SPANISH HORSES
I could not resist doing a quick Post on Spanish horses and riding in Spain. Partially, this is to please my daughter, who is obsesssed by horses and rides at every possible opportunity. I also rather wanted to share my photograph of a stunning Fresian being shoed!
Thankfully in our area (around Gandia in Valencia Province) there are untold places to ride and some excellent stables. My daughter, for example, rides at a place called Los Robles where there are some 150 horses and ponies, along with three fine, fenced in ‘schools’, one of which is covered.
Of course, riding in Spain can be sometimes a little different from that of the UK. For starters, many stables tend to specialise in the Spanish school of riding. This is a very formalised type of dressage in which the horses are high stepping and trained to almost ‘dance’. Typically, the horses used are magnificent, arch necked white Spanish horses (such as Andalusians) – although Fresian horses (huge, noble looking and black) are also common.
The Spanish school is nothing if not visually impressive and, like dressage in the UK, is all about total control over the horses concerned. As a consequence, it is a highly disciplined (for horse and rider) form of equestrianism and a long way from ‘hacking’.
Of course, there is plenty of hacking in Spain and by no means do all stables specialise in the Spanish school. However, the latter tends to be the objective of serious Spanish riders who seem to aspire to be good at the Spanish school – and to own a properly trained (and very expensive!) Spanish school horse.
Typically, my daughter is as perverse as most Britons and dislikes the formality of the Spanish school but loves jumping! This is looked upon as slightly eccentric at Los Robles but does not stop a crowd of admiring on-lookers gathering as she hurtles over terrifyingly high jumps. Naturally, this is not done on a Spanish school horse as they seem to have neither the aptitude nor training for jumping.
To my dismay and pride (when I can bear to open my eyes!), my daughter rides the only ‘real’ jumper in the stables. This is an enormous, 17.5 hand Hanoverian ex-international show jumper – with an urge to leap over any obstacle in front of her that is truly awesome. I gather her record (the horse – not my daughter) was during a competition when she cleared a 2 metre high by 2 metre wide jump!
Fortunately, my daughter is good hands. Her instructor is a lovely Bulgarian man, who, I believe, was a notable rider in his own country. Certainly, he seems to be something of a ‘horse whisperer’ and I have a sneaking suspicion that he is not keen on the ‘strictness of the Spanish school. His approach (which I love) seems based upon communicating on a different level with horses – rather than exercising ‘control’ over them.
Needless to say, if you want to horse ride in Spain then there are plenty of opportunities to do so, whether you want to ride ‘formally’ or just have a day out ‘hacking’. On the whole, I also suspect that (depending upon the area) it is probably much cheaper than in the UK. Private classes tend to cost around 20 Euros per hour – which in the case of my daughter is excellent value given the fabulous horse and charasmatic instructor.
