There May Have Been A Road-Trip……….
Northern Alabama has hills.
No, it doesn’t……………..it has mountains!
(Compared to super flat Florida.)
And sharp, sheer sides to the mountains!
And narrow roads…….
And narrow roads with sparse, flimsy, inadequate guard-rails……….
And narrow roads without enough guard-rails at all!!!
On one of those narrow, down-hill, especially-curvy ones…………………….I may have thrown-up in my mouth just a little bit……..
And my truck’s brakes may have been smoking……………just an eensie weensie bit…
This was all compounded by a long, heavy horse trailer behind Suzanne-Annette (alias) & me…………pushing us…………..pushing us a lot………….pushing us a lot down the very narrow, mountain (inadequately guard-railed) Alabama path (that they referred to as a road)…
Aaauuuuuggggghhhhhhhh!!!!!!!
But what was in the horse trailer that made it extra heavy, you may be asking?
Why of course……………….two Clydesdale mares……
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Enter Chantilly and Claire into our lives…..
Scooped up from the hills of northern Alabama and stuffed into Suzanne-Annette’s horse trailer (because her trailer is zippier & more manageable than mine).
(Suzanne-Annette is a super-knowledgeable friend and she went along with me on our Alabama-jaunt to help me check out the horses—–plus, she was one of three friends who told me about the mares in the first place.)
We drove straight through the night, so that it would be cooler for the girls, and hopefully less stressful for them too, rather than an extended trailer ride…
We arrived at Mary Constance’s stable at 5:30AM.
Mary Constance was expecting us…
The mares need to stay at her place until they get all three of their Botulism boosters.
That way they will be innoculated against Botulism Type #B before coming onto our property.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
*****Chantilly is a six (or is it eight?) year old, 16.1 hands, Sabino-marked mare. Under-weight, but relatively close to okay.
*****Claire is eleven years old, has had multiple babies, is way over 18 hands, and a Budweiser-type bay………………….and basically a sad rescue………..a kind, sad, sweetheart of a rescue……….
Where Chantilly needs about 100 to 150 pounds put on her……………Claire needs about 300 to 350………………….poor thing……
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I drove up to look at Chantilly, but when we saw Claire……………..there was just no way we could leave without her……………sigh…
She reminded me of “Boxer” from George Orwell’s “Animal Farm”.
“Man’s inhumanity to man” is not just limited to our own kind……………..we branch out easily and without hesitation to other species too………sigh…
But, I desperately need a project…
After loosing so many good friends this last April, and feeling hopeless to do anything to stop it…………….helping Claire is helping me…
I’m hoping we can turn Claire’s health around…………………..time will tell……………..she might have some issues that are daunting & impossible………………..but, at least in the meantime……………..she’ll have a full stomach.
