Hello, I thought I would fill you all in on our adventure to the new winter National Riding Club dressage championships at Hartpury Equestrian centre in Gloucester. Victoria had kindly arranged all our entries and stabling so all we had to do was to get ourselves there!
Well I don’t know why, but Vanessa and I are jinxed when it comes to going to National Championships and this year was no different!!! Firstly, my pony decided to get a funny tummy and not poo for over 12 hours on the Wednesday before. The vet was ready to come and flush her at the first sign of colic but thankfully after a load of fresh grass and very wet feed things started moving! First panic over.
All was then planned so that Vanessa’s father would drive her lorry to pick me up at Saffron Walden and then my dear other half, Nick who has come to hate horse shows, was to drive us to Gloucester (after much bribery). Well as per norm there was another panic as Vanessa’s father was taken ill and couldn’t drive the lorry. Nick was faced with the prospect of driving from Saffron Walden to Tiptree to Gloucester and unsurprisingly was not jumping for joy at the idea! Thankfully, Vanessa was able to find a kind man to drive the lorry over so all went a head as planned.
Hartpury is lovely and the stables were brilliant for the horses some even had gold knobs at the top of them, a far cry for my pony from her muddy field at home! Brenda managed to drive the whole way on her own with her trailer and I take my hat off to her as it is a long way to drive let alone on your own! She too had the added stress that one of her bitches was looking like she was about to drop her puppies, and she had had to leave hubby at home alone to deal with it!
Vanessa, Nick and I managed to cook our dinner on our little gas stove and feeling quite chuffed with ourselves headed over to say good night to the “neds” and pop in to see Victoria to check things for Saturday! Well we were quite deflated by our gas cooked sausages once we found that Gordon had cooked chicken with tarragon sauce etc for Brenda, Victoria and himself (Now I fully understand why Brenda turned down our offer of sausage that afternoon!!) They even had the port and cheese ready for dessert! (Note to oneself get an invite to theirs next time!!!)
Saturday came and thankfully the weather held while we were there. Carol and Brian came all the way to support us, which was very very kind of them and much appreciated by all. There was only one last minute panic when Vanessa realised she had forgotten her cream jodphurs!! Thankfully we are a similar size so she borrowed mine and they managed to stay up while she did her test!! We all did our bit and were all pleased but felt that we could have done better, like we all always do! I had to kick myself as Milly had been trying to tell me while warming up that she needed a wee and I thought she was just being lazy and wanting some grass so didn’t really listen. After warming up a very touchy and grumpy pony, doing the test and then returning to the stable understood why she hadn’t been quite herself as she had a mega long wee – remember next time listen to pony! I promise I’m not that fascinated by my ponies’ bladder and bowel movements!!!!
Out of 20 teams our team came 12th and so we all have work to do before the qualifiers this summer! It was definitely worthwhile going and I think we all enjoyed it even though it was a long way to go!
Thank you to all that supported and helped including Nick who has sworn he is not driving to Lincoln again if we qualify this year to which I have replied (and have done over the past few years and he has driven each year!) “of course my dear”! Good luck to everyone who is competing in this summer’s qualifiers!
