To trot or not?

I rode Sammie for the first time in nearly two weeks yesterday. I was intending just to give him a walk in the school and hop off straight away if I felt anything odd.

"Walk?", said Sammie. "No, you don't want to be doing that - let's just trot and trot and trot!" Even when I didn't ask, he wanted to trot. YM was in the school at the same time and said he looked just the same as usual - she said he looked lovely going round. So we did about half an hour in the end and whilst it's wonderful to feel that he's still ok, I'm well aware that it could be a different picture in 2 or 3 months' time. But I guess we just have to keep going, although I will be avoiding overly rough tracks etc for at least the next month. I'll just keep trying to condition him on tarmac and wee bits of rough stuff without me on his back.

Today we did some long lining and he was as good as gold. He even went out of the school the opposite way we normally go back up to the yard. He had a mild tantrum about me changing the route but it was a good way to do some tarmac work as well. So we turned right, went down the hill and back up the lane. It was all a bit scary for Sammie, but we coped.

I managed to do a bit of rasping as well, just as the farrier showed me, to tidy up around the nail holes, so they're not looking too bad any more.

YM said Sammie's feet looked a really good shape and like me, she wondered how on earth the farrier managed it. She said he's so quick that he must do it purely on instinct; she would suspect any other farrier of not doing a proper job judging by the speed, but the proof is in the pudding on the fronts and hinds. He must just have a very good and practised eye.