Day Two - Horse Ride for Henry and Kyle

We had an unsettled night with the wind howling and the rain hammering down on the roof of the van. Poor Cara in her little festival-grade tent got dripped on all night. Mike went out several times in the night to bang the pegs back in on the awning, then around 5am the wind picked the whole awning up and blew it right over the roof of the van, totally mangling the poles in the process. We dashed out in the rain our Pj's to retrieve it out of a large puddle and then frantically tried to get all our stuff from out of the awning into a nearby stable to keep it dry. A very rude awakening!

To say we were not looking forward to a day out in it is probably and understatement! Having to deal with all this made us late to get going but before long we were off the lanes and negotiating a very steep, rutted and rocky track down to the river at the bottom of roych clough valley. We both ended up getting off rather than risk a tumble so early on in the week. At the bottom we met 4 other horses and riders - the only other ones we saw for the entire week!

The going was slow and we got really wet with the rain being horizontal at times and the horses both swinging round to face their bums into the weather and wanting to go back the way we came. But we had no option put to keep pushing them on. At home we always have the option of not riding in the worst weather so it was a revelation to us to learn a very valuable tip from the boys. We noticed that when it was really windy and wet they would turn their heads towards to direction of the wind and look down. We were initially turning our heads away, which meant that you got all the rain down the side of your neck - really horrible. When we copied the horses - facing into the weather and looking down - it was much more bearable.

We had a really steep descent down into Hayfield, with a sharp drop on one side which was nerve wracking as the horses could easily have slipped and sent us flying down the bank. But they took extra good care of us.

The picture is of Mike at the pub in Hayfield, holding the horses whilst we grabbed a quick bite to eat. Our visions of lazing the afternoons away in pub gardens before finishing off the ride for the day were a distant memory. Even if we had the sunshine for that, there was no way we could have afforded the time.

It seemed to take forever to get to Padfield and our accommodation for that night. Our maps and the bridleway signposts didn't seem to correspond and we ended up doing a massive loop and having to go several miles down a really busy main road in rush hour traffic with all the cars, lorries and tractors hurtling past. We got a little lost and felt like we were racing the daylight. There were no stables at the B&B - just a field for the horses so we had no option but to just chuck rugs on and feed them and leave them to it. They both looked really fed up, despite the lush long green grass (testament to all the bl%dy rain they get here!) and we wished we could get them out of the weather just for a few hours.

Me and Cara spent the evening at a nice pub while Mike stopped in with Toby. We talked lots about Henry and Kyle and what the ride meant to us. I hope they were looking down at us and feeling proud.
Horse Ride for Henry and Kyle