A Loopy Ride

Today's ride had many loops to it.  It was a ride I planned to see how Zoe would do going out, heading back, going out somewhere else, heading back, going out somewhere.......you get the idea.  She did pretty good.  We trotted when we had good ground and walked the rest...mud.  We went out to beginners hill, turned right at the top, worked our way down to the big road and turned towards home only to turn to go out again before we hit "grand central station".  Then we went towards the big rocks that the 4-wheelers like to go up, took the small trail to the left and the next trail to the left so we ended up on the road where the horses live on the other side of the fence.  Followed that road to just past the turn off for Inspiration Point, made a few loops there and turned towards home.  Ended up at the place where the lone tree stands in the middle of a 4-wheeler muddy place, turned around a few trees and headed to the left towards bread rock.  Turned right at bread rock, right on the next road, at right at the next road...which landed us back at the lone tree.  The trail is pretty mucky there, but passable, the 4-wheelers aren't helping.  We headed back up the same trail and this time before we got to bread rock we turned left and took the shortcut to enchanted valley.  At the top we turned left and started heading towards deer valley, but found another loop to the right, back up the hill to the top where we originally turn left and....turned left again.  Back down the same trail, took the left turn to deer valley and followed the small trails towards the big road.  At the big road instead of heading right (towards home) we turned left and headed towards the KBB hills.  This road meets another large road (another crossroads) and that was another mucky place....but we found our way thru.  I'm so glad Zoe does good with water and muck.  Instead of turning right (towards home again) we turned left so we were headed the back way to look out rock.  But we didn't go that far but picked up a trot and turned right at the first road to find a small trail to the right that I like to trot up.  At the top we jogged to the left and took the big road to the bottom.  At the bottom I turned around here to trot back to the top.  At  the top we jogged to the left and took the small trail to the bottom.  At the bottom we turned right and we were back at the crossroads.  Now we turned left towards home and met up with a very LARGE trail ride - 10 riders.  We were ahead of them on this road and they turned off at a trot.  Zoe was a little excited, but I encouraged her to keep her mind on her job, going forward and picking our way thru the mud puddles.  I decided to give her a break and just head towards home for a while.  We went on the trotting trail which has a small creek running thru part of it.  We dropped down into the cow pasture and I took the high road to stay out of the mud in the middle.  When we reached beginners hill......yes we went up it again.  And at the top we took the small trail to the left towards home.  At the bottom we met another rider, Zoe was very interested in this horse and whinnied....just once.  We headed towards home, I started a few songs which she seems to like...no more whinnys and a calmer horse.  We walked the rest of the way home, did our usual side passes at the top of the second cow pasture, went across the creek and went home.  Zoe's attitude for all of this was pretty good.  She did question me a little bit going up beginners hill the 2nd time, but only for a few steps.  She didn't get real itchy to get home.  Her whinny to the lone rider was unusual, but her attitude was good.  Just getting her back to work seems to really help...along with some songs.  I wonder if other people experience music as soothing to their horses.  I was thinking of putting my phone on pandora.com and just letting it play.  Sometimes I do that in the arena in the mornings.  She was a bit sweaty when we got back....a roll in the front pasture was in order along with some goodies in her bucket.   7.79 miles, max speed 8.46, avg speed 3.99