Aliénor's equine story so far......

I was watching Aliénor ride today and thinking how good she looked, she certainly rides better than I did at eleven, indeed some would say better than I do now. So I decided to do the proud mother thing and look out some photos that chart her equine progress.......I really wish there were some photos of me riding as a child, but my father used to abandon me at the stables gate without ever hanging around to watch.

As we bought our first digital camera just before Ali was born (which was about 4 times the size and weight of my current one, and could store a fraction of the number of photos, I still have it somewhere), she will have no such regrets. So here we go......

This is the first ever time she sat on a pony, aged 1:

We didn't have equines in those days, still lived in the UK. This was on holiday in October 2001.

A year later, she was very taken with this Shire at Northcote Heavy Horse Centre in Lincolnshire, she was happily leading him around!

By this time we had moved to France, and had a little bit of land, so the mother in law very helpfully bought Aliénor a pony......a two year old Shetland filly called Milka, who was trouble from day one.
Looks cute, doesn't she?

Well she wasn't. She thought she should be in charge. She was jealous of anyone that took my attention away from her (including poor Ali). She would rear and charge at anyone who went into her paddock apart from me. When I got Gandalf, she bullied him unmercifully. But she taught me a LOT!
And she was Ali's first pony......

Ali & Milka Nov 2004

However, even after I'd backed her it became obvious she could never be trusted off the lead rein so eventually we swapped her with a bloke from the circus for a 12 year old entire called Flecha. Who was ace. He was calm, friendly, once he'd got to know us he would let Ali do pretty much anything with him and we had a lot of fun.....

Ali & Flecha, May 2006

By this time, at the ripe old age of six, the girl was convinced she could ride the big boy.......and she could!!

She came off him once at that age and remains the only person to have fallen off Gandalf......to date.

She grows like a weed and was soon too big for Flecha so I found him a nice home with some people in the Charente who needed a companion for their Shetland (once he'd been gelded). By this time, I had bought another horse, a Percheron x Anglo Arab called Freya and Ali and I started riding out together. The first hack we did is something I'll never forget (not least because Freya tried to buck me off)

September 2008

Sadly I had to sell Freya, because she needed a lot of work and I didn't have the time, due to the arrival of the SNO the year before. So we went back to sharing Big G and I decided to get a baby horse so I wouldn't be inheriting someone else's mistakes again. When Skyfaxa arrived as a 6 month old foal, Ali helped me with her right from the start.

November 2009

And then a few months later I saw Kinna, and she looked so sad I had to bring her home, so Ali's future horse arrived.

February 2010

At this point I thought we had the full contingent of equines, but as it happened, I was wrong, in April last year the Naughty Nordic Princess arrived, and the rest, as they say, is history......

Busy day.....

Went on a bit of a trek today. We'd been invited to go and visit Flecha in his new home so set off to drive the 3 hours up to Oradour Fanais, near Confolens in the Charente. He now lives with another small pony, Gypsy, and 2 Fjord ponies, Rocky and Kalix.

They make quite a nice little herd!

I love the colour of the Fjord ponies, especially the two coloured mane. Shame they don't get a bit taller, I think my feet would be down to their knees!!!

Then after that we went back to see the Breton filly Almonde. She's only about 45 minutes away from Flecha.

Turns out she's never been away from her mum or out in a trailer or out and about on the road so she could be a bit of a project.......but I'm sure she'd soon get the hang of it all like Skyfaxa has.....

One out and one in.....

Flecha's new owner came to get him on Friday, true to form he ambled into the trailer no problem and immediately started tucking into the haynet she'd brought for him. She phoned later to say he'd arrived after his 2 and a half hour trip as cool as a cucumber, went into the field with his new Shetland friend and they sniffed each other then started eating! He's made friends with the Fjords in the next field too! So no worries there......we'll go up and see them in a couple of weeks and get some pics.

Then on Saturday we went to fetch Noisette, she was a star! She's never been out of the field she was born in 6 years ago, she's never been on her own away from her mother and sister, but it only took about 10 minutes to tempt her into the trailer with a few carrots! She travelled OK (only 10 minutes from my place) and when we lowered the ramp she didn't come out straight away as she was too busy looking for bits of food left on the floor.....she's in the paddock here with the goats and has hardly made any noise, just got on with stuffing her face. She's not too sure about the goats though, she keeps her distance.....but she doesn't seem bothered about the chickens & ducks flapping around. She looks a bit lost to me, hopefully that will change when Skyfaxa arrives!

The boys are back!

Went to get the boys today. They both look none the worse for their ordeal, Flecha has definitely got fatter this week! Thought we might have problems loading Ross but he followed Flech up the ramp with some alacrity - I think he was worried about being left behind!

They were happy to be out on grass again, Flecha's head never left the floor even though he's never been to Heather's (the owner of Ross) before, no time to admire the scenery, just get on with the important business of filling my belly.......

Update on the boys

Went to see the two "geldings" today. They both seem fine, moving easily and eating well - especially Flecha apparently who started munching as soon as he came round from the op!! He has searched the entire (quite large) box for every last wisp of hay, he's such a greedy boy. Luckily their bed is sand, not straw or he would have eaten it all.......

Ross likes the sand, he has been rolling in it regularly so he can't be feeling too sorry for himself either. The girls looking after them say they have been as good as gold, even not minding the daily showers of their tender bits.

Waiting to hear from the vet (who wasn't around when I was there earlier) as to when we can go and fetch them........

Delinquent donkey

So while I'm waiting for my girl to arrive, I seem to have acquired a donkey for a while. He belongs to a friend nearby and being a 3 year old "entier", had decided that he was the boss and was pushing her around. She actually decided she needed to rehome him so I brought him here while she found a new home.


He and our pony Flecha had a prolonged willy waving session to decide who was boss:







Flecha won.








Now they are best friends and Ross the donkey is a much happier animal. He's been for waks round the village and has been as good as gold (it took him approximately 5 minutes to realize he couldn't behave like a moody teenager here in Barnes' Boot Camp).


His owner has decided she'd like to keep him after all. He's here now until he gets his (impressively sized) dangly bits removed next week.....