i like big buts and i cannot lie

my last day in Sweden was spent ‘horse’ ‘riding’. I got to meet some more of Agnes’ family. They were all lovely and fun, even though they were horsey people (who i usually find a bit queer to be honest) Agnes is quite good at horse riding and she got an appropriate steed for her advanced level.

and this was me.

I liked it because i could brace myself round the corners with one heel on the ground for extra stability. the lady owning the horses gave me a lot of propaganda about my Icelandic ‘horse’ about how they were the strongest ‘horse’ pound for pound than any other, and that their lineage is sacred. Once you take one away from Iceland they cant go back – they want to preserve the genetic integrity. a bit like Icelandic people perhaps. Despite these reassurances I couldn’t ignore the fact that my ‘horse’ was always last in the riding queue, was constantly trying to eat, and that all the other horses giggled at it behind its (quite broad) back. Also whenever we did a ‘gallop’ my ‘horse’ began to wheeze and got left behind so that everybody had to wait 20 seconds for me to catch up. Still, it gave the other horses a chance to have a bit of a laugh. I wondered a few times if she would survive the trip. Luckily im used to slow vehicles with bad suspension, and inefficient fuel consumption and we formed a workable partnership. At first i couldn’t see the fun in horse riding over riding a bike. Seemed really lazy just sitting there. I had pangs of guilt (pangs which originated in my arse) about riding my ‘horse’. Overall though – after the instructor stopped talking and let us ride some it was quite fun. Really fun in fact. I’d like to do some horse trekking though. with tents and fishing gear. that’s my kind of horse riding. but you got to start somewhere and this was it. For the second half of the trip i swapped ‘horses’. Agnes’ second cousin (Pia) is very nice and she offered to swap. I could tell she regretted the decision after an hour, but i pretended not to notice and carried on riding my real horse. anyway it was easy ignoring her because now i was near the front and she was near the back. hehehehe