May 22nd and 23rd, 2021

May 22nd, 2021:

In the morning, we had lessons on our horses. Fly and I are still struggling with "collection", the constant connection on the reins. We have less of that in Western riding, called "slack". Today, a trainer who works here taught us. It's quite challenging for us, but she's doing a great job. Even though it's a different riding style, we can benefit a lot from it.

There are quite a few people here at the stud farm now: prospective buyers from Germany, visitors and helpers from Lichtenstein and Germany, riding students from Switzerland, Safari tour with the Spaniards themselves... On May 22nd, it was an intern's birthday, so in the evening we all went out to eat together. Lebanese food, surprisingly delicious! Someone else had a birthday too: in the afternoon, a foal was born! You can see it in the photos, the placenta is still hanging out of the mother's back, as the birth wasn't long ago. It will fall off at some point. Some of us went to the mare-foal pasture to observe the two: the foal trying to suckle for the first time and still a bit wobbly on its legs. Since we didn't want to disturb them, we spent time with the others. That's when the great moments between Nick and a foal were captured.

May 23rd, 2021:

The weather is changing. One day I'm wearing a tank top and the next day a winter jacket and hat. At the moment, the vegetation on the uncultivated land is in full bloom. We have noticed that there is no syrup here in Spain (Nick misses it). Since there are elderberry bushes everywhere, we make our own syrup. We picked the elderflower heads on the pasture of the 3-year-old stallions, which are right behind our caravan. Since the pasture has been eaten by the mares and fences are scarce here, we closed the gates and let them graze around the caravan. There is another intern working at the stud farm who offers various therapies for horses in Germany. Yesterday, I showed her how to tape horses with different weaknesses. In return, she treated Fly today: color light therapy, dry needling, massage. Later in the evening, I did a "hill training" with Fly (I will take some photos of that) and she was really relaxed and satisfied. So it seems to have worked. Nick has been getting up early in the morning to study for his exams. Meanwhile, living in the caravan has become normal for us. There are some things that are more complicated: washing dishes, doing laundry, taking showers,... But we have gotten used to it. The horses are doing well as usual. The young ones are getting better every day. There are also some that did not progress as desired after being ridden or lack composure/coollness. That's why we were assigned to work with them on individual days by the trainer. Some came 1-2 times and did so well that it was already done. Then there are others with whom it's a longer process. Or on the ground, things are going well for us, but for the riders it's different. That's why we will be there when they ride the same horse.