string brakes or is that breaks?

Today we tested the prototype side pull. Not the clearest 'pic with his lordship being almost white now *rolls eyes*

Now I can tell you that a year ago nothing would have got me to ride on a cold damp morning with a piece of string for brakes! Coupled with the next door equines being mighty interested in our presence and then doing handstands and bombing about to show off, lol. I think that if I learn nothing from this exercise it will have brought about a deeper respect and trust between the two of us. I don't expect it to lead to nothing in any case but just in case.....
What I'm hoping to find is a bridle that can position the head with no tilt, no curl back, no excessive neck bend but with the squeeze of the fingers elicits a soft incurvation from nose to wither. Blimey, it does what I hoped for! I am so amazed and really can't believe how well he went. Downsides...the headcollar doesn't sit securely when you use the rein (totally fixable) the cord reins are just too thin. Now I thought thin would be good and it is but I think they're just too thin and the feel I get from using my old curb reins (very thin for leather) is actually a nicer feel. I want to keep them as thin as possible though because it always makes me want to be delicate in my feel with a lighter rein.
Halting is working well with the cordeo alone and some weight aid to back it up, rein-back is brilliant from the cordeo too. What I found really pleasing was that if I raised my hands and thus the bridle reins then he came up and open, not trying to curl back and down. Shoulder-in, counter s-i, travers all worked well and leg yield with a little shoulder aid through the cordeo worked a treat too. Oh well in for a penny as they say...and trot transitions; not sure if he really did feel looser or just that I felt slightly 'heady' with the thought of a piece of string for brakes but it was incredible. Crap bending on the left but after some tweaking we worked out a system of shoulder guiding with the cordeo and head flexion with the rein, balanced with some leg/weight aids for the other end; conversely no surprise that his right rein wasn't bad at all.
An excellent start, LOADS to work on and improve and more trawling the net to decide on which sidepull (I still like the Enduro but it's only rope and Patrick has promised to try constructing one for me).
The moral of this work....trust yourself to see the good in your horse and work with it.
Di asked me the other day about the cone targeting and *stuff* like that and what it's worth was in the general day to day business of riding/working your horse. Well I only got to mention the fact that it helped with trust and confidence before we rolled onto the next topic. I forgot to mention though that without a bit and especially in the liberty and cordeo work you need to find a way to guide the nose (so that you can have inside bend), ie following your finger/hand and crucially targeting is a build up to that.
Hey, I'm on a roll again ;-)

lost in thought

This has been the longest time I haven't blogged without good reason. I'm not entirely sure why, usually it's a part of my day that I look forward to; updating the progress we've (hopefully) made. I think the problem at the moment is that every answer I find leads me to another question. So I'm not sitting on my butt and doing nothing but as yet I'm still deep in thought (mmm, I think I'm also driving Di mad, sorry).
I have cobbled together a very basic halter to ride in, it worked like a dream in-hand today when I used it with the cordeo. We worked on some transitions to start and then rein-back to walk, then some shoulder-in/counter shoulder-in and travers. The trick is to use the cordeo as a shoulder guide and halting device and only using the reins of the halter for flexion. We finished with some trot work which he really seems to love in-hand, rein-back to trot is one big energy boost, lol.
The cordeo works on the base of the neck to re-balance the horse rearwards, as you watch the process from the ground it's interesting to see the way the neck lifts but without hollowing the back.
Lots more to come but just a touching base blog night :-)

where to start?

mmm, not sure where to start really. It's been a busy few days, lots of time spent with equines (Lydia now has a lesson at the club on Friday evening and Saturday morning) and even more time with the brain in overload.
As I said previously I have been searching on the www to fuel my interest in bitless riding. As a result of this I have joined a French forum of bitless riders/trainers. So far so good, bear with me dear readers.
Having joined this happy band of bitless bods I was somewhat taken aback to find myself castigated for using a hackamore, oops!!  In the spirit of learning, I asked for advice, one of the forum members, Donald , was very kind to suggest I try working on the ground with a cordeo (rope around the neck) and so here are the 'photos and some brief vids (thanks very much to Lydia) they are not of great quality as they were taken on my camera.

OK, bear with me some more. It was amazing! We could actually achieve quite a lot and he was just very chilled and listening. It's quite weird because you can really do nothing with the cordeo, no directions, no halts, it's just like an umbilical attachment that holds you together. We walked, trotted, reined back, lateral work basics and it was so much fun.
Bolstered up by our fun session yesterday, today I decided to try riding in the cordeo. Again my daughter was on hand to capture our amateur attempts. I started out in-hand, just reinforcing the halt voice aids (mmm, well it's pretty important when you have no reins, lol)
Then I got on and we walked, halted, changed direction, reined back. OMG it was so revealing! It highlights all the holes in your training but at the same time is really uplifting and I just know that I couldn't have done this last year.
The bitless write up is therefore still in the planning stage, each part is there in my head but it's going to be quite a lot of work to commit it to words on the page. I can say I'm very happy to have 'stumbled' across the cordeo and although it won't be part of my daily routine, it will be a regular session to check our progress.