Life's A Beach: I really needed a 3 day weekend...

It was the Prineville Grasslands endurance race this weekend. Which means I took Friday off and packed up the camper (not as good getting it packed solo as I was with company, but I made do), packed up the horse, packed up the dogs and headed off to the race.

Once there, I was actually able to get the panels down and the corral set up by myself. I did bruise my shoulder up a bit but it didn't take as long as I thought it would. All in all, it took me about an hour to set up camp. Then Flash and I went and got vetted in and waited for Hutch and her sister to show up. Her sister decided to ride Leo (Hutch's new endurance horse) in the 25 with me. And Hutch crewed for us.

I had a hell of a time getting to sleep on Friday night. So much going through my head. I hate it when I get like that.

At 4:30am I got up to give the horses their pre-race grain. Then tried to go back to sleep until 6:30am. I think I dozed a little here and there. At 6:30am it was time to get up and get saddled and head out to race. Hutch's sis and I decided to wait and go out with the last riders.

Horses are ready. Riders not so much...

Start of the race...

Once we got on the trail, the horses were super amped up. Leo took off at a very fast pace and Flash and I hung back a bit with another rider who was looking for a group to ride with. After a few miles we caught up to them again and the 3 of us ended up riding the whole race together. Although at times we had more company...

A caravan of horses heading up the big hill...

Gorgeous views on the way up...

Steep, but a very cool trail to ride...

The first half of the loop was 14 miles and seemed to take a while. There were a lot of steep trails both up and down so we ended up walking a lot of it. We also had some green horses that needed to learn to take their time. Since we left so late I wasn't worried about finishing in the top 10 and didn't mind the pace.

Once we got to the vet check the horses were catching their second wind, but I was getting tired and hungry. Hutch had peanut butter sandwiches there. At first I turned them down because I hate peanut butter. Hate. It. But then I decided to have a small bite and ended up devouring the whole thing and it tasted so good!! I guess the body knows what it wants when it's working hard.

Doing the trot-out at the vet check...

After we left the vet check it was a 12 mile ride back to camp. The trail had one small climb and then it was mostly flat or downhill the rest of the way. We ended up doing the 2nd 1/2 way faster than the first part. And came in with plenty of horse left and with all of us smiling.

Success!! And we finished middle of the pack...

For this race I decided to not camp out Saturday night and instead packed everything up and headed back home. Because it was such a nice day, I had been eating dust most of the ride. I was so happy to be in the shower... and it felt so good!!

On Sunday, I went to meet a friend and do some hiking. Unfortunately the lake we wanted to hike around was still closed so we ended up hiking a dusty road instead. Definitely not as much fun but the company was great. After we parted ways, the pups and I were hot so we went to the river to cool off...

View of the river from the top of the trail...

Let's get down there, mom!! We're hot!!

The pups found something way more entertaining than swimming in the river...

But I decided to go for a dip. Man, it felt great on a hot day...

After all of that, it was time to get home and get some rest. We were all tired after a long weekend. However, Noelle was having some difficulty finding the "sweet spot" on her bed...

Meh, not quite the spot...