Blog Hop: Hauling

Alanna from Pony Express asked us what truck/trailer we have and what we would like to have.  I've been trying to get out and get pictures of my truck and trailer, but I've been way too busy or the weather has been bad.  So I dug through my blog and found a couple of pictures.

Okay my trailer is an OLD two horse Thoroughbred trailer.  It is seven and a half feet tall (I think) and narrow with no divider (taken out before I bought it).  It is steel and heavy.  It was red and rusted when we bought it so we painted it gray and maroon.  The door on the front as you can see in the above picture doesn't even stay closed so a bungee cord holds it closed.  The plexi glass windows were broken out when we bought it.  We never replaced it because it gets sooooo hot here that air flow is more important I think.  The back is a ramp which is HEAVY and I hate it lol.  There are two upper doors that can be open, closed or removed.  I keep them on because Chrome doesn't know how to tie and I don't want him trying to jump over the ramp (he likes to ride backwards).

This is the only inside picture I can find.  I'll try to get new ones sometime.  It has a steel roof, wood walls (steel on the outside) and a wood floor that we replaced with rubber mats on it.  This picture doesn't show the ramp, but it's tall, wide and heavy.  No horse I've ever loaded on this trailer likes to walk on that ramp, although Chrome is used to it now.  I never want another ramp trailer!  As you can see in the above picture that's when I brought Chrome home as a five month old colt.... it's so narrow! Imagine a full grown horse fitting on there...  One that doesn't tie in a trailer and tries to spin circles the whole time you're driving... yeah not safe.  That's why I don't haul him unless it's necessary.  We are planning to build a storage unit in the trailer on one side so that it will act as a divider or second horse and keep Chrome on his own side.  Then I'll feel comfortable teaching him to tie in it.  Right now he can turn at an angle and if I tie it long enough that he can't sit against it, then he can get his head hung, but if I tie it short enough he can't get his head hung he can set back on the rope!!  I don't have pictures of the front, but you can sort of see behind him that there is a chest bar and there are bars between where two horses are supposed to have their heads so they can't get each other.  So if he's tied short enough he can't get his head twisted around.  He will hate it but he has to learn to haul like a grown up someday.  Sorry for the crappy pictures.

Anyway, I won't even go into our truck because I don't have pictures, but it's an older model Chevy diesel with dual tires.  It's a nice truck, but I do want to add a gooseneck and fix the air conditioning.  It's also a standard, which I can't drive so that sucks.... we have an automatic that I can drive, but it's not as powerful so I can't haul far with it.  I really need to learn to drive a standard.

The type of trailer that I would like is this...

This type of trailer is great for my area because of the air flow, but it's safer compared to a regular stock trailer because the sides down low are solid (a TON of people haul horses in cattle stock trailers around here.... scary).  The problem will probably be finding one tall enough.  I haven't decided if I want one of the slant load kind they make or just the standard stock on the inside.  The reason I want this kind is because the doors on the inside can be taken out so the horse can have the whole inside if they aren't used to being tied up (Chrome and donkey both don't tie in a trailer).  The standard stock type has a door across the middle so you could have one loose up front and one in the back.  That would be great for hauling Chrome and Zep together (right now I can only haul one at a time).  People tie in stock trailers all the time so once I've trained him to tie in one he could be tied no problem.

I've thought about it a lot and I just keep coming back to these.  Another reason I love stock trailers is because the guts can be removed and you can use it to haul anything from goats to furniture to lumber.  They are very versatile!

Well that's all I have I guess.  Thanks for the blog hop Alanna!

P.S.  I don't see a place to get the code for the link, but you can click here to see the post she made and to see who else has joined the blog hop.

P.P.S.  Some of you may be wondering why we bought the trailer we have in the first place... my dad actually traded something for it back in the 90s when I was a kid.... yeah we've had it that long!!!  We were very poor at the time and I was lucky to have a horse at all so I was happy with the trailer.  I also had a 14hh pony so it wasn't that bad of a trailer for her (and she knew how to tie lol).  Now I just feel like we've grown to the point where I need something more appropriate for Chrome.  :)