Endurance Horseback Riding

Among other things, I love to ride my horse. A few years ago, my friend Gayle King introduced me to the world of endurance riding - or more specifically - limited distance endurance riding. Real endurance riders think nothing of riding their horse for 50 or 100 miles. Limited distance riders stick to the 25 and 30 mile varieties. So, technically, I am a limited distance rider, which is a good thing because I'm not sure whether I (or my horse) could do the longer distances. Anyway, this year we'll get our 500 mile pin. Organizations I belong to include the American Endurance Ride Conference (AERC.org) and Southeast Distance Riders Association (SEDRA - DistanceRiding.org).

Today, my friend Lisa Senecal and I got in a good ten mile ride - awfully hot in Florida this time of year though. We rode at the Orlando Wetlands Park (CityOfOrlando.net) which is one of the nicest places around to ride. The trails are high and sandy or grassy. The bugs are limited. The wildlife can be amazing. We usually see 20 or more gators - not today - too hot. Instead, we saw a variety of birds, mostly buzzards. My friends and I have come to believe that the areas buzzards all make Orlando Wetlands Park their home base and fly out on missions from there. I've never seen so many buzzards just simply hanging out - in groups, alone, sitting on the bridge, hanging out in the trees. So, if you want to see buzzards, check them out. Usually though we see deer, racoons, an occasional otter (actually caught a glimpse of one today) and a few weeks ago I actually saw a bobcat - very cool. Mostly though, we see a lot of birds.

We created a club last year - very exclusive. You can only belong if you've fallen off your horse because it was spooked by an alligator. Gayle was the first to be inaugerated and then Lisa Dietrich and I followed simultaneously - no lie, we both fell off as a result of the same gator. She was sure I was going to get a good laugh when she fell off only to look up and see that I had fallen too. Fortunately, the horses didn't leave us. We scared a hiker pretty good though as he believed we had been attacked by the gator. No worries though, everyone was fine.