The Fall

I am going to try to write about what happened the day of my accident.  Typing is extremely good exercise for my hand, especially now since I'm trying to work my tendons to loosen them up.  This post will probably take me a few days to write since sometimes it hurts too much to write more than a few words.

It started off fine, like any other day at my dads.  We decided to go riding at the end of my dad's road.  This involved a half hour drive in the horse trailer to the end of the road from the house.  My dad, my brother Alex and his girlfriend T were going to go, my dad on his new quad, Alex on Sev, me on Thor and T on Pawnee.  Since we only have a two horse trailer, it'd take three trips, with T and I staying at the end of the road waiting with the horses.

By the time all the horses and the quad were at the end of the road, we had a quick lunch and then saddled up.  My dad went off on his own with the quad and the three of us headed off on the ponies.  It was a beautiful day, warm, not many bugs.  The ponies were being great.  Thor hadn't spooked at anything yet.  We rode, mostly walking and trotting for the first while.  Then, after about four or five kilometres in, we came to a wide, grassy part of the trail and we decided to run.  T and I ended up in the lead, there was more than enough room for the horses to run side by side and everything was great.

Then Thor finally noticed a small stump that had been there the whole time.  To everyone else it looked like a normal, harmless stump.  To Thor I can only imagine it had mile long teeth and claws ready to pounce on him.  He jumped to the right in half a second.  Which would have been fine, I stayed on for that.  What Thor does that is the problem is after spooking to the side, he immediatly jumps right back to where he was originally.  That, combined with the fact that my saddle wasn't quite straight, made it impossible for me to hang on.

I came so close to catching myself but I just coulnd't do it.  I started to fall and the only two things I could think about was not falling on my head and not falling under Pawnee.  He'd been further away but I wasn't sure how close I was to him now.  I fell with one arm tucked against me and one arm outstretched.

From what we've been able to figure out from my arm is that my wrist hit the ground first and then my elbow pounded down into the ground.  All I remember is lying on the ground and the first thought in my head, sorry for the language, was "Holy shit my elbow is broken."  I knew immediatly it was broken.  There was a big ball of pain in my elbow, which doesn't make sense but is the only way to describe how it felt.  My brother looked at me, said, "Good you're alive, i'm going to get your horse."  And then went to get Thor.

I wouldn't look at my arm until T and my brother told me it looked normal.  I was terrified it would be at an odd angle.  It wasn't, thankfully.  My brother didn't believe me it was broken, because it didn't look like the fall had been bad.  However, I was insistant I was going to the hospital now so he was kind of forced to believe me.  T galloped off on Pawnee to go wait at the trailer for my dad, while Alex tried to get a hold of him. 

I remember lying on the ground, thinking of how far I had to walk back to the trailer.  I didn't think i'd be able to do it.  Alex helped me up and slowly we began to walk.  I got two steps and I almost fell over.  I felt like I would pass out.  Alex kept walking far ahead, forgetting I could barely walk and leaving me behind.  At one point he wanted me to get back on Thor.  How, I have no idea. 

I could walk about 10 steps before I'd have to stop because it hurt so much.  Alex kept asking me how it hurt, where it hurt and then going "Oh yeah it's broken" until i told him to shut up and stop telling me it was broken.  My arm was hanging limply at my side and hurt in my elbow and wrist.  I couldn't move my lower arm but I thought that was because of my broken elbow.  I didn't think i'd broken anything else.

We couldn't get a hold of my dad because of bad service so T raided the trailer and came back with the first aid kit.  In my paiin crazed mind I wouldn't let her sling my arm up, because I was afraid I'd damage my elbow more if they bent it.  So the walk continued.  I was so thirsty, more than i've ever been in my life.  The bugs came out and I was getting eaten alive but I couldn't do anything about it.

We finally got a hold of my dad to find out that the quad battery had died.  So he walked up to the trailer and T went to meet him again.  He came on Pawnee and sent my brother with Thor and Sev back.  He walked with me for a bit and then decided to go get the truck.  So because he sent everyone back I was on my own for a bit.  I was just praying this wasn't when a bear decided to come by.

My dad came in the truck and I got in the front seat.  I regret that.  we were on a trail, not a road and the jarring of the truck hurt worse than anything else and finally made me cry.  He drove me to the trailer where he got out and Alex and T got in.  they drove me to the house where they swithced me to T's car, I finally let her slingmy arm and then T drove me to the hospital. 

this is wehre I'm gooing to end this.  Typing is frustrating, I'm a good typer, I write stories in my spare time and now I can barely do it.  I just want to say, I don't blame Thor.  He didn't do it to make me fall, it just didn't work out for me this time.

My second surgery went well and hopefully it won't take me long to recover from this.  I can't tell you how much I miss riding.

Also, i'm all ears for any blog suggestions anyone might have.  I'm so sick of TV so I'm looking for new blogs to read.  Any ideas?

Thor: The Cowardly Mustang

Thor is a six-year-old silver dun Mustang gelding.  He was another horse who I didn't think we needed but he showed us that we did.  More specifically, I did.  When we met him we had no idea that he would become such a special family member to us.  His owner at the time was the daughter of a woman my dad had trained a few horses for.  The woman was pleased with the result and recommended her daughter to us.  That's how we met Thor, named Gus back then.  The first time my dad and brother saw him, Thor went at them.  When that didn't work, he jumped the fence and took off.  To this day no one is really sure how they managed to get him in the trailer but somehow, he ended up at our place.  When I first met him he was alone in the pens and ready to take on the world.  Pawnee had taken one look at him and decided that he was not welcome within the herd.  Whether it was because Thor was another male or because Pawnee could see how unbalanced this horse was, I will never know.  For his safety, Thor had been seperated.

The first step in gaining Thor's trust was achieving join up with him.  He responded immediatly and within several weeks he was a different horse.  He was nervous and very scared, leading us to believe he'd had a troubled past, but he was also dying for attention and a good grooming.  Several people who knew us and knew him didn't think he could be trained.  They didn't think he was worth it and they focused only on his aggression.  My dad actually lost a friend over that.  The man did not believe that Thor could ever be safetly ridden and when my dad insisted on trying anyway, the man stopped having anything to do with us.  Like many horses, Thor soon proved them all wrong.  Being ridden gave him the confidence he needed and soon the aggression disappeared.  He was reintroduced into the herd and while he and Pawnee will never be close, they've developed a sort of truce.  Thor soon became a favourite of my father's to ride and was a permanet fixture on our trail rides.  I was comfortable with Thor on the ground, and although he rarely misbehaved in the saddle, I was too afraid to ride him.  I sat on him once and had my brother lead him but that was as much as I could handle.  Then one day, while my dad was riding him, we got the call that his owners were on the way to pick him up.  They brought him home that day, pleased with his training, and it always upset me that I never got to say goodbye.

Months later, on my dad's birthday, we got a call from his owner's.  They had been happy with Thor's training and how he behaved, but the owner's boyfriend had fallen off of him and they were afraid to continue riding him.  They'd come to the conclusion that he wasn't the horse for them and instead of selling him and taking the chance that he ended up at a bad home or at the slaughter house, they wanted to give him to us.  We accepted and in a few weeks he came home for good.  Along with him we recieved the story of his past.  He had  previously been sent to another horse trainer.  Unfortunantly we know of this man and his practices with horses.  As part of his "training" Thor had been tied down so that he couldn't get up and then beaten.  This was repeated everytime he misbehaved.  Thor returned to us a little shyer than he had been when he'd left us but no worse for wear.  He remembered his manners and seemed to enjoy being ridden again.  He and Pawnee grudgingly accepted each other and he settled back into the herd.  My dad and brother continued riding him while I kept to Socks and Pawnee.

Thor improved drastically and then came the fateful day.  Socks moved down to a stable closer to me, meaning that I had lost out on having a main riding horse at my dad's.  Pawnee was usually ridden by Sommer so he wasn't an option for me.  There weren't many options, Sadie and Seven are owned by my sister and brother respectively, and Jimmy had come down along with Socks.  That left Thor, Fonda or June, Thor being the one that we own.  I chose to ride him over the other two and I remember asking him to take care of me that first day.  He did.  He didn't misbehave once.  My greatest fault as a rider is probably my fear to ride horses besides Socks and Pawnee.  Thor is the one who fixed me of that. 

Thor is as different from Socks as you can get.  He spooks very easily and still isn't quite sure if he's allowed to run or not.  He's a tank, he will walk through and over any obstacle without flinching.  He's more sensitive and alert than the other horses, something I attribute to his mustang blood.  He's shy, he always hangs back behind the other horses and is always the last to eat.  He's always noticed for his colour and admired for his breed, but most people are put off by his shy personality.  He helped teach me that I'm a better rider than I give myself credit for and that to gain more experience I need to push myself past my comfort zone.  He has about twice as much mane as a normal horse and I keep promising myself that I will one day do the impossible and untangle all of it.  And the best part is, often when we ride Thor down the highway, the man who stopped talking to my dad simply because we wanted to give Thor a chance, will drive by and see Thor trotting calmly down the side of the highway, oblivious to the traffic and commotion going on around him.  He will always slow down to look and then, as if he realizes what he's doing, speed up and then speed away.  He still will not talk to us.


Thor is a special horse.  He is not and probably never will be bomb-proof.  Considering the abuse he suffered in the past, he's gotten over it extremely well.  He is still very nervous about ropes and whips, but he trusts us enough to let us do whatever we want with him.  He does spook but when it comes down to it he will be reliable.  He didn't spook once on his first trip in the mountains and acted like he'd been doing it for years.  My dad is convinced he wants to sell him, and although Alex and I go along with it for now, we know we'd never let my dad sell him.   He was given to us so he'd have a good home and we know he'll always have one with us.

Sorry for so many random posts, I have a few I've had typed up for months and would just like to get posted.  Plus I'd like to have a little more on my other horses since I never talk about them.

My Horse Fell Off a Cliff

Our campsite before we left, with my tent.

We had a pretty eventful weekend and yet somehow nothing actually went wrong, which was very surprising.  I worked from 9-5 on Friday so we had to wait until I was off before we could leave.  My brother had arranged for a friend of his who was also going camping to drive us halfway and meet our dad, so they met me at my work and we left from there.  This friend is one of my brother's that I actually don't mind but I have to admit, his driving could be rather terrifying at times.  Though our first near-death experience wasn't his fault.  He was passing someone and when came up beside the guy, the van almost drove right into the side of us.  People kept cutting us off and swerving badly on the highway, it's amazing we didn't get into an accident.

We met my dad and then went back to his house.  It was 7:30 by this point.  We had to pack up the trucks and then load the horses in the trailer.  Thor and Seven went in surprisingly easily considering we've never really worked with them that much on trailering, something we should change.  They just walked in after Pawnee.  Then my dad went in the truck pulling the trailer and my brother and I followed in the other truck.  By the time we found a campspot it was 11:30 and pitch black.  We set up camp in the dark and stayed up talking until 1:30. 

 We woke up around seven and sat around for the next few hours because it was too cold to do anything.  My sleeping bag had broken during the night so it didn't zip up, and it was SO COLD.  We had a very good, but rather strange breakfast of steak and shrimp.  We had a search-and-rescue guy come to our camp.  Apparently there was a lost hunter in the area.  I honestly wasn't very impressed with the search-and-rescue guy.  He didn't believe the guy was lost and was annoyed that he had to go out looking for someone.  After that we saddled up and set out.  Our ride began with a fun chase of the cows grazing in the field in my picture.  And by chase I mean Thor and Sev loped in their direction and then went "Oh my god, are those monsters?? You're not getting me anywhere near those man-eating beasts!"  Apparntly they forgot about the herd of cows they live with at home.  We had to stop because my saddle pad, the first time I've used this one, was awful!  We had to take it off, it kept sliding around and my saddle was completely off-centre.  We hid it in some trees and continued on with the ride.



Thor Checking out the river

We had to ride down the road for a couple of kilometres before we finally came to a spot where we could cross the river.  It was Sev and Thor's first time crossing a river and they were great.  Thor gets his head right down and watches carefully when he walks through it.  We were looking for a trail up a creek that broke off from the river that would take us up to a little cabin my dad and brother had found two years ago.  We just knew the general direction that the cabin was in, so we started by riding in that direction.  We saw two more search-and-rescue guys down at the river near where we crossed.  We decided to keep an eye out for people and any traces of people while we rode, since we were going off of the usual trails. 



The river after we crossed it for the first time.

 

Riding on the beach

We rode down a quad trail for a few minutes and then broke off onto a deer trail.  The trail was rough, there was a lot of ducking and frantic attempts to try and get our legs out of the way before they were crushed up against a tree.  And my favourite part...spiders.  Everywhere.  They are half of the reason Thor and I ended up behind my dad and brother.  Here's something you learn quickly, when you're on a deer/animal trail, don't be the one in the lead.  You let someone else ride through the spider webs first.  The other reason was at first we were riding too close behind Alex and Thor got smacked in the face with a branch.  It was my fault, I wasn't thinking and didn't have enough space between us.  Thor was fine, but he was really watchful of branches after that.  The first hour or so of the ride was through the dense pine trees and we were beginning to think that we wouldn't find the trail.  We stopped to give the horses a break and Sev decided it would be a good time to roll, with his gear on.  He was sweating and was itchy.  We managed to get him up before he rolled and hurt himself.  The poor guy, after that we took it even slower and let him cool off.



Sinking in the mud

We eventually came out to a meadow, to our great relief.  We had to cross a tiny little creek again, and as you can see in the picture, the bank was pretty muddy.  Thor wanted a drink but unfortunatly since we were behind the other two horses, he didn't really get one.  He would have, except Sev decided it would be fun to paw at the water and stir up all the mud.  We left the meadow on another deer trail and kept coming across these little meadows.  There were a bunch of stallion piles on the trail, but they were all old so we figured the wild horses hadn't been here for a while.  Finally, as soon as we let Thor lead, we found a pretty decent trail.  The logs were all cut on it so it was nice riding.  It wasn't big enough to be a quad trail so we figured it had to be used by other riders. 



One of the meadows


Thor was very happy to be leading at this point and Pawnee and Sev were having a hard time keeping up to him, so alot of the time it was just me, Thor and Si, our dog, with my dad and brother further back.  I have a video of us riding down the trail because I wanted to show what it is like to ride a Mustang through the Alberta forests, but it will not load for the life of me. 




Thor was not impressed about the hill

We eventually came out to the trail we'd been trying to find, by total fluke.  It was pretty funny because it took us two hours to get to it...and we could see the river we'd crossed in the beginning from where we came out.  If we'd gone down the other way down the river then we would have come across the trail quicker.  There was a big hill, as you can see in the picture, that we had to go up.  It didn't look bad until you got to the bottom of it.  Thor was great, he's so powerful he just launches himself up the hill.  I hold onto Thor's mane when he runs up the hill and I make sure to give him his head.  He doesn't need my help to go up or down hills, I just get in the way if I try to help.  



Continuing on the trail





High up in the foothills

The trail went up pretty steadily.  I tried to take pictures to show how high we were up but I'm not sure if you can really get a good idea.  To our right it was a very steep hill up, and to the left it was a straight drop down.  At a few points Thor decided it would be a good idea to walk on the very edge of the trail on the left side.  We had to have an arguement which I then won.  That's another thing you learn quickly on the trail, do not ride on the edge of a drop.  Thor learned that lesson firsthand later on but I'm getting to that.  We reached the top and then the trail took a dramatic turn down.  That's probably the steepest hill I've gone down.  The horses were sliding and I was just hoping they didn't fall.  They didn't and they were great.  We saw some GIANT Moose tracks in the mud, biggest I've ever seen.  I was very thankful we didn't run into it, Moose scare me more than anything in the woods.  My dad was attacked by one once and we've had several terrifying encounters of our own.

We came out the creek we'd been looking for all along and then ended up crossing it about six times in a row.  Thor finally got his nice long drink.  Unfortunatly my dad took the lead again so Thor and I were in the back.  Both of us prefer to be in the front and riding side by side wasn't an option on this trail.  I amused myself by taking pictures.  We came out to a flat spot on the river and decided to stop for a break and my brother wanted to fish a pool there.  I hung out with the horses while they fished.  I hate fishing and have long ago given up pretending to care about it.  Pawnee kept trying to wander off until I got mad at him and he settled for taking a nap instead.  Sev kept getting tangled in everyone else's reins and Thor was the only one being a good boy.  He just stood there and watched the other two being idiots.  My brother didn't catch anything and we had some beef jerkey before we continued on.  Beef jerkey has to be the best saddle bag food out there.

We crossed the creek again and we finally came to where the cabin was.  It's not even a true cabin, it's tiny.  It's barely taller than I am.  We think it was probably built in the 70's as a place for someone to stay when they came out to check on the free-range cows.  It's built in a beautiful area.  It's right against a cliff going down to the river with some falls not far away.  It looks out over a huge meadow.  We decided to take another break here and stipped the horses' gear off.  They enjoyed the chance to graze.  Then my brother went down to the falls to fish and my dad went for a walk up the other way of the river.  I once again stayed with the horses.  Sev and Thor were tied up and Pawnee was left free.  He stayed near Sev but then started to wander down the trail so I grabbed his lead rope and held onto him while I sat on a log.  Then something very strange happened.

 My dad was on his way back up to where I was with the horses and he heard a loud growl, very close to where the cabin was.  While he heard that, (I didn't hear it) the horses were all of a sudden just very strange.  Sev stopped eat and started making soft snorting noises and kept looking around.  He'd pull at the end of his rope and then freeze, and then start it all over.  Pawnee suddenly couldn't get close enough to me and was walking quick, almost panicked circles around me.  Then Thor started calling, which is very strange considering he never, ever calls.  I grabbed Pawnee and ran over to where Thor was and just stood there, kind of afraid, I won't lie.  When horses start acting strange I take it very seriously.  Then, after a few minutes everyone went back to eating and it was fine.  Talking about it later we think probably a bear was passing through.  We know there was a bear in the area, after we left the cabin we came across some giant black bear tracks that were a couple hours old.  I am very thankful that the bear, or whatever it was, decided we weren't worth the trouble.

Before my dad and brother got back but after the horses calmed down I ended up taking a nap.  I didn't really mean to.  I had spread some of the saddle pads out on the ground near Thor and Pawnee and next thing I knew I was being woken up by my dog's wet tongue.  I felt much better after the nap but it was not the least bit comfortable.  I don't suggest sleeping on horse blankets.  We decided to return to camp after that and the horses were more than happy with that.  We got home much quicker than it had taken to get out there.  We took the same trail back and it was uneventful except for when a spider fell on me.  Thor and I were leading and I brushed up against a branch.  A huge, fat gray spider fell on my leg and I was panicking.  Thor just kept walking along as I was freaking out and trying to kill the spider, and then find it as it fell down onto my saddle.  I never did find it and I'm still grossed out.

We kept going straight down the trail instead of onto the horse trail we'd come in on.  We came out to the river but there wasn't any good place to cross so we had to ride down the beach for awhile.  When we finally did find a good place to cross it was near to guys cutting firewood.  I'm pretty sure we scared them.  They were busy so they didn't notice us until we started to cross the river.  They stopped to watch us and asked us how our day had been.  We rode the rest of the way home on the road, until we got to where we'd hidden my saddle pad.  I carried that home and that simple fact was amazing.  Thor has an issue with having other things on his back but he got over it right away.  After we unsaddled we all just vegged out for a while until we went to bed.  I had the tent to myself and my dad and brother had air mattresses in the horse trailer.  We don't sleep near each other, it's kind of ridiculous I know, but my brother snores like there's no tomorrow.  I refuse to sleep next to him.  The first night my dad had slept on his air mattress outside of his tent.  The second night he quickly regretted sleeping near Alex. 



The culprit

The next morning I woke up to Thor falling off a cliff.  My sister has informed me that I'm not allowed to say that because it makes it sound like he fell of a 30 foot drop, but still, it's technically what happened.  Our camp was by a a creek in a very deep creekbed.  Part of the creek went under ground and it was a six-eight foot drop to the rocks below.  My dad woke up first and tied Thor on a long rope behind my tent.  Well Thor was standing near the cliff and stepped on his rope.  He backed up to get off of it, and went off the side.  He tore the ground up where he tried to keep himself up.  My dad started yelling and ran over to him and saw him lying on the bottom, tangled up in the rope.  My dad ran and got the knife and cut the rope, then had to convince Thor to get up.  Thor didn't even have a scratch on him.  I'll admit, my dad got a lecture afterwards.  I was mad at him for tying Thor up where he could reach the cliff. 

After that we had breakfast, packed up camp and left.  We ran into some other people on horses and learned of a new trail to ride on.  All in all, it was a fun weekend but there were a lot of near-misses.  I'm very proud of Thor and Sev, they did amazing!  I got to hang out with Cas and the others for a while too but I'll add that in my next post.

Our first view as we set out