My happiest horse memories are out on the trail. My first horse, an Arab gelding, loved to go and hated to come home. My second, an Arab mare, there was nothing I didn’t do with her. We explored all over the place, got ourselves into places we shouldn’t have been. We swam in the river during the summer. I did my first ‘baby event’ with her. I rode her bareback and bridle-less. I learned to jump on her, I learned dressage on her.
Another mare I had, a solid black paint, best damn trail horse ever. She and I went on many camping trips, some alone but most with others. I bought her as a yearling, she was my first “baby”. I rode her on a local trail system that is quite vast, I’d pack my saddlebags, bring my dog, we’d be gone all day.
Finally having a schoolmaster. He was an OTTB that was trained thru PSG. I had so much fun on him, learning all the really cool stuff! Bonus points that he was good on the trails too.
One favorite memory is my DH, at the time (30+yrs ago) a pretty Novice rider.
4 of us went out one wintry day, horses still wearing blankets, us bareback, snow up to horses’ knees.
DH was riding trainer/friend’s SteadyEddy schoolie, an AppX gelding, black with a blanket. Named Indiscretion - Inky for short - as the mare had been an Oops! pasture breeding.
I looked over & saw Tom cantering Inky through the snow, Bigass grin on his face…
He’d never ridden bareback, nevermind at canter 
My own fave is going out early one morning.
I was working a flexshift: 10A-7P, barn was an hour drive from home, about 1/2h from work.
So I’d get to the barn around 7 & ride out on trails.
Wooded trails opened to fields & coming out of the trees, I let my TB open up.
I can still feel him DROP as he hit full gallop.
He’d never raced, not enough speed to earn a tattoo, but he felt like we were winning that race that morning 
I can’t really pick one or even three happy horse moments, but I can say the relationship I’ve built with my 
horse over the years is my favorite memory. I started out half-leasing him at the farm I was with at the time… he wasn’t an easy ride, but he loved and trusted me and would jump around for me better than he would for anyone else (I still remember a barn-mate showing him once and quickly giving up saying she didn’t know how I did it). Then I had the chance to buy him and he moved to a new state and learned how to trail ride… going from needing a lead through water to falling asleep in the lake. I’ll never forget the feeling of truly galloping out and jumping hedges. And then we moved again and got back into horse showing, closing out our competitive career in the 3’ Adults. And then he was leased to a young girl to teach her the ropes so I could focus on the young horse, but he foundered and came home early. We were hit or miss for a while, but with careful management and rehab he not only survived, but came back sound to ride! So here we are, he’s 23 years young, first one to trot up to me in the field, getting legged up, and dragging me to the trailer to show in our local Adult Hunter Pleasure division.
Gosh, horses have enriched my life in so many ways, I have so many happy memories. 
My last ride with my late horse was bareback in Aiken. I almost didn’t ride him that day. We bopped around W/T/C, jumped a few fences while listening to early Beck hits, rounded out the ride with a hose off and a big spot of grass for dinner. I remember sitting on him, one hand on his broad back while he grazed, and thinking about how far we’d come and how special he was. The next day he was gone. 
Another good memory with that horse was when I worked for a BNT eventer during college. A few of us WS became friends with the boys that did the lawn work. They rode at a western farm down the road that specialized in $$$ reiners. One day on our day off, we hacked our fit event horses to their farm and swapped mounts. Same joy in horses, but totally different disciplines. Wow were there buttons on horses I didn’t know existed. I sat on a lovely young QH named Maserati and had so much fun discovering how responsive she was to the tiniest cue. Apparently she went on to make quite a lot of money. One of the boys got my gelding and god was it funny watching a gangly young western rider try to jump a fit young TB over sticks.
In my early 20s a of us barn girls got a wild hair under our bums after one too many cocktails at a barn-mates’ wedding. We decided to take our steeds for a midnight run. I remember driving past the barn owner’s house with our lights off, and sneaking into the barn to grab our horses. We galloped up the hill top, most of us bareback and in entirely inappropriate footwear and clothing. I was riding a very round fjord at the time. It was a beautiful summer night, full moon and seeing the farm and the town from that hilltop was just other-wordly. On the way back down the hill my sneaky turd of a mount dropped his neck and I slid right off. 
My best boy Buddy used to nibble on the buttons of my jean jacket. My last year as a junior, I leased him out and took on my sister’s pony (Sis had already aged out).
Now, sis never ever ever did fun stuff. If she was riding, she was schooling hard. If she was working from the ground, she was schooling hard. All Shena knew for years was that if a person was coming into the field for her, she was going to WORK.
I spent ~3 months hanging out in the field with treats and brushes. Everyone got treats and pleasant grooming (no big deal, all the rest were either broodies or babies). Nobody worked.
The first time she walked up to me on her own, and very hesitantly nibbled on a button…
Well, I’m tearing up just thinking about it 35 years later.
My Buddy gave me a thousand wonderful memories, but that moment with her is what came back to me reading this thread.
Shena and I weren’t ever what you would call great or even very successful, really. But she did try for me every show, and at home we generally just meandered on the trails. I got so many compliments from people who had known her for years with my sister 
That did not improve sisterly relations, of course 
When we made a change in lifestyle, and quit the racing scene, and made the move to our new farm, I had my last racehorse (home bred) retired to becoming a show horse. She was OK with this plan, and I had free jumped her a bit previously, and she looked like a nice little hunter for me. She was only 15.2, but I’m not tall, and she jumped cute. So we did that, and she was good at the little local shows and clinics. But I’m not really the “hunter type”, and used to do the jumpers, so we tried a bit of that… no problem. Did a local 3’6" “mini prix”, which she won easily. Oh my. Perhaps she was game for this?
The little fall fair offered a “3 bar” competition. I figured, “Sure, let’s give this a whirl, see how it goes”. She like doing grids, and I jumped her up to 4’ at home, which skipped over no problem. I figured she would roll a rail at some point, and we might get a piece of the prize money if we were lucky. So I entered her. But she was still green to the bigger fences.
So when the first of the three was set at 4’, the second at 4’3, and the third at 4’6" (and the “course designer” turned that one into an oxer at this point- didn’t bother with the “rules” too much), we cantered into this, and my “green” mare flattened just a little into the first one. She brought the rail down. But the rail landed between her front legs on landing, and I landed on her withers in front of the saddle. I dropped my outside hand, and attempted to shift myself back into the saddle, hoping that we both were not going to hit the dirt as we slipped out the side of the line of jumps at that point.
But did she actually remove herself from the line??? NO. Even though she was on her nose and her knees, and I was on her withers, she extracated herself from the pole between her front legs, and turned herself BACK into the line of jumps as I managed to get my butt back into the saddle, and she jumped the last two clean. After getting ring dirt ON HER NOSE. This was NOT MY PLAN. But she was determined to get the job done.
We finished second in the class. People in the crowd came down to the holding area, they wanted to just touch her. I was horrified that someone might think that this had been MY idea, that I had somehow made the horse continue jumping after this huge screw up. “It was HER” I said. “I dropped my outside hand to guide her OUT of the line. This was NOT MY IDEA”. The spectators knew this, they all saw it happen. The show announcer also came down to see her, and also saw what this horse had done.
After this, this class became our favourate class at the fall fairs. She jumped up to 5’ at the final jump each time. She won this class every other time we entered. She never “flattened” into the first jump again, never made a mistake again. Even though she was little, we had to come into these lines “dead slow”, at a bounce, to get the two strides in and jump clean. She was amazing… this was HER class. My little mare who I thought was gonna be a 3’ hunter.
I had to put her down last fall. Cancer. She was an amazing horse. It was hard. It still is.
We have one a bit like this at my barn. She was originally purchased for a beginner to do WTC & maybe some crossrails. Never thought she’d jump much. Not built athletic at all, but sweet and honest. Well, the clients have come and gone, and the mare is still here on her fifth (?) person and has done everything from the WTC to 3’3" workings.
The first time I was riding a sitting trot and my horse’s ears were flopping in rhythm !
ETA A 4 yr old OTTB thrown off the bushtrack so relaxation was a foreign concept with him.
I had a little horse much like yours @NancyM. She was an appendix that looked like she was put together from spare parts but man, could she jump! We’d be DFL at every horse trial after dressage and skyrocket to the top after the cross country. At one, we were doing our stadium run and I lost a rein and my balance right before the two stride at the end and pulled up about 2 strides away. I thought about calling it quits but she had a better idea and was antsy to go so she gunned it and nailed the two stride and came in 4th in a very competitive field.
I sure do miss her all these years later.
Just about every horse memory is a happy one. Best of all is the first time my mare ‘hugged’ me.
I think one of the ones that is most special to me is when my mare came home - she was just post weaning at that point, and had been travelling for 2 days. Box stall in a very neat van (more like the UK horseboxes than the conventional trailers I see in here in the US). I got in with her and she popped her head over the partition and was just so enthusiastic to see me.
She paused a little at the top of the ramp but I kept walking down and she let out the sweetest little whinny before hustling down next to me (and was an absolute rockstar going into a strange barn, in the dark, in a godawful cold november with ice and snow).
She was so, so brave and so sweet and so ridiculously good, and she was finally home. It’s a really special one for me.
I also have my first ride on her on video. I look at it occasionally - it is messy, and far from perfect, but I am grinning ear to ear and just so full of joy.
My happy horse memory is sharing our vet’s happy memory when, as he told me, drove up to our barn on his way home one evening, sun setting and I was standing in front of the dark barn door opening, my grey horse standing by me, eyes closed, his head against my shoulder, so peaceful and contented.
After a day of treating all kinds of horses and their and their owner’s problems, that happy sight warmed his heart.
I was happy he shared that sweet moment with me, as that evening was also sweet for me, the horse came from a neglect situation and was lovely and thriving, both of us happy to have each other.
Yesterday I went to the gate to bring my mare in for the night. I didn’t see her anywhere, resigned myself to having to walk the pasture. She must’ve heard the gate chain jangling, because all the sudden I hear this ‘don’t leave me’ me whinny and she came running. Galloped all the way to the gate, barely slammed on her brakes, stuck her head in the halter.
Those sorts of little things really stick with me.
All of my childhood ponies + horses – 1960’s - 70’s.
No: Hoof abscesses, thin soles or other.
Separation anxiety
Saddle fit issues
Special diets or supplements - just oats, hay, white salt block.
Rode all summer never noticed horseflies, no bombers. Never needed a vet – horses always healthy and sound. All us kids were happy and our horses were happy.
When my filly as born of course DH and I were out there working with her, giving her short little lessons on being a good horse. DH was determined to teach her to lead without a halter so I was watching him and mama horse, Annie, was picking up some stray hay strands by the feed room door. She looks over at what’s going on and comes and stands beside me. At the same moment, we both turn our heads and look at each other and I felt like a connection went between the two of us. It was so weird and only lasted a second but I could feel it. Never felt it again but she and I were a force to be reckoned with, one of the best mountain horses I’ve ever ridden and she was a pistol.
My best times were doing the last check on the horses before going to bed. It was so peaceful in the corral and pastures, and my Hackney pony was a snugglebug, happy to return hugs. Often I’d stay out there for half an hour, just existing with my three horses.
Years later when I just had my retired grade pony left and he was boarded, I’d go hang out with him and bring a chair. I’d sit in the barn at the end of the aisle with him on a lead, and he’d prop his chin on my shoulder and we would both nap a little bit in the sun. This pony was totally distrustful and full of dirty tricks when we’d gotten him from a rescue 15 years before. He’d turned into a solid citizen with DH, our daughter and me. We all played a part in showing him that life with humans can be a good thing.
My most memorable time riding was a trail ride on rental horses from Hollywood to Burbank, have dinner then ride back. This was no nose to tail ride. At one point we passed a pack of coyotes just standing in the moonlight. It was organized by my employer at the time (KTLA Channel 5), and I was surprised at how many good riders we had.
Was that the Moonlight Ride that included margaritas!
Every time I visited my folks in Encino, I wanted to go on that ride. Never succeeded 
Oh, yes, margaritas for sure! You could tell who had overindulged by the difference in their riding on the way back.
It’s funny–it was organized by my least favorite HR person. I always thought she was unintelligent, but man, get her on a horse and she was awesome! She herded our group well, got us across streets safely, and her riding was magnificent.
Not long after I got my first horse, I was at the end of my rope. She was kind of terrible. The conversation I had with Dad was priceless.
Dad: “Do you have a whip? Not a riding whip, you need a good beatin’ whip. About 5’ long so you aren’t on top of them. Take that whip and go into the stall, don’t say hi, don’t pet her, just go over and pound on the wall and leave. Do that for 3 or 4 days.”
It was just such a screwed up father/daughter discussion. But it worked. Used to drive me nuts because whatever he suggested worked. It was great to have someone who ALL the answers, but it would have been nice if he was wrong once in a while.
