Tuesday, October 10, 2006

Amanda Bailey's Journey to Dressage at Devon - In Her Own Words

Arriving at the Devon Show Grounds

The next day, I loaded up and made the short drive (1 1/2 hours) to Devon. When I arrived at the show grounds, located in the middle of an urban neighborhood, I discovered that there was a line of trailers which were waiting to enter and unload. Because of the cramped quarters, only a few trailers are allowed in at any given time. It was a full hour of sitting and waiting. Faulkner was going nuts in the trailer. Every minute felt like ten. I finally got to go in. Because of the "hurry up and unload so the next guy and get in" mentality, I went ahead and unloaded Faulkner into the bare 8x10 stall and threw all of my stuff into the tack stall, a much smaller space than I was expecting.

The trailers have to be parked off site at a turnpike lot about 5 miles away. When I finally got back to the show site to get shavings ordered. I got things organized and bedded Faulkner’s stall, then tacked up to ride. I was scheduled to be in the first class of the show the following day. It was the 4 Year-Old Suitability class, scheduled for 8 AM. Faulkner was excited for the first few minutes on the lunge, but then settled and I got on and had a good ride, but it was obvious that he was tired and somewhat stiff. I got him cooled out, cleaned him up and tucked him in for the night, then went to meet Brian and Sophia for dinner.