Our every whim (was: WATER WATER...)

["guest@endurance.net" <guest@endurance.net>]

K S SWIGART   katswig@earthlink.net

Tammy Robinson said:

>    The point to my response is, I just plain don't like riding my horse 
> without the option of having water.  Yeah, I know our horses can do it
> (and they have) but I don't like it.   

I mentioned the fact that ride managers don't "need" to put out
all that water because the horses don't need it.  

We had just gotten done with discussing how important ride 
managers are to our sport, and that it is a tough job that
nobody "REALLY likes to do."  And I wanted to point out to
an admittedly novice ride manager, that they don't really 
need to provide, not only water that often, but all the
other rider amenities.

As riders, if we want people to continue to volunteer to
manage rides, we would do well to not expect ride managers
to cater to our and/or our horses every whim.

This is one rider who is perfectly content to have ride managers
provide me with a trail marked well enough that I can follow it
and enough information about the expected conditions (terrain, 
availability of water/feed, location of vet check/s, etc.) so 
that I can properly plan my own ride so I can take care of my
own horse.

So when the last day of last year's Grand Canyon ride had water
at 13 miles (before we started the Rainbow Rim) and at 31 miles
(the vet check at the end of the Rainbow Rim), I didn't have
any problem with that because it was clearly marked on the
ride map that this was where the water was.  (It turns out that
there was also a stock pond up off the trail somewhere in the 
middle that some people saw and used to water their horses, but
I never saw it, and the Ride Manager didn't know it was there,
so it might as well not have been there as far as I was concerned.)

Was 18 miles a long way to ask a 3-day horse to go without 
water?  Yeah.  But my horse never said, "I'm thirsty, I don't 
want to do this anymore." He just drank really well when we
got to the vet check...and I got to ride the Rainbow Rim.

So here is what I, as a rider, have to say to all the great 
people who volunteer to manage rides.

"You don't have to cater to my every whim and provide me with
every convenience.  My horse and I don't need water every 5 km,
hay and bran and carrots at the vet checks, people to hold my
horse for me if I have to pee, breakfast and lunch and dinner.
It's not that I don't like and appreciate these things if you
do provide them; but you don't have to. Provide me with a 
marked trail and enough information that I can take care of my
own horse, and my horse and I will do just fine. Water about
once very 15 miles or so is perfectly adequate out in the desert, 
just so long as I know where it is."

kat
Orange County, Calif.