The Fool on the Hill

That's what was playing on a CD in my car as I drove home from the yard, and I reflected on two things.

First, I had dug out The Beatles; "Magical Mystery Tour" CD because I had spent the evening before watching Beatles night on BBC2 and I fell in love with the Fab Four all over again. Still held on to my favourites, too, John and George.

The second reflection was that the song was an appropriate score to the hack I'd just had with Max.

We had been trundling along perfectly happily, climbed up a hill to the ridge, trotted along the ridge like we knew what we were doing, and then spied a large group of ramblers walking towards us. I spotted them first so was able to anticipate Max's reaction when he spied them too, and keep him steady.

We carried on towards them and they to us. Then we all stopped to watch an owl make a graceful swoop and pass over the field to our left.

When we were level with the walkers, we stopped to have a chat about the owl and the beauty of the day (and the beauty of Max).

This was when Max decided he'd quite like to stick with the walkers, because they had packs on their backs, and in Max's experience, quite often there is food in backpacks. "Follow the food" would be Max's motto, if he had one.

The walkers tried to depart, Max tried to follow, and I tried to stop him. But no, he was determined. he was also atop a ridge with a sharp drop and a lot of people on the ground around him. Rather than have a battle which might mean Max backing his rather ample backside into the vicinity of people who were not necessarily as convinced of their safety around Max as I was, I dismounted, told him to stop being foolish, led him a little distance and then hopped back on again.

We parted company with the ramblers and carried on to have a wonderful snorty canter through a stubble field!

That makes two fools on a hill.