Beasties

Heavy horses are kind of the All-terrain vehicles of their day.

While they don't cover as much ground as quickly as a lighter horse, they can cover a lot of ground and do so with a deliberate fashion, with each foot being planted with a satisfying and soild clomp. In fact, after the third day of the ride, I had a hard time falling asleep at night because I kept fading into a dream-state in which all I heard were the ringing of hoofbeats in my head.

It was simply perfect countryside to ride through. Despite the rain, there was so many great trails and views to take in. I didn't know this until I arrived, but this is Beatrix Potter country, and her cottage here is a well-known tourist hotspot as the countryside looks much like it did when she was writing here.

Up mountains, down mountains, through creeks and puddles, these horses did it all without a moment's hesitation. They were so not the divas of the horse world and had no problem clomping their way through mud and water and rocky terrain. While they tried to keep riding on the road to a minimum, we did occasionally have to, and they didn't bat an eye in traffic.

They were also the perfect height to get you into the hard-to reach spots on a blackberry bramble.

Although they were a bit challenging to get on and off, they were all so quiet and sweet natured. We rode them into a village and because the main tourist attraction as we lined up to get ice cream.

Rather incredibly, not a single horse decided to poop in front of the ice cream shop. It's like they knew.

Heavy horse breeds are not the easiest keepers though. Eating 35 lbs of food a day means they aren't the cheapest animals to keep. The days of horse and plow are long gone in all but a few small farms that still enthusiastically use horsepower, so most of the breeds have been on the decline for decades now.

While photography conditions were a tad treacherous, I snapped when I could and with a lot of abandon. I did get a lot of smiling happy riders in my shots, and I think that really captured the spirt of the moment more than anything.

These animals can sprint like hellfire, and it's totally surprising to be on a long-reined walk at one moment and asking them to get on racing full speed in the next, and then they go right back to walk calmly with a self-satisfied snort.

Far from being lumbering beast, these horses have big, lively strides, which makes them feel more like thoroughbreds than plow-horses. They have great, bouncy active trots and huge canter strides that is a bit unexpected, but loads of fun. It's just so much power, but they are so controlable and sweet.

I think the zoning laws in Paris would crush my dreams of taking him home with me, so I'm not even going to inquire.

Thank you to Yvonne and Peter and Annie at Cumbrian Heavy Horses for such a lovely ride.

Ride

I viciously regret the course my life has taken on days like this.

Then I beat myself up for thinking that way, because really now. No one has it better than me.

Still, I feel like there is a huge chunk of my life that I divorced myself from, and it pains me a bit still to be divided from. I miss being around horses badly. The smells, the sounds, the lovely velvet muzzles, the giant brown liquidy eyes peering out from under a bit of forelock. The routines of feeding and mucking and tack cleaning and grooming. It's very comforting and cerebral for me.

But I choose the life I have. Devoted urbanites can only dream. I did, however, give it a try, and when I first moved to NYC I taught riding lessons in Central Park for the first year and a half before putting on a pair of pantyhose and having to go work smelling clean. It just wasn't sustainable to not have a high-paying job in a city like New York.

So, um, anyway. Aside from my personal grievances, any time in saddle is awesome-time for me. I relish every moment.

And thundering around the countryside with a group of nine great war horses was an attraction in itself.

On The Backs of Giants

Ages ago, I had booked a day-long horseback ride at a reputable stable on the Isle of Skye in Scotland while I was hiking around there. Have you been? Go. Skye is a wild, lovely place. Then I promptly canceled my ride when I found out about another stable that did beach rides on Clydesdales, which made pony trekking through the highlands seem kind of a dull.

A fantastic time was had, and it was a highlight of that entire trip, and I kept it in my mind as something I had to do again. I had looked up the stables a few years later and I was selfishly disappointed to find out they had picked up and moved to the Lakes District and were doing bigger, longer rides, and they had rebranded themselves as Cumbrian Heavy Horses. One rather booze fueled night, I informed a friend about them, and one thing led to another and we ended up booking a ride.

A train ride through the blindingly green countryside out of Scotland brought us to the small village of Windermere, where we headed to a nearby farmhouse inn. There are tons of little farmhouses here that rent out rooms for a little extra income.

A little damp, but the whole area was gorgeous. I instantly took to the place- there are hiking trails and walking trails and bridle paths that criss cross the hills and forest, dotted with perfectly quaint farmhouses, hedgerows, stone walls, and fields of sheep and cows and horses.

It was unseasonably warm (or so I was told) but the first smattering of fall colors were starting to show.

And then, our steeds arrived.

Enormous, gracious, and docile beast.

Time to ride.