It's been just over a week since my last post, which is not what I intended with this blog. Unfortunately, I've had a mad week at work so didn't had time to write about last week's excursion to Hartpury before I went off on this week's, to the Ashbourne Show.
First, Hartpury. Above is a picture I took on my new fixed 50mm lens, which I am in love with (more on that later, hopefully). The picture is of Paul Tapner, who is my new favourite eventer. Well, new since I sat at the main arena at Badminton and saw him go out and come back from his cross country round, on Inonothing, who also happens to be the horse above. Anyway, that round turned out to be the round of the Badminton champion, and he was so lovely about the horse in interviews afterwards that he's my new favourite.
Anyway, apart from the presence of Mr Tapner, the whole event was lovely. The weather was great, course was interesting, and the people were lovely.
Amongst the cross country course was a fantastic water complex at the lake, which had seen a few falls during the day (nothing serious, I think). Here are a couple of the best pictures that I got there.
On to this week, I have been to Derbyshire, for the Ashbourne Show. I thought this would give me the opportunity to have a look at something a bit different to the usual showjumping/eventing, and it did! This was a fantastic country show, with lots of shire horses, sheep, cattle and goats, as well as lots of other things including a lot of light horses classes. Amongst the light horses classes that I saw were side saddle and miniatures, so there was loads of variety!
There really was too much at Ashbourne to mention in one short post, but please see my Flicr set at http://www.flickr.com/photos/ruthwareing/sets/72157624651281971/ for a selection of what was on show. Here are a couple of examples!
