Wow! What can I say? One of the best weeks of my life. Their slogan is "experience the freedom, discover the passion" and I'd have to agree. One whole week in Ireland, riding four hours a day, doing things I would never have imagined. It was a trip I organized for the vet school riding club and five of us went for a week.

We met our horses within an hour of arriving at Crossogue are were out on the trail a few minutes later. Our first afternoon was just a quick hack around the property and down to the river. If gave us a chance to meet our horses and stretch our muscles a bit.

I was paired with Oscar, a huge ,black bay thoroughbred with an awesome personality. He was about 6 feet tall at the shoulder (for those of you who know Jazz, Oscar is about 6 inches taller) and rather intimidating, but his face was kind and he quickly gained my trust. After our first jump session I knew he was a horse with lots of "go", but who would jump anything I asked. Once I'd ridden him cross country I fell in love. He loved jumping and gave me the confidence to jump bigger and braver than ever before.

Each morning was spent working on flat work and jumping in the arena and we went to the cross country course almost every afternoon. The tyre jump in the photos is the largest jump on the course, but we also jumped up a bank that was over 4 feet tall and over some much more intimidating jumps and combinations.

I could talking about the trip forever, but I'll just end with a bit on my race horse ride. Mark, the owner of Crossogue breeds and races National Hunt horses (what we'd call steeplechase) and let Tiff and I ride one called Beauty in the morning exercise gallops.

The Estate

The house was built in 1860 and is surrounded by over 350 acres of lush Irish pasture land. It is owned by Mark Molloy and has been run by his family for generations.

Let me tell you, for all the work, I sure didn't lose any weight! Mark's sister, Pippa comes in each day to cook for family, staff, and guests. There were hot scones in the morning, hot cooked lunches and dinners and homemade desserts every day. Everything was made from scratch and soooo good. They even make all their own preserves and jams and sell them in shops across Ireland.

The horses were all wonderful. Very talented and willing. Oscar was definitely the best horse on the flat, but they all excelled at jumping. Several of us had very little cross country experience and the horses gave us tons of confidence and made the scary stuff fun. Riding a horse who will jump 3 feet without thinking twice was a new experience for me...and I like it!

Can't wait to go back next year!