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Dr. Condi and I were invited to ride with three ladies at York River State Park this morning. Always in need of a therapy session I promptly accepted on behalf of Dr. Condi and myself.
I had ridden with one of these ladies at the last Poor Peoples riding club ride at Washington Lacy Park and our horses were well suited in pace and temperament and we had a nice ride.
she and her friends were riding and asked me if i would care to join them.

Condi and I had not been to York River but once with the Poor Peoples riding club and that was quite a few years ago.

photo park sign

I had little memory of the trails but remembered how to get to the park….I had no recollection of how long it would take to get there….

I allowed time to stop at Hardees for a biscuit and a drink….wanna guess who was still a bit early….I had no idea how long it would take me to get there and I allowed plenty of time…
bugs were pretty fierce in the parking lot but it gave me time to give Condi a good grooming. The stable flies were pretty bad in the parking lot so I slathered her up pretty good
with both some ultra boss and some regular horse fly spray. Bugs out on the trail were not too bad at all. But I had my trusty fly bat and did swat a few.
The bug dope seemed to make her less appealing to the pests. Bugs out on the trail were not too bad at all.
while I was at it I slathered myself as well with some Repel and high percentage DEET. I was aiming to deter ticks…
I picked up a bunch on my last couple of walking forays.
all kinds….some lone star…some brown dog ticks….and a number of seed ticks so small they are hard to find until they start itching

Apache had quite a few as well so I got a can of sevin yesterday and dusted him pretty good and that helped him immensely…thinking about dusting me.

The ladies got there early as well and intros of horses and humans were made all around and everyone tacked up and we headed out.

Condi and I started out in the back and for a little while she was comfortable with that, but before long she had managed to sneak her way to the front.
The ladies did not seem to mind and if they did were too polite to criticize. They were all on gaited horses so keeping up with Condi was not a hardship on them.
We mostly just ambled along due to the heat and humidity. It was warm but under the shade in the woods there was a little breeze blowing and it was not uncomfortable at all.

I had two cell phones with me but I never took either one of them out of the holster to take any photos…I had on gloves and did not want to drop either of the phones and when i am riding
Condi I am enjoying life too much to worry with taking pictures. When we rode out onto a small beach along the river i thought about photos but I didn’t take any…there were
warning signs about steep drop offs and swift currents so I did not venture into the water. Condi was sinking in the dry sand up to her fetlocks so we did not hang
around in the sun and got back into the woods. a little bit later i ventured up into the woods on a bit of a hill and there was a beautiful vista of the river.

this photo is very close to what I saw….

I gpsed the trail we road and downloaded it to google earth pro and printed the route. it was basicly a ride out and back and we did 7.31 miles

Looking at the PARK trail map on the web site there are horse trails and there are pedestrian and bike trails. I saw a couple of signs for no horses allowed.
the majority of the trails we rode were nice sandy well graded trails suitable for side by side riding. the trails were soft enough that shoes or boots are not necessary….
mostly sandy footing. the forest was beautiful and a good bit more open than here in central virginia where thick underbrush is more the norm.

I had a wonderful time and travel time to the park is no worse than a trip from here to Petersburg or Five Forks which are both nice places to ride..
as long as the traffic on the interstate cooperates…today it was pretty good.

When I got home I saw a message on facebook that my friend Jim Leahey is plannning to celebrate his 80th birthday with a ride at Lake Anna on the 16th…..
I immediately signed up for the ride