A First Dressage Lesson

Today L had her first dressage lesson.

From my uncultured viewpoint I was amazed at the complexity of the signals you need to give to the horse to make it do what you want. L will tell you she is a ‘happy hacker’ so to be put on a horse that has been trained for dressage is a completely different discipline to the riding L has done in the past. Each movement of your hands, legs and how you sit on the horse combine to choreograph the movements

She did brilliantly, making the horse walk, trot and canter to her commands, all the time listening to the patient instruction of Lorena, her teacher.  At the end of the lesson you could see that it had been an intense period of exercise and woe betide anyone who suggested that she was just sitting on the horse and letting it do all of the work.

After lunch we popped into the local town of Arraiolos to get some supplies.

There is an extra of the sunrise over the local reservoir that morning.  Despite it being the rainy season it is still a good 2 metres below the level where water would run off down the stream bed from the dam.  Another sign of the impact of global warming in different regions.