Guest post: best horse rides in Africa!
Guest post for Ethnic Equestrian
Hello Ethnic Equestrian readers! My name is Sanne, I’m the creator of Hooves Around The World and I have the pleasure of writing a guest post for Noori today. For the last 6 years I have been traveling a lot through the African continent on horseback, and have been living in South Africa for about 4 years. Recently, I moved back to Europe to work with horses in Wales for the summer. In this guest post I’ll be telling you all about my favorite experiences with horses in Africa!
Having lived in South Africa for quite some years, I fell in love with the country and all its quirks. It is a unique country with a tough and interesting history. The people in South Africa are incredibly warmhearted and welcoming and they have a vast amount of interesting and touching stories to tell about their lives here. Horses are immensely popular in South Africa, with lots of breeds having been introduced throughout the wars, such as thoroughbreds and the boerperd, a hardy dutch breed. Nowadays, there is lots of horse racing in and around Cape Town, and there are hundreds of places around the country where you can do trail rides in South Africa’s varied landscape and wildlife.
It can be difficult to find a nice place to ride that has well trained horses, is in a beautiful place and especially where the horses are well cared for. Standards of horse care in Africa are a bit different than for example in Europe. After years of traveling the country, I found and fell in love with three horse riding adventure organizations around South Africa. One amazing trail ride along the Wild Coast in the south, where you ride over cliff tops and gallop over stretched out beaches with not another person in sight.
Another trail ride through the impressive Drakensberg mountains (which was the inspiration for the Lord Of The Rings books!) on local Basotho and Boerperd ponies to carry you over the rocks. Last but not least, an incredible horseback adventure in a big 5 game reserve where you ride with lions and other great wildlife, truly a once in a lifetime experience.
Image courtesy of Hooves Around The World.
Zimbabwe is one of my favorite countries on the African continent! It’s still very wild in lots of places and so many different landscapes to explore. About two hours from the capital of Harare there is a beautiful place called Imire, where hundreds of people spend every day giving their all to preserve Zimbabwe’s nature and wildlife, with a focus on rhinos specifically. Here you can come volunteer in their conservation program, and spend lots of time with their incredible animals. You will get the chance to teach the elephants, feed the rhinos, monitor the other wildlife such as giraffes and buck, you’ll also be able to see their rescued lion Mambo and crocodile Crispen.
Moreover, you’ll be helping with maintenance and other useful tasks around the reserve such as picking up litter along the main road. Last but not least, you get the opportunity to visit the local schools and communities and help in their efforts to make this world a better place. The community has started some amazing initiatives for helping young girls be able to keep going to school. You will help the women support group sow reusable sanitary pads that they give away to girls in need. You also get the chance to buy their sanitary packages. Imire is truly a magical place and after a visit here not a day will go by where you don’t think of all the beautiful memories you made here.
To make this place even more magical, you get the chance to participate in their equestrian volunteer program. In this, you get to combine half days of horse riding with half days of the regular volunteer activities. With the horses you will monitor the wildlife in the places around the reserve that are not accessible by car, check the fences and herd cattle on certain days to get rid of their ticks. It’s a true privilege to ride horses around this reserve.
The owner of Imire, Judy, has fantastic horses that are well trained and a pleasure to ride. Judy takes care of all her animals as if they were her children and loves them more than anything, the horses are in excellent condition despite the harsh environment. Ask to ride Lundi! She is fabulous and it made me so happy to get to ride her every day.
Image courtesy of Hooves Around The World.
Recently, I had the pleasure of exploring Luxor and its surroundings in Egypt on horseback. Before, I never really traveled in Northern Africa before, and I couldn’t believe what I’d been missing when I saw Luxor with my own eyes. Here you get the chance to ride at a local Egyptian owned stable, where you will be welcomed with open arms by your fantastic host family.
You stay in stunning hotels where the local staff go above and beyond to make your stay great. The horses at this stable are fabulous, they are very sensitive and alert but not scared of anything. They are in a great condition and they are very well taken care of and loved by the stable’s staff. Here you get to ride in the town of Luxor, under hundreds of hot air balloons, in the desert, past temples, statues and heritage sites and through endless fields full of bananas!
On the sunrise and sunset rides you will see the skies turn a magical color as you blast through the desert on these incredibly fast horses, or as you canter slowly underneath the glowing hot air balloons. To really understand what it feels like to ride here, you have to experience it for yourself. I didn’t have any expectations before coming here but it blew my mind!
Image courtesy of Hooves Around The World.
I truly hope you enjoyed reading about my favorite adventures on horseback in South Africa, and I hope this post has inspired you to explore this beautiful continent for yourself.