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Sunday - My "Monday" in the Office
Today my alarm started buzzing at 7:30 AM. Under any other circumstances, this is the part of the day where I would scream and hide dreading the day ahead of me and incapable of doing anything productive. But it’s a Monday, and that means we have a lot to do today to get ready for the ride as all of the saddles have to be put back together. I roll out of bed at 8 still wearing the t-shirt I wore to the bar last night and not caring much. I throw on the first pair of shorts I find in my drawer and grab my awesome Orange Tivas I picked up at the cheap Chino shop in Barbate for €8. I drudgingly climb down the steps to the basement and grab 10 small bottles of water and emerge just as Rachel is pulling the van out to go up to the horses.
She doesn’t usually bother saying good morning anymore as she knows me response will be in no language she speaks. It’s generally just incomprehensible mumbling. Still on autopilot, I grab the tack box out of the backseat when we get to the horses, which Jose has already pulled out for us and tied to the bar where we tack them up. I take a brush and run it over each horse, use my hoof pick to remove any rocks or mud from their shoes, condition their manes and tails and brush them out and paint their hooves black with some conditioning cream to help prevent cracking. Rachel unloads all of the tack and places it next to each horse neatly so that when I finish grooming, we tack up each horse in a row. There are 11 today, as we have 8 guests and 3 guides.
I’m awake by the time we’re finished and we mentally jot a list of the things we forgot. Today it’s a large girth for Polly our cob as well as her bridle and a bottle of water that I miscounted and didn’t bring. Rachel and I head back to the house and throw 3 bags of horse food in the back of the van along with the forgotten items. We have an hour before we need to go back up to the field, so I head into the guest kitchen to make my usual bowl of Muesli with sugar and a cut up banana – horse mash, as most people call it. I down a glass of orange juice and head back to my apartment to sort out the mess that I’ve made of my body this morning. I change out of my drunk clothes from the night before and into my jeans and t-shirt for riding. I comb through the rat’s nest on my head, brush my teeth, pack my fanny-pack (*ahem* or bum bag, as the Brits call it, since apparently fanny-pack roughly translates to “vagina bag” in English English) and check my e-mail.
We meet Jose back up at the horses at 9:45 to help him finish putting on the bridles, unload the feed out of the van and do one final check to make sure we aren’t missing anything. The guests walk up on their own at 10 and we introduce each of them to their horses. Jose helps them mount as I help adjust stirrups and once everyone is on, I go and grab my horse, Infanta and get on myself. Monday’s can be a bit interesting, as sometimes guests aren’t particularly honest about their riding abilities, but this week, we’re lucky and everyone knows what they’re doing. Because of this, Rachel rides a beginner easy horse in case we need her to switch with someone.
I lead the ride out to the East towards some amazing Cliffside views of Vejer de la Frontera and the mountains on the other side which make up the big beautiful valley. We ride up a long firebreak and past the Pine Nut factory, an antiquated series of donkey pulled cranes and contraptions that break up the pine cones found in the area into the nuts that we all love so much. We have our first canter at about 11:30 and it’s pretty easy, so we can suss out everyone’s true ability. We cross over the main road in and out of San Ambrosio and up past the picnic area La Breña. We have another canter up through the forest to another firebreak where we cut up and ride past Los Majales del Sol, the bar run by my friend Antonio to tell him that we’ll be back early today, at about 12:30 for lunch. We ride farther up, now heading back West towards the sea to the Eucalyptus Gallop, a canter that winds through a Eucalyptus forest and then opens up into a large Eucalyptus grove perfect for a full-out gallop.
From here we ride past the Torre de Meca, a large old watchtower built in the 16th century to look out for Pirates in the strait of Gibraltar. There are several of these towers that dot the coastline and I give a quick speech about their history and importance. After this we take a 15 minute break at the Trafalgar Mirador on the top of the cliff overlooking Los Caños de Meca and el Cabo de Trafalgar, the cape where the Battle of Trafalgar was fought and won by the Spanish. Jose and I pass the time gossiping in Spanish about anything and everything; we usually have a lot to catch up on since we last saw each other Saturday afternoon.
After our break, we ride 45 minutes back to Los Majales del Sol. We tie our horses up to trees in the forest and then wander over to where Antonio has set up a large table for 11 in the front garden overlooking the gorgeous pine forest. My favorite meal of the week, I can hardly wait and am constantly walking back into the kitchen to ask if anyone needs help getting anything ready. Antonio brings out a gorgeous beet, carrot and tuna salad and I pile a heap on top of my pepper, potato and egg Tortilla, smother the whole thing in oil and vinegar and dive in. I wash it all down with a couple glasses of Tinto de Verano, the summer wine I was talking about yesterday. We finish our meal with gorgeous Spanish coffee; I take mine cortado con leche fría which is basically a strong coffee with cold milk.
After the meal, we climb back on our ponies and begin the trek back home. I take the guests for one last canter up a hill towards a large fire watchtower and then we walk down a dirt road and back home. When we arrive home, the guests untack their horses themselves and give them a quick sponge bath before Jose ties them up to their trees for their dinner. Rachel and I clean each of the bridles with the help of the guests and finish up about 2:30. We drive back to the house and swap any tack we need to in the van, we’re switching one of the guests tomorrow to a new horse because he developed a large sore where his girth was today.
And it’s naptime. I don’t have long today, as I have plans for the evening, so I set my alarm to go off in an hour and I wake up about 4:30 to the sound of honking outside my window as Miguel, Jack and Fabi furiously let me know that they’re ready to go to the beach. Miguel has the bar closed on Monday, so it’s the only day he gets to go out and do whatever he wants all day. I throw on my swimsuit quickly and grab a fiver and a towel and run out to the car. We drive down to Los Caños to the nude beach – our favorite place to go. We grab a couple beers each at the bar on the way down and set up shop in the sand. After a couple plunges in the sea and another hour worth of attempting to nap while Miguel jabs my ear off about lord knows what, we grab some snacks at the shop and a litrona or liter of beer and head to La Breña picnic area near the house.
Miggy!The boys drop me off back home at 7:45 in time for me to set the table on the back patio for dinner and pour myself another beer. Tonight is a night with the guests. We have chorizo and mashed potatoes for dinner, serano ham wrapped esparagus for appetizer and pears poached in rioja a Spanish wine, for desert. Today, since Miguel’s is closed, I stay with the guests, drinking and chatting until about 11 before strolling back to my apartment and watching an episode of Friends before I head to sleep.