Wood Creek Riding Academy - 1

Chapter 3

LILITH POV: A few days had passed since I last entered the beautiful Wood Creek Riding Academy that was approximately 10-15 minutes from my house. Today I was planning on going up to have a lesson with Sarah, 'I wonder if she will put me up on Frosty again or on a different horse?' I thought.

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     "Hey Lilith!" The happy go lucky barn owner called out to me while hopping out of the office.

     "Hey Sarah!" "Ready to ride girlfriend?"

     "Oh yeah sure!" "I was planning on putting you on a different horse today, sound okay?"

     "Sounds fantastic!" She walked me out of the isle way of the beautiful barn and walked along a stone pathway to where many paddocks help many huge horses. I believe we had walked past like 3 of these huge things and my feet were getting kind of tired.

     "Ok here we are!" I almost crashed into her as I expected we had to keep on going, "Ok!" She opened up the gate and brought me in closing it behind me, "Follow me" she said. We walked into the huge paddock, me following behind her. Two horses stood there looking at us while the other two could care less as they continued to graze, probably getting fatter by the minute. We walked past the two horses who stood side by side staring at us, two bays. Then we passed another horse who could care less about us, it felt like an hour of walking but I really wasn't far at all as we stopped infront of this beautiful horse. "This Lilith, is Cherry, she is a 16.3hh Hanoverian cherry bay mare." Sarah informed me.

     "Wow! She's gorgeous!"

     "That she is." She handed me the leather halter and leadrope, I walked up to the mare who slowly brought her head up from the ground, I slipped the halter on then walked her out following Sarah. Cherry walked by me the whole time not going infront and not going in back.

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     I slipped on her saddle pad then half pad then her beautiful leather saddle and admired how pretty she was for a hot minute before putting on her open front jumping boots and bridle. I put on my helmet and gloves and walked her out into the outdoor arena where I found Sarah putting up a few jumps.

     Cherry followed me into the ring as I closed up the gate and brought her to the mounting block, she stood there perfectly while I tightened her girth and pulled down my stirrups. I walked up the three steps and put her reins in my hand as I put one foot in the closest stirrup then I swung myself over and out the other foot in the other stirrup. We walked around the ring on a lose rein as Sarah kept on checking to make sure the jumps where all in line, I chuckled at the sight of her fixing a jump, running back to the front, standing there and looking at it then running back to another jump and she kept on doing that process. Cherry walked so smoothly on the soft sand underneath us, I could tell she was checking out those jumps Sarah was setting up though.

    "Ok I'm ready!" Sarah hollard to us as she walked to the middle of the ring and told us to trot. I placed my legs on Cherry and squeezed just a tad and she sprung up into a nice flowty but bouncy trot. Cherry tossed her head up in the air when I asked her to collect, she bucked a little but we got the collection after her little tantrum that I found quite hilarious. "Haha, ok now start doing a figure eight so she gets back in the swing of things, she always thinks we are going to jump her so some flat work will help her as I'm sure you have noticed she's out of it a little," Sarah said from the middle of the HUGE arena. I nodded my head and turned my shoulders placing my inside leg on for her to bend around then my outside leg on her also to help her bend around my inside leg, we changed directions in the middle of the ring then turned to go and change other directions. We kept on doing figure eights until Cherry had finally stopped throwing her head, once on the rail after a lap Sarah had called out to me, "Ok pick up the canter!" I sat down and put my outside leg back squeezing her then picking up my inside rein just a tad, she threw her head but then picked up the canter. "Not acceptable, bring her down to a trot, do a tight circle then once back on the rail pick it up again, she will learn eventually." I did as Sarah told and brought her down to a trot, 'yikes that downwards transition was not the best that's for sure' I thought to myself while doing a tight circle, we got back on the rail in a blink of an eye and once again I placed my outside leg back and squeezed while picking up my inside rein, she picked it up then must have tossed her head like 10 times in a row! I brought her back down to a trot before Sarah could even open up her mouth and circled her tight then did the canter cue once AGAIN.