Horse riding in Bohinj -Senior backpacker goes to Slovenia (6)

 On the 5th day in Bohinj, July 27, I went out to the ranch early in the morning by taxi for joining a horse riding tour into meadows along the lake. There is a ranch called as “Mrcina Ranč” in the “Studor” village of Bohinj, just the opposite side of the lake from “Ukanc” where I stayed in. I reached there earlier than 8:00 am when the first tour of the day would start for which I had made a reservation last night. 

    

  There I met charming Patricia, who loved and had a considerable experiences with horse riding. Only she and I were the guest riders led by Anna, our instructor. It’s never gonna happen in Japan that I, a 66 years old senior guy, accompanied by young attractive ladies, could enjoy horse touring in the scenic paradise along the emerald-green lake.  

 

 “What a lucky day!”, I cried in my heart , but after that I began to worry about if I could get along well with a horse. I’ve never had experience with horse riding in Japan with my right hand completely numb due to the polio which I suffered from when I was 5 years old. I had experienced horse riding only two times in my life, one for three hours riding at the foot of the Canadian Rockies 8 years ago and the second one for just 30 minutes training by a professional coach in Hungary 5 years ago. With these two old memories, I wondered how well I could control a horse to follow Anna without delay. After practicing in the training ring, we got out into the village lane in a row with Anna leading and myself in the middle, guarded by Patricia in the rear. 

     




 There were very few people we met on the way, but sometimes village people called her from the porch to which Anna responded having a friendly chat with them. She knew everybody as she was born here. Even when we encountered a herd of cattle on the trail, they looked like knowing each other.    

    


We got to the lake. My horse was gentle to a beginner like me, but she was a gourmand. When she saw sweet weeds, she could not resist to eat them forgetting that she was carrying her important guest. It was troublesome for me to persuade her to go ahead again. Jože, an owner of the pension that I stayed at described horses in Bohinj as small, but strong for their size. According to the description by the ranch, their horses were the Icelandic which had been brought here by the Viking settlers in the mid-800 and bred with Scandinaian breeds. They are a different breed from the famous Lipizzan horses of Slovenia and said to be very social with "family life" in their blood. That may be why I had never been dropped off the saddle.           

     

     

 It was a really relaxed and fabulous horse riding tour. I’m sincerely grateful for their kindness. When we returned to the ranch, I asked Patricia's mother who was waiting there for us, to take a photo of us all with my camera. She carried a super Canon's camera and looked like a professional photographer. 

 Leaving the ranch, I walked down on village roads to the Church of St. John the Baptist near the west end of the lake in Stara Fužina. From there I took the route along the northern shore of Lake Bohinj back to Ukanc. This was also a nice walking trail with a beautiful view of the lake and the glacial U-shaped Upper Bohinj Valley.


(To be continued; the next is "Lake Bled" )