special mash diet up to her knees in grass.

My two would level that field in no time. However such is the fear of laminitis that no other horse has been put in their to graze it down. This is a very reasonable precaution on land that has been re-sown with dairy grass.

Now all of the fields are taken. The farm has a delightful feel, with several dozen horses all turned out. Where fields meet they gather in small groups, grooming across the fences or simply congregating. In the long evenings there is activity right past nine at night, with horses being schooled or ridden around the farm. Sometimes I get back as late as ten.

Brena's feet are standing up to the work, though chipped and worn. She does have curious upright feet with great wide coronary bands. I could neaten them with a rasp, however I think that the less removed (and the more hoof material remaining in place) the better. I do remove broken fragments that are hanging off, however that is rather a cosmetic exercise.

She is sound on all surfaces but does choose her path carefully, as I would expect a natural horse to do so. I select places to trot and canter based on the going rather than simply where I feel like it. That, too, is an impact of the weather - springy going after rain or hard as iron in the dry spells.

Anyway we have five days of fine settled weather forecast. There will be plenty of riding. However it may be slow going on the bone-dry ground.

Here...

Here, the intersection of the timeless moment
Is England and nowhere. Never and always.

Back to the tight-knit wisdom of the Four Quartets. Isn't it strange - an exile returned from Transylvania owning a Slovenian mare in a place where Saxons strove with Vikings?

To begin with one adjourns to a foreign and becomes an exile. Then, if roots do not take in the new soil, one becomes an exile everywhere. Finally, identity complete, one is not an exile anywhere. One is no-one and everyman, resident and wanderer.

Yet the open spaces beckon. Why is it that one place feels more like home than another? Can it be that landscape and history draw me?

In Transylvania my neighbours were interesting and I spent much time with some of them. We had time for one-another. Here I see little of neighbours. This land is landscape and history, and these at least fascinate. The people are too busy with the things that they do. In this we are all guilty, me included.

It's curious. I've found my identity. But what about the identity of the place where I live? It's defined by people long departed. What of the people today: what is their identity? Now we are all so mixed up. What a contrast to my Carpathian village where neighbours knew precisely who they were.

Moving the field shelter

A fresh wind and dry weather have combined to banish all but the most persistant mud. It was time to implement my plan to move the field shelter.

The aim was to relocate it at the northwest corner of Brena's field, blocking off the point nearest to Doru. Whilst he shows little interest in mares, I gather that Brena has been curious about him. The two fields are staggered slightly however at the near corners mare and stallion could almost touch noses.

This type of field shelter sits on steel skids and is marketed as "mobile". The main reason is that, not being "fixed", no planning consent is needed for erecting one of these shelters.

Not everything performs quite as advertised.

However to my delight the field shelter proved to be just as "mobile" behind a small truck as the manufacturer had claimed.

I slipped the towing chains that came with the shelter over the ball hitch, engaged 4WD low ratio, gently took up the slack and set off. With surprising ease the shelter slid along behind. It was no trouble at all to move.

The towing chains were inclined upwards towards the ball hitch, helpfully lifting the fronts of the skids and putting weight onto the back wheels. 

It was good to see that the move hadn't left scars across the pasture. Despite the fragility of the ground I had done no damage.

The tricky bit was to draw the shelter up to the fence. However I had brought my old Transylvanian logging chains complete with hand forged hooks. Driving around to the far side of the fence I used those longer chains to pull the shelter into place. This was the only time that traction proved a little short, requiring some thoughtful driving.

Finally I threw some hay into the shelter at which point it became interesting to Brena. Incidentally this is the first day of 2011 when she isn't wearing a rug.

All in all this was a satisfying exercise and one that I had been waiting for dry conditions to accomplish.

However I do wish that I could post a video clip showing a truck pulling a shelter around a field.

Good news

Today it was announced that our government has abandoned its deeply unpopular plan to sell our public forests. A massive campaign of opposition to the sale has borne fruit.

For now our forests are safe from sale to banks, corporations and private speculators. People will remain able to walk, ride and bicycle in our forests. New owners won't be able to shut us out.

Our government has raised taxes and thrown many people out of work. But they have not succeeded in separating the people from the forests that are a part of our heritage and a valuable recreation space.

A period of madness has ended. But the people must remain vigilant. They must remain ready to stand up and be counted.

Bizarre times

These are strange times. Nevertheless going out to see the horses on a dark evening made life seem a little brighter: an odd statement that.

There are moments who I feel like going into exile again: if I could find a place and a way of sustaining myself there. This island is too crowded. It's economy is groaning. Now we're paying higher taxes to bale out the misdeeds of incompetent bankers. Of course the professionally idle are as lazy as ever. I'm sick of belt tightening to pay for other people.

But now it's got worse. It may amaze Americans, Canadians, Germans and so on reading this - but the government here is determined to railroad through legistaltion to sell off the English public forests. Much access in these forests is "permissive" including most riding trails. Very soon we'll have lost many of the best places to ride (and walk, cycle, picnic, etc).

Of course the infamous hunting legislation is to be repealed. Riders matter to the government if they use their horses to pursue foxes. Otherwise they do not matter in the least.

All this is happening in a country with little wild land and no true wilderness. The aim, I think, is to keep the population cooped up in towns and cities. That way they won't get in the way of wealthy landowners.

It makes me sick. Nothing can be done in this so-called "democracy" that actually has no Bill of Rights. We elect some group and they do what the hell they like for five years. Every time we discover that we have no right to stop them. Then we elect someone else in the hope that they will clear up the mess. But they don't.

People are paranoid about "security". But greed and idleness drag us down. Yet credit isn't restricted and the workshy aren't marched to workshouses. Meanwhile those of us who care will be shut of the public forests - in a land that forebears fought and died for in two world wars. Were they here today they'd wonder why they had bothered - for our own government to snatch our freedom?

February mud

We have mud. Unlike Lytha we don't have ice too. That's one benefit of living on a rainy island.

I'm not at risk of slipping over. The mud is too sticky for that. The main "danger" is losing a boot through getting stuck in a deep equine hoofprint.

That means I have to take care leading a horse. I plan our route to avoid the worst mud. Fortunately both beasts meet me at the gate.

Fence posts are smeared with mud from the scraping of boots. There is no other way to remove the stuff.

Like Lytha I am thinking of dry dusty pastures. Indeed the trails on the chalk hills above here will become hard as iron and very dusty. Riding along we'll leave a faint grey trail hanging in the air, a fleeting mark of our passage.

There will be white patches in the pasture where Brena has rolled, and brown for Doru. I am looking forward to these signs of impending summer.

Grooming will yield a flurry of loose hair. I'll try to stand upwind and will become covered in it nonetheless.

We don't have lonmg to wait for this. A few weeks, that is all. Already daylight tangibly lasts for longer.

Snow

The odd thing is that I seem to live in a snow-free oasis.

I admit that the word 'oasis' may be misplaced, leading to thoughts of warmth in distinct contrast to a period of bitter cold.

But it is strange that places fifty miles away and not separated from here by terrain are thrown into chaos by snow.

Meanwhile here the iron-hard ground remains exposed, stark like the bony form of an emaciated body. No padding of snow covers that body like a soft warming welcome layer of fat.

So it seems to me that snow is healthy, rounding the form of the earth like a well filled horse that has not been lacking for sustenance.

Travellers may not agree. But why do we need to rush around? And do I really mean 'travellers'? It's commuters and hauliers who suffer, not those of us who value of a journey by its richness and variety.

 

It's wet earth

Twenty years ago a friend was warden of a remote rural youth hostel. To get there one had to walk a mile through the woods taking a track too rough for motor vehicles. Of course the way was muddy through the winter, and indeed often during spring and autumn too. But as my friend used to point out when we trudged up to the front door, boots heavy with clay, 'it's not mud just wet earth'. He was an eccentric chap.

I must keep reminding myself that Brena's field enjoys a surfeit of wet earth. The situation has deteriorated far since the photo was taken. Now she is sharing a pasture with two other mare. Together they have churned the area around the gateway into an ankle-deep morass through which a person can walk only with difficulty.

After getting her in from the field I can spend quarter of an hour hosing and brushing her legs without getting them clean. This worries me. Other horses at the premises are beginning to develop mud fever.

Indeed the premises are now filthy with mud. The manager and staff seem to spend much of their time sweeping the limited concrete areas. I wonder how much worse this can get? Appreciably worse, I suspect, with several more months of horses and vehicles churning fragile turf.

At least Doru has a nice field higher up the hill where the ground is drier. I can only hope that another field will become available up there - I am next in line when one does. Then the daily challenge will be reduced to a two hundred yard slither up a track too muddy for even a 4WD truck to negotiate.

Larynn and I enjoyed another ride with Josh and Brena today. She is recovering from a broken ankle and her horse is getting over a bit of back trouble. We were delighted to see that he did not flinch when she climbed aboard and then went around the farm without any reluctance or signs of discomfort. This is a big step forward for them. Larynn's repaired ankle remains a little sore however that seems a matter of muscles needing to regain condition.

Well the weekend is almost over. I shall need to refocus my mind on work. This does seem like a dual existance, five days busy with the planning of a construction project, two rushing around fitting in riding, socialising and getting a few things done at home. Activities are presented in nose to tail procession.

But I am starting the new week reflecting on how Brena calmly carried me around the farm on two nice rides, clearly becoming used to her new life here. What a great piece of encouragement to carry around with me. A piece of success granted by a good horse who has taken my side in the journey of life.

Sun and storm

This may be the hottest summer on record in Britain, and perhaps the driest since the great drought of 1977.

The hills have an arid cleanliness, an ascetic beauty that I am better placed to admire than a farmer who must wrest a living from this tough place.

Farmers are busy harvesting, and the dust forms a grey plume behind each tractor and combine harvester. They are rushing, for rain is forecast after long parched weeks.

The ground is dry as iron, and that is good for a barefoot horse. And Doru too raises a little dust as he passes, even as we travel slowly out of respect for his limbs.

But today was different, for dark clouds massed to the west then bore down upon us. The photo does not capture their brooding inkiness.

Doru was lively by draught horse standards, stepping out energetically and keen to trot on the grass. The cool breeze envigorated him, and we made a pleasant circuit of the farm.

He ate an evening feed and I lay in the paddock near him to make some stretches. Loosened after exercise, this is a good time of day to stretch back and limbs. Refreshing harbingers of growth and goodness, the first drops of August rain pattered onto my face as I reclined in the stubbly grass.

Doru just ate, for carrots and lucerne are good too.