Thursday

On Thursday, we had to get up early and drive down to Ontario to pick up Kathy's friend from work, Roxanne.  We headed back to our hotel near Pomona and dropped off our gear.  Then we headed toward Pomona.  At about 2:30, we could be seen going under the highway in the tunnel heading to the Fairplex and Equine Affaire.

The picture to the left is the PNH trailer that they haul the horses and equipment in.  We went and saw Nicole Shahninian-Simpson give a clinic on jumping. After that, while standing in line to get milkshakes, I heard a girl behind us talking about the savvy system.  I turned around and asked her where she got the PNH stuff. She pointed to a building and said that Pat was in there right now.  We hurried in to see him.
 

The PNH booth took up half the building! it was huge.  The PNH staff said that Pat was roaming around, so we would probably be able to find him sometime or another.  After we had browsed through the clothes a bit, I saw him sitting in a chair on the far end of the building.  I quickly bought a shirt, and Kathy Roxanne and I all went over to him.

He was very nice, I told him I came all the way from Alaska just to see him, and he said that it was very nice for me to do that.  He has been to Homer before, and he knew right where it is.  He signed my shirt. 

For the rest of the day, all we did was go around the booths, and see Monty Roberts.
In the evening, Pat was scheduled to give a demonstration.  We got there half an hour early so we got good seats. The Savvy team came out and played with their horses, and Linda Parelli (Pat's wife) jumped her Dutch Warmblood, Remmer, over a picnic table bareback with a halter.  Pat came on, and the Equine Affaire staff cut his microphone connection.  I will not tell the whole story here, if you want to read about what happened, click here.
     Anyway. the show went on, and it was great.  At the end, Pat said to feel under our seats, and that two people had slips of paper saying that they won something. Then, he called out, "where is that little girl from Alaska that came up to me this afternoon?"  It was me!!! I raised my hand, but of course he didn't see me with 2000 other people. The whole row in front of me, and Aunt Kathy, Roxanne, Lindsay and Karen were all shouting "SHE'S OVER HERE!!!"  Pat said to get on down there.  He wrote on my arm "2 tickets" and said that it was good for two tickets to the Horseman's Savvy Conference in September!  I couldn't believe it!!!  What a wonderful way to end the day!

Friday