Simultaneous 180° spins - aka spooks - and good thing we had coffee

After the boys displayed some crankiness on our Friday trailride due to pesky deer flies and other nuisances of the blood sucking kind we decided to head out early this morning. In the house only the dogs showed excitement at the prospect of a 7 a.m. breakfast on a Sunday.

It was well worth it, the trails through the woods were beautiful. The biggest challenge for JP was to keep Chambord from working his way from snack to snack. The heat and high humidity put the grass in some areas right to the horses' nose. That's just perfect there for me!, Chambord says.

Up on small hill in front of us JP noticed a beautiful white-tailed buck (Weisswedelhirsch to you Germans, Cerf de Virginie for the French) right next to the trail. Usually the boys are good with deer, so we didn't worry much about it. Well, obviously neither Remy nor Chambord had finished their coffee this morning: Once the buck decided to exit stage left both of them woke up and simultaneously executed fast but beautiful 180° spins.

Luckily, both JP and I had had ample coffee this morning, so we stuck to the saddle. We were very happy that both boys stopped right after their respective spins and remained calm. Saumur would have said "Gee, that's it, I'm so outta here!". Actually, a few years back that's exactly what happened, Chambord and Saumur got startled by a crying fawn stuck at a fence. That time JP and I simultaneously hit the ground. While Chambord stared rather perplexedly at JP "What are you doing on the ground? You are supposed to be on my back!" Saumur ran after the fawn (it had freed itself from the fence the moment we hit the dirt). It took me awhile to catch my runaway steed.

After their 'wake-up call' this morning Chambord and Remy were as chill as ever. They didn't even flinch when a hawk carrying his breakfast (a mouse) flew right over us. I briefly considered rescuing the mouse, but alas, even if it feels sometimes like Remy is flying - today he stayed earth-bound (whew): Good news for the hawk: he didn't have to give up his breakfast!