Enjoying Winter in the summer

This week I can tell you about a lucky young lady's most fantastic summer holiday.

Florence Finzi has enjoyed a vacation she will always treasure. Her family home is located in a very small village between Newbury and Andover, in the English county of Hampshire.

Florence's mum Theresa, head of music at St Christopher's School, taught one of her neighbours son's to play the trumpet. The trumpet-loving twelve-year-old Ted's dad Keith is a popular British TV presenter and his mum, Maria, is passionate about horses - probably on a par with Florence.

Maria has her own 17.2 horse called Juno, and she takes him out in the wonderful Hampshire countryside every day. Being great friends with Theresa, and knowing of Florence's passion for horses, she decided to buy a pony for Florence to ride when she is back in the UK. Now, how totally wonderful is that?

So, Winter was purchased. He is an eight-year-old 12.2 Dartmoor dapple grey pony, and is simply gorgeous. Mind you, he had not been ridden for three years! This did not deter Florence, who made it her mission to get the pony fit and with Maria's help, jumping.

So, she woke up bright and early every morning to ride, groom and tend to her pony. Along with the usual tack cleaning she also had to get down and dirty, with mucking out, helping with the general cleaning and the traditional 'poo picking' in an enormous field. All the hard work was done with a smile, despite the fact that it rained just about every day!

Florence's fitness regime started first in the school and paddocks before going out for quiet hacks. Then Maria and Florence set about teaching the pony how to jump, having never even seen even a trotting pole before, this initially came as quite a surprise to Winter.

After three weeks of fitness training, Florence was then lucky enough to be able to take Winter to the Royal Artillery Pony Club camp for a week. The camp produced a far fitter Winter, and a very happy Florence, with an invitation to attend senior camp next year. Even though she is technically not old enough, her standard of riding puts her into that elite league.

Florence did take a couple of breaks from her beloved pony during the summer, but these were horse related breaks such as a visit to Talland, the esteemed equestrian centre in Gloucestershire.

Florence's riding impressed all her instructors, and consistent comments on how well she had been taught, were a real tribute to the team of instructors at Twin Palms Riding Centre, where Florence keeps her own pony, MissPrint.

After her first camp, this extremely lucky young lady was given the opportunity to go on a very different kind of Pony Camp in Tuscany, Italy, with her best friend Amie, and a lady called Cica.

This is another story in itself, but the pair stayed in a remote Italian farmhouse, with no other dwelling for miles, and spent eight hours every day on horseback exploring the Italian countryside.

On her return to the UK, and back to Winter, Florence continued working on the pony's skills with Maria. All their hard work paid off when her holiday culminated with a 12-mile cross country sponsored ride at Highclere Castle.

So there you have a dream summer break come true for a horse-mad 10-year-old.

However, a footnote from her very proud mum, is that Florence works incredibly hard both at school, and at anything she is involved in, her own pony is kept immaculately, along with all her tack and equipment.

This is a youngster with a mission, to become a champion rider and personally I would suggest this is one young lady who will achieve her goal.

Now back in Bahrain and concentrating her efforts on her beloved MissPrint, undoubtedly we will be seeing and hearing a lot more of Florence's horse riding exploits in the not too distant future.