Buy me a pony

I love horses. I've even had the good fortune to own a couple. When I was a kid, my Daddy bought me a pony. A Welsh pony named Shadow. He was black, of course. We lived in a neighborhood so Shadow wasn't in the backyard, but in a pasture just down the street. He loved that pasture. He loved it so much that even if my Daddy would bring him to our house, every time I got on him he'd make a bee-line back to that pasture. It would scare me to death! Needless to say, mine and Shadow's relationship was short-lived.

But I didn't stop there. Jim was suckered into buying my second horse from some "friends" of ours. A quarter horse named Eternal. He was a good horse and I did enjoy riding him, but again, we lived in a neighborhood and Eternal lived several miles away in a pasture. In the dead of winter, it wasn't much fun to get up at the crack of dawn and drive to the pasture to go feed that horse. Again, our relationship was short-lived.

My horse ownership ended with Eternal, but I still do love horses. It would be the only reason I'd live in the "country". I can't imagine having enough land for a horse and not having a horse on it. Even if I never rode it, I could just watch it. Kind of like some people do with fish tanks.

This past weekend there was a paardenjaarmarkt in a little town nearby. That's "annual horse market". Typical Flemish - string as many words together as you like and make one word out of it.

We presumed all these horses were for sale since it was a horse market.

Here's a picture of the one we bought. Okay, we didn't buy it, but I wanted to.

These are Belgian Draft horses. Used as work horses, they are also desirable for their meat :-\

This castle was right next to the horse market so we walked around it. Sort of looked like someone might live there.

Turned out it was the Police Station!

This is an Andalusian horse, also known as the Pure Spanish Horse. Throughout history it has been known as a war horse and prized by nobility. Today they are used mostly for show jumping and pleasure.

Making horseshoes.

A matching set of Belgian Draft Horses.

This is also a Belgian Draft Horse. Can you believe the size of this thing? The average weight of this kind of horse is slightly over one ton. By comparison, the American Quarter Horse weighs about half that. I think this one probably weighs even more than that.

In addition to the Andalusian horse event, this video shows a smaller version of the Belgian horse (I think) going through a little obstacle course. He looks like he's so proud of himself.

I hope to never be hungry enough to eat a horse and I hope to go to my grave having never eaten a horse.