Yesterday we had a one hour track with Tynings Trekking Centre - or rather my kids did; my 10-year-old son and my six-year-old daughter. Last May they did a one hour riding lesson at Cantref Adventure Farm in Wales, which they loved, and they've been nagging me to do more ever since.
The Tynings website has various information about them, but the booking process isn’t really a booking process. It feels odd to fill in a form and click a button that says "book" without knowing what date your booking. I filled it with a few notes about dates and they replied to say that they were closed, I think it was Monday and Tuesday, so I kind of feel like they could help their process by giving a bit more information on their website about when they’re open. Arguably this could be quite changeable I suppose based on staffing or the weather or holidays, but then as someone who makes websites my answer to that is just a website that you can very quickly and easily update with when you’re away. Still, it only took a couple of emails to establish a time and date that we could do, and they were very responsive on email.
There is a list on the website of things to bring or know before you come such as wearing long sleeves and trousers, wellies, suncream and insect repellent, and the fact that you can take your own helmet if you want to (that’s not an exhaustive repeat of the list - do check it out yourselves). I didn’t notice anything that said to arrive early or before our booked slot but I did have an email from the person I was speaking to saying "see you at 12:30". Nonetheless, I thought we would aim to get there a little before that in case it was useful.
In realtity, setting Google Maps to the post code took us to a place a few minutes away so then by the time we searched for the trekking centre itself on Google Maps and found it we arrived with only a couple of minutes to spare. (I was lucky actually that could I could load it all as reception is quite patchy out on the Mendips.)
When we got there, the car park was full of horses so I couldn’t actually park which ate into our few minutes of wiggle room... I told the kids to get out of the car so that it was clear that they were here for their session whilst I waited for the horses (with people on) to move so I could get to the parking spaces they were just in front of.
Anyway, once we were there, we had to fill in a form which could’ve been done in advance on the website which would save a bit of time when you get there, and pay. I paid £35 for each child. I didn’t ride myself as if I had I think it was £40 for an adult and I just didn’t want to spend over £100 on this activity today.
The lady who was organising it was, I think, also the lady I’d spoken to on email and she seemed very knowledgeable about the horses and their temperament and was really considered in choosing the best horse for the best rider. She was also instructing the girls who walked with us on whether the horse should be led or whether the horse could just follow on behind the one in front. My daughter was put on Fiona and my son was put on Flo - who are apparently besties, which is super cute. They were both ponies and I learned during the day that any 'horse' that’s 14.2 hands or less is a pony whereas 14.3 hands and above is a horse. I didn't actually know before we arrived if we'd be part of a bigger group or if I was just booking for us, but we had four horses in our group, being ridden by 4 kids, with 2 members of staff/guides, with various parents and grandparents walking alongside. The group who left a few minutes before us had adults riding too.
I was worried that us being ready a few minutes after 12:30pm would delay everyone else in our party and I guess it did really, as we set off at about 12:37pm. We got back at pretty much 1:30pm on the dot, and I feel like the route wouldn’t have changed even if we had left a few minutes sooner or a few minutes later. We walked along a track which forked at one point, so we took the left fork and then looped around so that we rejoined the track by coming along the right fork.The views weren’t amazing for me, but I think they were better by the time you were high up on a horse.
The majority of the walk was a track with hedge side but there was one point where we walked through a wood. Given the 25° heat and the track being in direct sun, the wooded area was a welcome relief - probably for the horses as well. Near the end the girls leading the horses took them up ahead a little way and then ran back to us with the horses so that the kids got a go at trotting, rather than just everything being at a walking pace. They also then stopped by a dip in the hedge with a nice view beyond for everyone to take a photo of their kid, one by one, on the horse.
When the kids had their horse riding lesson last year, they were just going round and round in an arena and they were keen this time to go further a field which is exactly what they got. However, they were just led on a slow walk for an hour and whilst my six-year-old preferred that to last year, my 10-year-old preferred being taught things last time. Last year they were shown how to change hands, and how to even turn around on the horse; various things that he felt were more interesting.
I asked if we had booked the 1.5 hour trip if we would’ve done the same route but just a little longer and they said that they have lots of different routes that they do at different times so at least that keeps things more interesting for the guides and for the horses. As we came to a crossroads a different group of people and horses trotted at quite a high speed past us. This lead me to ask how they accommodate different levels of ability, as there were tick boxes on the form asking what you were able to do, and she said that they try to group people by ability but if they can’t then they can just branch off and some people can get a chance to go a little bit faster than others. They’ve got 15 or 16 horses I think she said, and the ones we saw all looked very well looked after.
Overall in an ideal world, I think the kids would’ve liked a bit more variety than being led around for an hour on a slow walk but they both came away wanting to do it again - there was even talk of regular lessons which got a firm "no" from me!
The thoughts and views expressed in this blog post are the author’s own and not that of Activibees.com or it's operators.
