Arthur!

Drove out to Zoilo's today to see how Arthur is doing.  It took over two hours to get out there and I was only there an hour (I got there later than planned and Zoilo's boy was playing baseball and he wanted to go watch the game), but I was very happy to see how well he's done already with Arthur.  For starters, although he still doesn't run right up to you when he sees you like Duke and Lizzie do, he doesn't race away kicking and carrying on anymore either.  Progress.

And Zoilo has been working on trying to get him to bend his head to the side -- kind of like Clinton Anderson does.  That is, he gets him to bend his neck and bring his head all the way around to his side.  (A good thing for an emergency stop  IF he ever has any desire to run - something he has NO desire to do under saddle.)  Zoilo said when he first began trying to train him to bend he would get extremely upset,  rear up and carry on.  Now - although he still acts like his neck is stiff  --he DOES finally bend it around with just a little encouragement.

While Zoilo rode him, his tail hung straight and quiet the whole time.
While I was riding, though, he started switching his tail back and forth after a point.
Not sure what I was doing that he didn't like.
I'll have someone video me next time so I can watch it and
see exactly what I'm doing WHEN he starts to do that. 

He stops easily, too.  "Good boy."

Zoilo showed me first how he works him on the ground, then he saddled him up and rode him around very easily.  Of course, Arthur was always easy to ride once you were on him.  But saddling him up was the challenge.  Not anymore.  I led him into the barn and Zoilo cross-tied him and went for the tack and he stood there perfectly quietly while he was being saddled.  Then he got on him IN the barn and rode him around in circles in that narrow hallway, halting him often.  NO problem.  Then he rode him out and went from the open area  into the round pen and then over to the paddock.  And he listened really well. 

Here's a video of  Zoilo riding Arthur  out in the paddock.  Look how smooth his trot is.

Then I rode him for a little while.  I never could get him to trot, but that was fine with me today.  Wasn't sure my back was up to it.  And good news! . . . when I got off I was able to step down with my left foot still in the stirrup and easily reach the ground!  Yeaaaaa!!!  

Now the only tricky part of riding him will be getting him saddled up AFTER I bring him home.  He was easy to ride before I bought him.  But it was impossible to get to that point once I had him home -- getting hold of him, saddling him, and mounting.  So next time I go out there, I think I'll ask Zoilo to let ME deal with all that just to see if he's going to give me trouble. 

Anyway, after we finished riding, Zoilo hosed Arthur down and cleaned him up good.  He even let him hose down his face without rearing or having a fit.  Excellent!

But then once Zoilo turned him back out he immediately cancelled all that cleanliness.  And he was incredibly thorough about it, too.  I took these pictures the first time he rolled.  Then he got up, looked over at us, and immediately  laid back down and rolled in the sand AGAIN, so that time I videotaped it! 

Hey - you not only can't tell what color he is anymore, you can't even see that his halter is green!  Gees!

But look how tidy his feet are.  Zoilo has gotten him to accept having his feet trimmed already!  This after he tried to kick the crap out of him when he tried to trim him at our place after he first arrived.  In all the time the previous owners had him, his feet were never trimmed so I know it must have been a challenge to get him to accept that.  That alone is worth everything Zoilo is being paid!

All in all, it was a really good day.  I do wish his place weren't so dadburned FAR -- 80-some miles, 2 hours or more each way -- but it's going to be worth it.  This is the first time Zoilo has ever worked with a mule, but he's doing really well.  I pretty much figured his calm, laid-back way of dealing with horses would work well with a mule.  And it does.