Horse Hunting :)

I never thought this day would come... or at least not so soon. It has been a dream of mine since I joined a local riding school in 2004 (or was it in 2003... it seems so long ago!). However, things just wasn't working out at the time and I got by riding riding school ponies and horses owned by other people. This journey has led me to meet some very interesting horses, and ponies, and have taught me a lot.

Imagine the excitement and joy when my dad finally decided to buy me my first horse as my 21st B-day present :) I was over joyed. The excitement was constantly threatened by some hiccups along the way, but I stuck through it and am one step away from my dream.

At first I was given a chance to get a 7 year old Arabian mare for “free”. The owner valued her at around R15000 and would have had to for her owner to pay her off. I had grown very attached to this mare, because she wasn't the easiest horse to work with and I love challenges! She had been abused before and had very little training, but I just fell in love with her from the first minute I saw her. I was very tempted to take her, but after a lot of thinking I decided not to take her. There was just too much at stake and I wasn't quite sure what I would be getting myself into (with the owners that is). All I will say is that you get some dodgy, greedy people in the horse industry.

So the hunting started... and how very exciting and educational it was! I had a very good friend help me with my search, giving me opinions on conformation etc. And eventually found the perfect horse for me...

Before I talk of my chosen horse I thought I would first show some horses that were available at the time. My heart was set on getting a TB, relatively young, something between the ages 3 and 5 and at least 16h.h.

The first horse I found was a beautiful dapple grey gelding. He was absolutely stunning! However, he got sold before I could make an offer (I'm not surprised though!). He was more or less what I was looking for in my horse and so set a very high goal for the other horses to meet :)


Ain't he stunning!

The very same owners had a couple of other Tbs for sale and I saw a couple that looked promising, but I wanted to wait a little longer. These owners take Tbs off the track and then rehab them for a bit before selling them. They have gotten some lovely Tbs off the track in the past, so I was willing to wait. At the time 2 of their horses caught my eye.





At some point they had a lovely light bay mare for sale. His conformation wasn't what I was looking for, but I loved his colour. It was just something different to the usuall bay and chestnut colours.


Do you see what I mean about her colour?

Then I saw my boy! He is a dark bay, 4 year old gelding standing at 16h.h. He has an honest looking face with a real sparkle in his eye. His conformation is as good as it will get for me so I decided that he was the one :)





If all goes well he will be coming to me end January the latest... so fingers crossed!