belle31
Well-Known Member
Had an awful hack out yesterday, my TB mare is a nightmare at the moment as she is full of grass so was determined to have a nice, slow leisurley ride yesterday without tearing around the place. There was myself, my daughter (7 year old) on her pony (he is very well behaved) and a friend on her 21year old cob (again sensible), we set off met a fire engine on country road within 5 mins, my mare jumped a little but it passed and we carried on with no probs. All going well, got off the roads and onto disused railway line (now a bridleway). My friend was dying for the loo so decided to get off and nip behind a bush!! So we walked down a steep part on the grassy side as for some reason the stupid council has concreted and is slippy and stopped at the bottom, said friend got off and me and daughter stood quietly waiting all relaxed, the next thing this middle aged man appeared out of nowhere flying on his bike. Well the pony just fled the other way with me in hot pursuit, my daughter was crying out for help, my mare was launching forward to try and get up hill as she was sliding backwards on the concrete it was awful and all the time the stupid man on bike was following. Thankfully we got to top without a) falling off b) the horses going down and luckily the pony stopped as did my mare, I jumped off and screamed at the man to stop, grabbed pony and tried to console daughter as both horses were trembling and blowing, obviously frightened. He said ' can I get past' in a nasty manner, I said 'no can you wait a minute the horses are petrified' I was then met with I shouldnt have been stood there, to which i replied he should be going slower as people are walking with kids and dogs along there also. He then said 'if i get off can I go past' so I said 'yes', as he went past he said 'Will IT kick me', I said ' no 'IT' won't kick you' (secretly wishing she would give him a good bat for being so ignorant!), he never once said sorry or even asked if my daughter was ok, I cant believe a grown man wouldnt show some concern to a seven year old little girl after frightening her half to death. i got back on and we cut ride short as in all the drama I either pulled a muscle in my neck and shoulder or have whiplash of some sort, been in agony since. We did pass some more bikes after that and the horses were fine with them and a group of them talked to us, we told them what had happened and they said some people are a disgrace to the good people who mountain bike. Luckily we are all ok except my neck and shoulder but it could of been a whole lot worse if they hadn't stopped or they had gone down on the concrete hill. Very very frightening..... I have just bought off the internet some brushing boots which have a part that goes over the knee, I will make sure my two have them on for hacking from now on just incase they do go down. My daughter has got over the schock now and hopefully it hasn't put her off, its just a good job the pony is so good.
I think they get more startled by them. I've had a couple of hairy-ish experiences with a flotilla of racing bikes out on the roads before, just had no idea they were coming until they were streaming past us. Luckily he was a sensible old horse, so apart from a bit of snorting and ear flicking and bouncing he was ok - a younger horse could have been very scared though!