October 24, 2025
I got a call from a friend today. She wanted to know when I was going to share more of our adventures in my blog. I have to admit that I have neglected my journal, so now I’m back to it!
We sailed back from the Bahamas and made landfall in Fort Pierce, Florida in June, then made our way up the intracoastal waterway to New Bern, North Carolina. We stopped for a week in Cape Lookout NC, where my son Jackson, his wife Rebecca and the three girls joined us. I have three beautiful granddaughters now, Frankie, Dani and Avery. We had an absolutely wonderful time swimming, walking on the beach, fishing, and making memories!
Marc had made arrangements with the Bridgeton Boatworks in New Bern to haul M & M out of the water while he worked on it. It was also a great location to be safe during hurricane season. From there, we rented a car and headed down to Florida to pick up our beloved horse 007, and our two vehicles. We spent the next three months at an Airbnb in New Bern.
Marc worked like a dog sanding and painting the bottom, adding and improving systems on the boat. He installed new batteries, 🔋, Starlink setup, electrical wiring, moved eyes on bow sprit fixed fuller worked on the windows overhauled outboards bought new outboard for dinghy, pulled out and worked on daggerboards, repositioned the mounts for the bowsprit, installed better insulation in the water maker, new membrane in water maker. I helped by polishing the boat and adding new pin striping and letters to each side of the boat. Now M&M‘s name was clearly visible on the sides, as the name in the back was partially blocked by the dinghy.
New Bern is such a great little town! The town is named after the city of Bern, in Switzerland, and several of the buildings downtown have similar architecture. There are lots of little restaurants and shops, with a wonderful Riverwalk and live theater.
I have to admit I got a bit fat while on the boat. I launched myself into getting fit again. First I tried walking, and gradually began running on the Riverwalk. Unfortunately, my right knee began to swell, so I decided to try something else. I discovered the YMCA had a wonderful facility that included swimming pools and exercise classes. Marc and I both joined, and I made an effort to to exercise almost daily there.
I also made an effort to ride 007 almost daily. I found a lovely stable only 20 minutes away called Rollover Downs, 🐴owned and operated by Bethanna Perry. Although they were primarily a hunter stable, they also had a beautiful grass dressage arena. I gained a student (and friend) while there. I had lots of fun teaching Cindy, and she soaked it up like a sponge! Bethanna also gave me a jumping lesson on 007, and I’m a lot braver for it! Thank you Bethanna!
As a dressage rider, I achieved my USDF bronze medal in 2011, and it took another 12 years before I achieved my silver medal. For the past 2 years I have been working on getting my gold medal. Up until this summer I had achieved 2 of the 4 scores I needed. I set my sites on getting the last two scores, which are at the Grand Prix level. 007 is just turning 20 years old, so we don’t have a whole lot longer to try. We had tried to get those scores at a show in the World Equestrian Center in Ocala Florida last November, but fell short of the scores we needed.
007 had 3 months off while we were sailing. I had to slowly bring him( and myself!) up to speed. Working out at the Y helped immensely, as well as the encouragement of my wonderful husband.
We gave our first attempt at a show in Virginia Beach. It also gave us an opportunity to visit our good friend Maribeth Dunlap. She is a realtor, dressage rider and trainer, and we both boarded our horses with Gene Gage in Florida years ago. Whispering Miracles Farm is a beautiful farm, and the arenas were fantastic. The first day, we again fell short of the score we needed, but only by 1.5 percentage points! The second day, 007 wasn’t himself. He was tense and stressed in the warmup, so much so that I made the decision to scratch.
I had told myself before the show that if we didn’t do well, that this was going to be it. I would retire 007, and just ride for fun. He did so well on the first day and came so close though, we decided not to give up yet. When I say we, I mean Marc and I, because Marc is very much a part of the team. If it weren’t for him, I would’ve given up a long time ago!
I signed up for a working equitation clinic with Polly Limond. What fun that was! For those of you that don’t know, working equitation is a combination of dressage, trail riding, and speed. And a complete change of pace for 007 and myself. We decided to enter into a competition at the Carolina Horse Park in Raeford, NC, along with our friend Natasha Russell. Natasha and her husband Tim Russell have been friends of ours for many years, and have shared multiple adventures around the world together. It was so exciting, not only to participate, but to watch! There were people in the bleachers cheering us on, which is a rare thing in dressage. There is a joke about how the only people in the bleachers are your best friend and their 🐕 dog😂!). I think I’m hooked on this new discipline in riding!
We had one more dressage show in the Virginia Horse Center in Lexington, Virginia, a 5 hour drive from New Bern. We are fortunate that 007 is such a great traveler. I think he really likes to ride in the horse trailer. We have a camera in the trailer, so we can check on him from time to time while driving. He loves to stare out the window and munch on his hay. On the first day of the competition we got one of the scores we needed, and the second day we fell just a little short. We need just one more score, but it will have to wait until next summer, because now it is Marc’s turn- it is time to go sailing! ⛵️
We headed back to Natasha’s in Southern Pines, NC, and spent a couple of days there working on a Painted Pony for the next fundraiser for the Carolina Horse Park. Natasha is also a fine artist as well as an accomplished equestrian!
From there we loaded up 007 and headed down to Punta Gorda Florida, where we left him in the capable hands of Gene Gage. Gene will be caring for him until we get back in May. We then headed back to New Bern to get M&M.
Our plan, going forward, is to launch M&M, head to Florida where Marc and I both have projects waiting for us. One of the projects I have is a painting demonstration at the Pelican Landing Community Center in Bonita Springs on November 20th, 2025 .
Stay Tuned for Part 2 – Launching M&M and Heading South!
