Dressage at Devon Recap

A couple of my wonderful barnmates and I took a "bucket list" trip up to Dressage at Devon last weekend and had an absolute blast.  We enjoyed wonderful horses, good food, and shopping (so much shopping).  I also met my best friend and her family up there, which is always a blessing because I love love love her and we always have the best times. 

The first thing we saw!  Fall! Dressage! Cute horses and barns!

The iconic Devon Horse Show sign

Our view for Friday night GP action

We arrived a little later than expected on Friday, so we took a quick spin around and got settled in to watch the Grand Prix from the main grandstand.  It would have been truly perfect except for the ridiculous commentary from the folks behind us.  I never understand why people have to be so critical and outright NEGATIVE about someone else's performance.  Let's be real here:  the riders in the GP at Devon are probably more accomplished than about 99% of the people in the stands.  Agreed?  Good.  So while it's fine to discuss with others and question the execution, there is no need to be nasty and rude about someone who you don't know and have never ridden with, no matter how much you want all the people around you to think  you know the horse and rider....Good for you, you fed the horse a treat at a Meet & Greet once, that doesn't qualify you to blatantly spat on and on about things you probably have no first had knowledge about.  Don't even get me started on her critique of a rider who came down the centerline, saluted, and tracked right at the trot to start her test, and the woman's critique of the ride was "Hmph.  Slightly above average."  Really?  You got "slightly above average" from the first 10 seconds of someone's ride?   

The utter negativity and bad attitude from this one woman was almost enough to make me turn around and tell her to STFU.  Talk about ruining everyone else's evening.  She criticized Guy McLean's horsemanship act, ranting on and on about how the horses were intimidated and beaten into submission, how terrified they were because she "looked into their eyes and saw fear" in the warm up area....ok, Lady.  The horses in the ring with no halters or restraints of any kind are standing there yawning, having a nap in the middle of the performance, and I've never seen a frightened horse yawn. At the end of the day, it's another barn biddie complaining about someone who has more skills than she does, and can do things with horses she can only dream of.  This is the same type of person who "rail birds" the rides of her barnmates and criticizes them behind their backs.  I strongly dislike those types of people.  Just enjoy the horsemanship demo for what it is already!

Yep they look scared shitless don't they?  [/sarcasm]

We had a great time on Friday despite her obnoxious ranting.  Saturday started with a yummy hotel breakfast, chocolate ice cream at the show grounds at 10am (WHY NOT IT'S DEVON!), and time for Making Really Bad Decisions With Credit Cards.  I went into it thinking "Hey, I'm a jumper rider, I shouldn't do too much damage since all the stuff will be Dressage related, no way I buy a lot here."  Good one, me.  Let's say I walked into one of the vendors empty handed and walked out with this:

It wasn't supposed to fit!!

And these...

One fleece jacket and the fleece vest I got for a combined $32, so those were bargain deals and had to be made.  And all this happened BEFORE the mimosas...

Thus I have no excuse.  I spend the rest of the day trying to convince my travel companions to "buy more things" to little success.  Oh well.  The shit I bought is pretty fantastic and I legitimately needed new barn coats anyway.

Photos from Saturday action:

The amazing farm stand on the way to the show grounds!

The Saturday night GP Freestyle was very, very fun.  There were a couple of routines I didn't like, but there were a couple that really moved me.  It was a long day of food, fun, friends, freestyles, and great memories, and thus our first trip to Dressage at Devon came to an end.  It was the most fun 36 hours I've had in a long, long time, and we all never stopped smiling and laughing.

It was "slightly above average."  ;)