Tuesday morning was just beautiful at the mystery spot. Sunny, warm and delightful. I took an outside shower, in the full and glorious sun (sound like a New Englander, don’t I? Can’t get over the sun and warmth in March.), then hopped into the hot tub for a soak, and then washed the chlorine off me with a quick rinse under the shower. Then Evan put the bareback pad on his horse, Taj, and Chico and I went for a short ride. My bareback seat isn’t especially secure, and Taj is kind of round, so at first she thought I don’t know how to ride, but we worked it out.

Before I got on, I said, “As soon I start to get on, Chico is going to run in circles, and bark like a maniac until we get going.” And, of course, he did.

This is Taj. She’s mad at me because by accident I touched her and the electric fence at the same time. We both got shocked, but I wasn’t wearing steel shoes and she was, so I fear she got the worst of it.

In the middle of the afternoon, we went downtown to Barbara’s house for dinner. The weather had been so nice that she invited us to come eat on the deck. As these things sometimes go, at about 3:30 it started to cloud up, to drizzle at 4:15, and to really rain at about 6. Needless to say, we ate inside. The cats hid from Chico, much to his relief. He chewed a bone while we ate dinner.

And that night I had a chance to find out how my tent does in the rain.

And the answer was, only OK. The site is not completely flat and, I think, water got between the ground cloth and the tent floor, so I was a little damp this morning. But not too bad, and nothing that a few minutes in the hot tub couldn’t fix. The tent and sleeping bags are drying under cover, Chico and I are warm and dry, things are OK. And for the first day since I got here, I’m not getting in the car.