Rhythm Thief
Veteran
bonj said:
Spot on. Was that so difficult?
canals, walkers and bell tinklers...
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Spot on. Was that so difficult?
tdr1nka
Taking the biscuit
- Location
- SE London, Bandit Country
Going on present thinking, if we were to ban all who Simon deems unfit to use the roads it would leave only him, as he really is 100% predictable!
As for the OP, tow paths are to be shared and FWIW, walkers, cyclists and anglers are all equally irritating to boat owners who actually pay licence fees to live on and use these facilities.
T x
As for the OP, tow paths are to be shared and FWIW, walkers, cyclists and anglers are all equally irritating to boat owners who actually pay licence fees to live on and use these facilities.
T x
Arch said:yeah, good point, although I dunno that I could say what makes a horse look young, whereas I might hazard a guess.. Mind you, some riders will wear a vest saying "Young horse take care" or similar, which helps
And it's not just youth. You can sometimes tell a horses temperament (flighty, nervy, bombproof) by looking at it, although sometimes it depends on details like the ears and eyes that you might not be able to see from behind. Most of my experience is with riding school nags anyway, most of whom have that specially dejected sleepy look that only a horse or donkey can really acheive... Or maybe they only do that when they see me heading for them...
This is one thing that really gets up my goat about the horse brigade - how they're constantly trying to educate non-horse people about horses. Dog owners, too, for that matter - if not more so (or maybe the same amount but there's just more of them). Why should everyone else have to become an expert on how to deal with your animal? It's you that chooses to bring it out, YOU should be the one that knows how to control it, and if that doesn't extend to knowing how to keep it calm in the presence of people, then you shouldn't bring it out where there's going to be people.
It's no different from the argument speeding motorists give to people who complain that it's intimidating to cross the road when people speed, that 'if you don't know how the road with fast cars then you shouldn't cross the road'. The attempt to make out it's a completely different issue is a bit hypocritical imho. It's still the "everyone else should watch out for me" mentality on both sides. No different.
Rhythm Thief
Veteran
tdr1nka said:
True. I remember squashing an angler's keep net with my narrowboat because he was fishing on a lock mooring. I did give him plenty of warning but he refused to move it.
I'm sure there are friendly smiley anglers out there but, as a boater, I found them to be a pretty miserable bunch. And they block both the canal and the towpath with those carbon pole things they use.I never minded cyclists, and certainly not pedestrians unless they allowed their dogs to shoot all over the towpath by the side of my boat and then failed to pick it up, but it did used to amuse me to see them peering into my living room as they walked past, then hurriedly withdrawing when they realised someone was in there looking back at them.
tdr1nka
Taking the biscuit
- Location
- SE London, Bandit Country
To be fair Bonj,
When people offer advice about animal behaviour to non owners it is usually in response to fears voiced.
If you are happy to not know that a dog will feel defensive if you, as a stranger, stare it down or it will continue to chase if you run, then you are welcome to be ignorant, miss out on good everyday advice and most likely to be bitten or have the sh*t scared out of you.
You have learned when best to avoid the violent nutter in the pub or the hoodies on the street so why anyone should feel the need to voice a right to ignorance and not value and respect all non car road users is beyond me.
The outlines for approaching horses are in the HC and work well enough if followed.
IMHO it is the nervousness and ignorance of drivers/riders that is probably more dangerous than the 'possible behaviour' of a horse. Remember we share the roads and cars are by far the greater evil on the roads.
I'm very worried that the OP and some postings are showing real elements of self rightiousness and inailiable right that we all criticise car drivers for driving under the influence of. Or is it just natures pecking order, car bites bike, bike bites anything else it can find on/off road..........?
T x
T x
When people offer advice about animal behaviour to non owners it is usually in response to fears voiced.
If you are happy to not know that a dog will feel defensive if you, as a stranger, stare it down or it will continue to chase if you run, then you are welcome to be ignorant, miss out on good everyday advice and most likely to be bitten or have the sh*t scared out of you.
You have learned when best to avoid the violent nutter in the pub or the hoodies on the street so why anyone should feel the need to voice a right to ignorance and not value and respect all non car road users is beyond me.
The outlines for approaching horses are in the HC and work well enough if followed.
IMHO it is the nervousness and ignorance of drivers/riders that is probably more dangerous than the 'possible behaviour' of a horse. Remember we share the roads and cars are by far the greater evil on the roads.
I'm very worried that the OP and some postings are showing real elements of self rightiousness and inailiable right that we all criticise car drivers for driving under the influence of. Or is it just natures pecking order, car bites bike, bike bites anything else it can find on/off road..........?
T x
T x
Gerry Attrick
Lincolnshire Mountain Rescue Consultant
Eloquently put, tdr1nka.
tdr1nka
Taking the biscuit
- Location
- SE London, Bandit Country
Rhythm Thief said:True. I remember squashing an angler's keep net with my narrowboat because he was fishing on a lock mooring. I did give him plenty of warning but he refused to move it.
I never minded cyclists, and certainly not pedestrians unless they allowed their dogs to shoot all over the towpath by the side of my boat and then failed to pick it up, but it did used to amuse me to see them peering into my living room as they walked past, then hurriedly withdrawing when they realised someone was in there looking back at them.
Ahhh I miss my boat so much, nothing could beat the lazy chug on the first spring days after the winter system closure. Approaching 400yds of towpath and a fishing competition, nudging the BMC to just a notch above idle and drifting past while each scowling angler in turn reels in his line like fury and raises his rod to let you past like an angling guard of honour.
Hehehe,
T x
Well, I have never claimed to be of the 'horse brigade' - nor indeed to be any sort of 'expert'! Certainly I know nothing of how to rear a horse, how to groom it, how to train it, how to feed it, how to ride it ... yet what I do know - or make an effort to know - about horses - is how to safely encounter one on the road. Because it matters: knowing the right thing could save me, or the horse, or the rider, from injury. And I've already said, I don't actually like horses much. I suppose my position is a bit Voltaire-ish: I may not approve of equestrianism, but I will defend to the death the right of equestrians to be there on the road or wherever I meet up with them. Simply that.bonj said:
tdr1nka said:
Pete said:
Hmmm... I just don't like the attitude of most horse riders, which seems to be that "I can't control my animal, because it isn't possible to be in complete control of it, so therefore it's YOUR job to make sure it doesn't throw a strop, which it might well do."
Rhythm Thief said:
Unpredictable vehicles are not allowed on the road, except for horses. I think horses should be banned from the roads like all other unpredictable vehicles. Drunk drivers would be OK on the roads if we all made every possible allowance for them - for instance we could all drive tanks at 15mph and pavements could all be surrounded by huge cages of thick metal bars. Horse riders are banned from motorways. The time has come to ban them from all roads. Many ordinary roads today are much busier than motorways were when they were introduced.
tdr1nka
Taking the biscuit
- Location
- SE London, Bandit Country
bonj said:
But surely this boils down to 'I may have difficulty controlling my horse if you cannot follow or are ignorant to prescribed and simple road procedure', is this not what we scream at cars everyday?
Practice what is preached.
What horse has given you a left hook or driven on your back tyre at 30mph, none I suspect.
T x
tdr1nka
Taking the biscuit
- Location
- SE London, Bandit Country
I do have a gem of a story vis horses & bikes from some years ago, when I was working for a School Arts project.
We had a selection of bicycles that some South London school children had built up and decorated to look like sea creatures. We were riding them in the Lord Mayors Parade among the floats and marching bands, when one of the bikes which was done up as a sea monster with a tall swinging articulated head rode close to a rank of 4 Police horses causing 2 to rear and dump their riders!
FWIW To train Police horses to be calm in riot situations they take them down between parallel rows of noisy people with horns, rattles, bangers etc. This is called a Nusience Ally.
T x
We had a selection of bicycles that some South London school children had built up and decorated to look like sea creatures. We were riding them in the Lord Mayors Parade among the floats and marching bands, when one of the bikes which was done up as a sea monster with a tall swinging articulated head rode close to a rank of 4 Police horses causing 2 to rear and dump their riders!
FWIW To train Police horses to be calm in riot situations they take them down between parallel rows of noisy people with horns, rattles, bangers etc. This is called a Nusience Ally.
T x
tdr1nka said:
About 8 years ago I was riding very slowly with a 7 yr old child on our bikes. I alerted the horse owners ahead and we rode past at about 10mph. One horse of the 2 reared up and deposited a young girl on the ground behind it. She started wailing and started to chase her horse. The adult horse rider let us know that we were entirely to blame and seemed completely shocked that I refused to admit this. I told her that I wasn't too happy that she'd allowed her child to ride a horse she obviously couldn't control, and that I was not too impressed that my small companion and I had been in the vicinity of a riderless horse prancing about in the lane in a state of distress.
Horses should not be on public roads. The holier than thou attitude of their riders is a mystery to me. Is there something about riding a horse that makes someone feel superior to everyone else? I'd be ashamed to use a vehicle I couldn't control, and even more ashamed to take an innocent, nervous animal on public roads for my own enjoyment.
simonali
Guru
Anyway, back to towpaths?
I walk along towpaths as much as I cycle along them and when walking I frequently get cut up by speeding mountain bikers doing 20mph+, who don't slow down, say excuse me, ring a bell or say thanks after I've dived out of their way, grabbing my dog where possible. It is these sorts of people, like the RLJers and no light brigade to the motorist, that cause walkers to be surly to those of us who do slow down and ding our bells, even though we've done nothing wrong.
Like most things in life, there are peanuts everywhere who ruin enjoyable experiences for the rest of us. The average towpath stroller will have in no doubt nearly been mown down by the speeding peanuts, just as I have, and will tar us all with the same brush from that day forth.
When I'm a walker cyclists are a menace and when I'm a cyclist walkers are a whinging obstacle! You can't win!!
I walk along towpaths as much as I cycle along them and when walking I frequently get cut up by speeding mountain bikers doing 20mph+, who don't slow down, say excuse me, ring a bell or say thanks after I've dived out of their way, grabbing my dog where possible. It is these sorts of people, like the RLJers and no light brigade to the motorist, that cause walkers to be surly to those of us who do slow down and ding our bells, even though we've done nothing wrong.
Like most things in life, there are peanuts everywhere who ruin enjoyable experiences for the rest of us. The average towpath stroller will have in no doubt nearly been mown down by the speeding peanuts, just as I have, and will tar us all with the same brush from that day forth.
When I'm a walker cyclists are a menace and when I'm a cyclist walkers are a whinging obstacle! You can't win!!
tdr1nka
Taking the biscuit
- Location
- SE London, Bandit Country
simoncc said:
Was anyone seriously hurt in this incedent, no. Who was in more fear for their child?
Maybe if you had done something to assist after the child took the fall you might have some reason to be so bloody pius.
To feel immediately and unjustifiably blamed is one thing but to extrapolate an imaginary disaster befalling you and your child, as example, over the facts of the event you have recanted here is pure and glorious b*llocks.
If I were a horse, I'd shoot you.
T
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