Not that I'm bragging, but there's some crazy cool stuff to do up here. I know. Eye of the beholder. Still, I think most folks would get a big (metaphorical) kick out of watching enormous horses do what enormous horses do. Each year at this time, the Draft Horse Classic (the generally-acknowledged best giant-horse event in the West) is held at the local fairgrounds.Entry to the grounds is free and one can wander all over the place watching and petting the horses, talking to the horses' people, looking at horse art, horse tack and just-plain-tacky horse-themed products (horseshoe wall hooks, are a mild example). I go every year just to be near these amazing animals. Plus there are blacksmith and shoeing demos, live music, lumberjack shows and garden competitions. But one has to pay actual money to get into the arena for the six shows featuring huge-horse competitions and huge-horse entertainment. That, I'd never seen.
This year, as a perk for entering something in the fair (or so we learned when we got there), we were given two free tickets to the opening show Thursday evening. Didn't really know what to expect, but thought it might be interesting. So, I packed us a little picnic dinner and we went.
So fun--even Tom thought so! The core of it was the first of six installments of the draft horse competitions to happen over the next three days. There were single horses pulling well-dressed gentlemen in two-wheeled carts and teams of two to six horses pulling wagons through different maneuvers.
The animals are gorgeous and impeccably groomed. And big--did I mention that they're big? They're also extremely well-trained and work well as singles and as teams. The toughest competition of Thursday evening (there were five) was the task of a four-horse team that had to carefully maneuver a wagon backwards into a "dock" during which time the entire team had to step sideways to a 90-degree angle (to the wagon) on both sides of the wagon in sequence. Hard to explain. Fun to watch. Between competitions there were demos with mules, donkeys and rare Gypsy horses, plus fancy trick riders and "chariot races" for comic relief.
Following shows would feature larger teams, youth drivers and such events as weight-pulling competitions. Next year.I went back the next afternoon to walk around and hang out with the horses. As you can clearly see, not all of the horses are of the humongous sort. And then there's me atop a big Belgian (that's a breed you smirkers). Of course, getting to go on an actual factual ride on one of these babies would be a goal of mine. A fun fact: the world's largest horse at the moment is a Belgian in Tulsa named Radar who is nearly 6'8" (20 hands) at the shoulder and weighs 2400 pounds. He eats 18# grain, 40# hay and drinks 20 gallons of water a day. Historically, it's said that in the 1850s a Belgian named Samson weighed in at over 3200 lbs and was over 7 feet tall (21.5 hands) at the withers. None of the horses at the show were quite that size, but you get the idea. We won't be getting one any time soon.
I crammed a lot more knowledge about these animals into my brain for no good reason except that I find them so fascinating and am glad to have the chance to get close to them now and again. Of course, I had to leave room for some other faves with whom I had the opportunity to spend some time this weekend--alpacas...
