got a completely new field today. The herd at Ísólfsstaðir was lucky enough to get access to the last unopened part of the winterpasture. Now they can roam free on around 100ha! Think they'll try to find the best places to eat first and taste their way through the whole pasture. 
On our way back we checked on Hugleikur and Pandóra. Everybody's fine and in good mood in wonderful weather.
Ingólfur started to clean out the snow from the barn. Think it was at least 10 wheelbarrows full of snow...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

... no idea, stopped counting! This time it was that cold that the snowcristals were really fine and just sneaking in through the smallest tiniest little crack, which resulted in a huge snowpile in our barn and the stables. Not so much fun! Next thing to do, when the storm is over, cleaning out the barn...
Ingólfur made a beautiful cake for the local drama group which celebrates its 120th birthday this year. Looking good and hopefully tasting great, too.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Most of the snow down by the seaside at Ísólfsstaðir is gone! And the horses enjoy it a lot, free access to the grass and soft and dry ground to lay down, roll over or take a nap. They were even more excited to meet us and the big bags of bread in our car's trunk. Everybody healthy and looking good.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Pandóra is a little lookalike of her mum Vordís, but rather different in behaviour. Vordís is quite wary and likes to keep a distance to new and unexpected things whereas Pandóra is nosy and forward going. She's always the first to arrive when something is going on and checking on everything, which can be rather tiring when she's checking on fences or the waterhose... Sometimes I think she's a bit of an adrenaline junkie.
But she too knows how to present herself. Will be fun to see how she'll look in spring without her thick coat.

 

 

 

 

We checked on our horses at Ísólfsstaðir yesterday and fed them, too. Today it was time to fetch Sæla and start to train her again after her autumn/winterbreak. She'll help us training the youngsters as she's a very reliable leading horse. Hopefully the weather will stay as beautiful as it was today for longer now.

 

 

That's the view from Snerpa's back! Finally tried her and liked her very much. Will be fun to keep going with her.

 

 

...in just one day we got today. Reminded a bit of April... We had sunshine, heavy snowfall and all inbetween. 
In the morning we met with a local electrician and some clubmembers to put new LED lights in the riding hall and one on the gable end of the builing as the last one broke off during the severe storm in early December. When finished we put our horses outside and just then it started to snow quite a lot. Well, the horses didn't mind.
I thought in fact that nobody would go for a ride in weather like this, but to my surprise 3 riders from the new stable area popped by to have some coffee with us and then invite us over to have more coffee there. Ingólfur, Jón Óli and Sigga joined, I had to say no, as I wasn't going to try my youngsters the first time in a group ride. I'd like to do that in quieter circumstances. 
When the weather got better again the geldings in the paddock started to play quite wild and you couldn't see that one of them was on sickleave after a car accident just 2 weeks ago. Good to see that he has recovered that quick.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

...at least north of town. South of Húsavík there was beautiful weather, sunshine and no wind, but when driving north out of town, heavy winds struck and we had to drive rather slow on our way to Ísólfsstaðir. Thankfuly the road wasn't icy. 
When arriving at our destination, we saw that the horses were down by the old stable, where they have pretty good shelter from the wind. We drove down there as we had loads of bread in the car. The horses were quite happy about that. There's nearly no snow left, so they have plenty to feed on, but I think they are already a bit tired of the repeated storms. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Is spring just around the corner? At least Snerpa believes it's time to get rid off her winterfur and she already started to loose quite some. The other horses don't share this opinion and hold on to their fur at the moment. Will be exciting to see who's right!

 

 

Finally got some pics of these two (Kóngur & Snerpa) side by side. Guess which one belongs to me (Karin)...

 

 

 

 

Finally we got great weather and used it to do quite a lot of different things. First we had a look at the horses at Ísólfsstaðir. The snow's nearly all gone, at least down by the sea, where the horses like to stay these days. We took a drive down there and when the horses saw where we were going they followed in hope to get some bread. And they weren't disappointed! There was enough for everybody. All of them were in good shape, so no need to worry about them at the moment. 
Afterwards we finally checked on our big fence down by the sea at Saltvík to get a better view on what and how much we'd have to repair in spring. Things aren't looking that bad, just a few fencepoles and 2 gates we have to replace. The windshelter on the other hand needs a bit more repair as you can see on the pic.
The horses at the fence at Húsavík were happy to see us, too. There was some bread left for them and they were fast devouring it. 
Unfortunately Magnús wasn't so lucky to get any as Ingólfur had already put a bridle and saddle on him to go for a ride and move him up to the stable. Well, he got some treats there. Now there are just 7 horses left at the fence. 4 in our responsibility and 3 belonging to Gísli. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The last days have been quite busy. We decided last weekend to delay taking horses inside a bit due to the weather. No need to have riding horses inside when you haven't actually got a chance to go riding because it's getting dark early and a heavy storm is blowing. Talking about heavy storms... There hasn't been travelweather nearly the whole week, roads closed, no flights and even no international flights one day. The "good" thing about this is, it's merely in the south and we got away rather well, except for heavy winds, which finally blew the damaged part of our windshelter completely down. Well, just another thing on our to-do list for spring/summer... Hope the shops selling fencing materials have already placed huge orders at their suppliers! 
Yesterday morning there was an unfortunate accident closeby our stable when a group of horses got hit by 3 cars. 2 horses got injured and it's not looking too good for one of them. No human was injured, but at least one car isn't looking fab after this. It weren't our horses, but those of a friend, and they were already on their way back home from their nocturnal adventure when deciding it would be best to run on the road. The injured horses were tended to by our vet and the less injured is going to stay at our place for recovery.
Today we went for the weekly monitoring trip to Ísólfsstaðir but this time with quite some old bread for the horses (and Jóel's sheep). They got it served down by the cliffs as they were all staying there close by the old shelter.  No need to make them walk up, when there's that little snow it was no problem driving down there.
Afterwards we fetched the horsetrailer and moved Kóngur, Fönix and Snerpa to the stable, where Sigga's horses were already waiting for them.  Next stop was a farm in Aðaldalur, where we got a new roundbale. The trip there was rather spooky as there was definitely more wind on the way than around Húsavík which resulted in the trailer swaying to the side and into the other traffic lane. Not so much fun, but fortunately nothing severe happened. When back we sought the injured horse from the vet and brought it to our place. 
Now the weatherforecast is rather bad for the next few days, especially Tuesday is said to be awful. Hopefully just rain here and no sleet, which would probably take our fences down again. But we can't do anything but hope and see.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Yesterday the weather wasn't too good when we went to check on the horses at Ísólfsstaðir, very windy and little visibility on the road close to Húsavík. It was definitely better at our destination, but the horses were down at the shelter and we decided not to disturb them but come back the next day.
Today we met Friðbjörn at the sheepstable and took a walk down to the horses. They were expecting treats and hay, but as the snow already had melted that much, we decided to stop feeding at the moment and leave the horses to working for their feed again since they were supposed to loose a bit of weight there. 
On the way back we stopped and Ingólfur went to meet Hugleikur and see how he's doing. Looks like he and his friends are doing well, enough food and space. I'm really looking forward to getting to know how he'll look in spring when in his shiny summercoat.