So…. what breed is your trail horse?
10-year old OTTB, and he is a Trail Rockstar. I’m pretty sure he would walk through fire if I asked him. 
First two, when trail riding was all I did were QH and TB that never raced. Both awesome at their job. Later in life, when my hunter mare was not holding up to jumping, we did trails. She was a Trakehner, and 17 hands, lol. Not the most agile thing due to size, but brave and quiet.
1/2 arab, now retired. Her daughter, warmblood/arab cross and granddaughter, welsh/warmblood cross. The granddaughter has only been off the farm a handful of times and is awesome
Paso Fino. He was, uh, interesting on the trail at first as had been stalled 23/7 at a show barn until age 3.5. He now rocks. Most of the time.
I have a 7 year old paint who will pretty much go through anything!
9 year old Thoroughbred and 13 year old Paint. Both are wonderful on the trail.
21 yr old Appy and 13 yr old Paint
Mustang! He’s . . . wow . . . 9 this year! I love that guy like crazy!
My other horses that I’ve trail ridden are my TB and my QH. My TB likes to go for long gallops and sometimes it gets pretty exciting. My QH could walk only, but we explored lots of fun places and he was great at what he could do.
Polish Arab! He’s the perfect trail horse!
Right now we have an appy, a TWH, a QH, and an Arab as our main riding horses and a QH/Arab and a Welsh/Belgian as our pack horses. We have a Morgan mare that was a rock star for 30 years but she’s mostly retired now. In the past we’ve also had Montana Trav’lers, Morgan/QH cross, a Morab, and a NSH. Begged and borrowed a wide assortment including mules.
It’s not the breed that makes a good trail (or mountain, in our case) horse, it’s the conformation and the mind. :yes:
Morgan all the way! :yes::):love-struck:
Otherwise, agree with Cowboymom, as usual- it’s not the breed.
She is a kick butt trail horse - very brave, will trail blaze just about any where (pushing through thick bushes, navigate ravines etc), with tons of GO. Plus at 16.3, she has LONG legs and a crazy fast walk when moving out. Even the gaited horses at the barn can’t keep up. Oh, and she does it all barefoot, deer trails, gravel roads - just marches and shows no signs of issues.
[edited to add] She also enjoys impromptu coyote chases (think one man fox hunt 
), pampas grass bush jumping and is KILLER at gates - Does this cool scoot over and back through routine, so you can keep cattle, horses etc contained while going through gates. Oh, and she will herd said horses and cattle. Yep, I think she is pretty awesome ]
Current horse is a SSH (Spotted Saddle Horse) and he is fantastic. I camp and I swear when ever he gets off the trailer he looks around and thinks to himself, “now where the heck has she brought me to now?” Previous horses were TW, OTTB (not a good trail horse), QH, Paint, though my all time favorite horse was a Arab/QH cross. He never shied or refused anything - he was a one in a million horse…
Irish Draught.
12 year old home bred QH/Arab X
I’m in the process of bringing up my 5 year old Paso for competitive trail. She is second generation home bred – her grand-dam was my very first Paso.
My first trail horse was an Arab - we also did CTRs but mostly trails. Smart, agile, brave! I got him when he was 4 and just started.
My current trail horse is a cross between a Spotted Saddle Horse and a Kentucky Naturally Gaited horse. He was 10 when I got him and he’d been ridden, packed, and camped with since he was very young. So much smoother than my Arab - still smart and brave. Have not done the challenging trails with him, so I don’t know how agile he is.
Rocky Mountain Horse, coming 8. Bought when she was 1.5 years old.
Before her, arabs.
Morgans, since 1980. Currently a 12 yr gelding & a 8 yr mare.
