Hello!! Sorry it's taken me a could of days for an update! I've actually been quite busy! 😅🐎
Sheena, my host/boss for the next week, picked me up outside my hostel in Auckland yesterday and took me out to their loooovely property just outside the village of Clevedon, about an hour from Auckland.
Upon arrival I was shown my living quarters in their beautiful house, introduced to the various animals, and quickly put to work grooming the horses (Fugato the Stallion and Danny Sheenas main dressage/show horse)
Fugato being exercised
The walk out to the paddocks.
Me and my new bestie Bobby!
Just some of the lovely horses
Two of the babies! The wee filly on the right is only about 8 months old!😍😍
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| Bobby <3 |
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| Danny with Kate and Sheena - pre-ride |
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| Frankie |
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| Nacho - Kates lovable Staffie |
My work yesterday (and today included grooming, tacking up/down, cleaning rack, cleaning the yard, trying not to have a NZ twang in my first two days!!
Oh I also god some new riding/general mucking about boots which I looove !
Yesterday evening Dermot, my other host, came back from his job in Auckland to have dinner with ourselves and Sheenas father and step mum, Allan and Pippa, who live next door in the adjoining house. (I enjoyed myself so much I didn't take any pics!) Dermot and I
DID watch the game of thrones finalle together last night though :D
TODAY was another full day!! I was up at 7am (yeah I know!!! My body clock is still confused!) and had breakfast with Sheena before heading out o take some photos in the lovely mist morning (the best ones are in my camera but here is a taster)
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| the mist this morning at 7am! |
| alsothat morning - view from the house looking out to be yard/sheds |
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I then went out to the yard to help Kate - the employed stable manager/breeder/all round cool person - with her daily duties (as I mentioned above!) I swear these giant horses seemed less huge and intimidating today after working with them all day yesterday :)
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| Kate and Bobby watching Sheena and Danny work. |
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| Sheena working Danny. |
Sheena worked Danny in the arena for a good bit, (they are Grand Pris level dressage show competitors and multi award winners) and it was a pure joy to watch them work!
Then we did something really new to me!!! We collected seamen from the stallion! 😅 yup it is as weird as it sounds! Haha Fugato is a prize stallion, and Sterling Warmbloods (this stud farm) sell his semen to impregnate people's mares via IVF. I gave photos of this process coming soon but for now this shows a couple of steps of the process.
Filling the ...thing...(I don't know what it's called... fake horse vagina? 😅😅😂😂) with warm water to make Fugato as comfortable as possible.
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| Temperature checking...very important! |
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| I wont caption this what Sheena suggested...you had to be there! |
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| Letting him smell a cloth with mare's urine on it, taken while that mare was in season. |
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| doing the dirty. |
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| Post ejaculation...checking the semen through a microscope. |
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| It's healthy!! And gross!! 😂 |
I was then tasked to groom the two mares who are in foal, Lily who is due in December and Ruby
who is due next month! These are both future Fugato babies. After tidying the yard in preparation for tomorrow's visit from a university class from Australia I headed out for a hike! My first since arriving in NZ since I feel that I've now almost fully recovered from my jet-lag (mostly) :)
Sheena dropped me off at the Clevedon Scenic Reserve and I then liked through the beautiful, of not s but soggy, forest paths up and back down the mountain. It was about an hour and a half long hike and it took me another 40 minutes to walk back to the farm. A fantastic walk and a brilliant evening for it!! A really great first two days, and I can't believe it's only been that! I feel so at home here, with all the animal and with the family :)
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| the blue dot is where I live and the green is the reserve. |
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| walking home... |
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