Centered in the Saddle

Alternate title: Building jumps takes a lot longer than you think it will.

After we left the halfway-completed Weldon’s Wall in the midst of a thunderstorm, it was a waiting game to see how our beautiful hand-dug ditch would fare in the deluge. I had nightmares about it turning into a mud pit with the sides collapsed. This is how it looked when we left it:

But it didn’t collapse! The ditch looked even better when M and I went out to check on it the next day. The rain had smoothed the sides and bottom, and helped settle everything into place. It looked great! Thank goodness.

A few days later, we brought our guys out to assemble the wall and try to build our coffin complex (comprising of two skinny jumps and a mock ditch because you KNOW we weren’t about to dig another one).

There were some old barn doors that we were able to use to build jumps, and they are coming in handy. We cut one down to become the base of our mock ditch, which we lined with landscaping timbers and filled with rocks.

I say “we” but honestly during much of this process, M and I sat in the shade and watched the guys measure and cut everything. However, we did screw it all together and drill holes in the bottom for drainage so…we helped. I originally thought this series of posts could be a “how to build your own XC jumps” kind of thing, but honestly – I have no idea. I did very little of the actual skilled labor. Maybe I’ll get one of the guys to do a guest post about actual measurements, materials, tools, etc.

M and I filled the mock ditch with rocks while the boys started on assembling the Weldon’s Wall. The rocks we used are SO BRIGHT WHITE. Like, blindingly white. Like, you can’t really look at them in full daylight, bright. I think they’ll fade some over time, but in the meantime it’ll be nice and scary for our horses.

This project didn’t take long. Perhaps an hour or two? So, naturally, we thought that we could finish up the wall and put together the two skinnies pretty easily.

We vastly underestimated the time it took to finish the Wall. It was hours. And hours. I don’t really know what all went on, because M and I went to go get more landscaping rock to fill in the bottom of the ditch (not bright white this time!). When we got back, we annoyed the guys enough about finishing it and putting the rocks in that they sent us off to ride for awhile. We went on a very nice trail ride.

And when we got back, it was DONE.

Kind of. We put the rocks in the bottom of the ditch, then signed our names on the back. Remember when the guys overbuilt the wall and it was going to be more than 4 feet tall? Thankfully they cut it down and the final height is 3’2.5″ – almost exactly to Training level specifications.

AND IT IS BEAUTIFUL.

I can’t wait / am slightly terrified to jump it.