some horse shit

(from 6/15):

horses today. we started off with the usual, somewhat demoralizing bunting-family routine of waking up at 730am (on vacation) and proceeding to some planned activity. this time it was taking a tender to shore. by the time breakfast finally got to a place in my digestive system that made my brain start working, we were bumping around in the back of a mitsubishi fuso (which seems to be the working vehicle of choice in all of central america) with a wooden trailer attached to it, covered by a makeshift tin roof. that woke me up.

as always, i got the one recalcitrant, semi-mentally-handicapped horse of the group. this is a recurring theme in horse-related ventures for me. just in the circle we were walking the horses in while everyone else got saddled up, my horse broke the circle and went into the feeding pen four times, which resulted in a lot of people screaming in creole and hitting the horse a lot, as well as my right leg getting caught between a fence and a horse flank, which in turn resulted in a lot of blood and pain for me (not the horse).

once we got going in earnest, the horse came around a bit. he stayed mostly on the trail, though he was a little too fast and i had to keep reining him in for like 30 minutes to avoid eating other-horse-ass.

then we went riding in the ocean, at depth just below the horse's head. we were bareback for this, but it was easier than it sounds because of the water depth.

we finished out the day by sitting around on the beach, which sort of combines my least and most favorite bunting-vacation activities: sitting in the hot sun for a long time for no reason and swimming in the ocean. one of those two things was awesome.

it's interesting how hard the touristy parts of the islands here try to imbue you with "island spirit" - carefully chosen music, ethnic help that conveniently conforms to people's expectations, decor that's obviously not natural, but reinforces the ideas that white people have when they think of reggae culture, etc. who defines the amorphous "island spirit" anyway?