Our organization has had 6,000 plus visitors over fifteen years tour our game preserve. Our tours start out with a short briefing about the fundamentals of riding our horses. Our horses are highly trained endurance horses. Once the briefing is completed, we give a brief hands on horse control session with a riding instructor. Once we feel comfortable that each guest can safely mount and control their assigned horse, we will spend the balance of our session in the field touring the game preserve. Our riding sessions are a two hour experience with an instructor as your tour guide. We do not allow our visitors to endanger themselves or our horses. Safety is always our first priority.
Driving a cart requires the same basic skill set as riding a horse. We begin our instructions on a cart with an instructor teaching everyone the way our horses are trained to respond to your commands. Our horses are trained to respond to the same instructions from the saddle or a cart. We give everyone the chance to feel the importance of proper balance and the movement of your hands controlling the horses.. This hands on instruction normally involves a brief time before heading out in the field. All of our horses start out as riding horses. Driving skills are given to a horse after their basic riding skills are operational. Our driving horses come in different sizes with a varying degree of skill set. Our driving horses have become our most popular option for our guests.
Our tour instructors and horses have been working together for at least seven years. Our instructors normally drive a cart for everyone's safety. An instructor on a cart leads most of our tours. Our horses are trained to ride side by side behind a cart. We want to prevent a horse from leaving their position while in the field. If a riding client is feeling uncomfortable riding a horse in the field, we secure their horse in place and transfer the rider to the lead cart. The horses do not go on the same route every time. Our horses will not go blindly in the same direction. Our horses are trained to only respond to the instructions given by the person controlling the reins. All of our horses are trained to drive and ride together. Our guests can take out a saddle horse or a driving horse once we feel comfortable that everyone is safe.