Well, I’ve less than a week left in South Africa and I’ve had an absolute ball. The current group of work riders plus one staff and the proprietor of Wild Coast Horse Trails have just been out on a trail for five days. The trip in a nutshell? We rode from Kei Mouth to Trennery’s to Wavecrest, along the Eastern Coast of South Africa.
Consequently, you see a lot of sand and surf! Two nights are spent at each place in gorgeous rooms on the beach. The trail involved around 3-5 hours in the saddle each day, long canters up hills and across the beach; a gorgeous gallop and lots of breath taking scenery – a ship wreck, sand dunes, rocks, hills and beach, cliffs and valleys and South African culture.
Before the trail I had the time to ride 15 of the horses here – up roads working on fitness; on trails round the 400 hectare property and at the beach and school horses in flat and jumping – what a great riding experience!
I also got to work with a foal that was born the night I arrived, work with weanlings, yearlings and stallions; free lunge endurance horses and learn Join Up and start two 3 year old mares under saddle. Oh, and I’ve raided an impressive horse library here, making note of a half-dozen must haves for my collection and have read five books while here – relaxing!
Yesterday we got to go to the Inkwenkwezi Game Reserve and saw warthog, giraffes, a rhino, many types of antelope, lions, ostriches, wildebeast, kingfisher, elephants and finished up playing with cheetah and lion cubs – just gorgeous. Photos to follow when I get home!
For the horse riding enthusiast, you can’t pass this working/riding holiday up!
“Good horses make short miles.”
tag: horse books, join up, endurance riding, south africa
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