2009 Fox Point Farm Myrtle Beach Trip

We were blessed with two gorgeous days to ride on Myrtle Beach this year! Everyone did so beautifully! I was thrilled - it was absolutely magical for me to see my girls galloping through the surf and down the beach!

We loaded up 15 horses, riders and a few brave parents on Feb 20 to make the trek to the beach. It was an event I have hosted several times with great stress and great success; this time I was plenty stressed because we left with only 4 horses and no people (except Tommy and me) who had actually been before; everyone else, horses and people, had not - it was nerve-wracking! I just trusted it would be ok ... I was so right - thank Goodness!

We left around 7pm Friday night. We arrived at Hardee Lane Farm around 12:30am (we are not the fastest movers) after a crazy supper at Wendy's. Glenn Singleton, my friend and owner of HLF, was there waiting for us with clean stalls and a big smile! It was quick and easy to unload all the horses and get Glenn set up with our horses' breakfast. He is so wonderful to feed and care for our horses when he does his. When we first started coming to Myrtle Beach, we stayed at Seawinds Stables - no frills and no help - when Seawinds closed we moved to Conway and Glenn's - happy we did!  We progressed on to the Crown Reef Hotel, arriving at nearly 2am. The kids were wide open when we hit the big purple hotel - you should have seen them when they saw it all lit up - they were impressed!  We checked in easily and all got ocean-view balconies, our room even had a jacuzzi in it!

Saturday started early with us hitting the Treasure Chest restaurant in our hotel. They had wonderful huge breakfasts for $3/each. Stuart and Lisa (our adult friends) were there eating, ready to meet us for the day. We all got what we wanted and headed on out to the barn. Glenn and his daughter Lindsay were waiting there for us to arrive. It was wonderful to see Lindsay! I have known her more than 10 years, I have seen her grow from a 'youth-kid' to a gorgeous college graduate who has her life completely together! She was working a baby in the arena when all our kids descended upon her. Fortunately she was just lunging him because he came alive when our 15 hit the stage. It was a great way for the horses and the girls to get out some excess energy before we left for the beach. After all the horses seemed calm, we loaded and our 4 trailer plus two car convoy set out for Myrtle Beach.

The ride was at least 30 min and the kids were getting crazy in my truck. We stopped at the ranger station to pay for our horse beach permits (every horse had to have one) and I started to have a little meltdown because I could neither find the Coggins tests for the horses that went to TN (Tommy put them somewhere) and I couldn't find my Parelli bag with my checkbook, my credit cards, drivers license and all my cash. Fortunately Tommy knew where he had put the Coggins tests and he had a checkbook and drivers license so we got our permits and proceeded to park. Unloading went smoothly but many of the horses were quite bouncy. I went ahead and tranquilized most of the group of horses that had never been there before. I thought better safe than sorry. There are no rules against it and as excited as the kids were, the horses needed to be calm. After a 10 min wait for the drugs to kick in we were all off to the beach!

It was a beautiful site when I arrived; the kids were all doing their groundwork spread all across the sand. A small crowd had gathered to watch. Although there were many riders that day on the beach, there were no other obvious Parelli people. After answering many questions we mounted and started moving. All the kids and horses were doing great as we played in the surf. Dauntless was the only horse who really didn't want anything to do with the ocean, but Arianna kept him focused down the beach. After going under the first pier, we found a cool spot where a fresh water stream emptied into the Atlantic Ocean. The stream had cut banks into the sand and we spent some really fun time jumping up and down those banks. Dauntless reluctantly got into that water and we all were feeling good. We split into 2 groups and the faster group galloped away down the beach. Our group started trotting from pier to pier, then cantering from pier to pier - it was amazing!

After we finished riding, we drove the horses back to Glenn's and put the tired souls to bed. We were starving so we stopped at Ruby Tuesdays for dinner. We had 18 people in our total group so they gave us an entire section. The dinner was good and we went back to the hotel with full tummies. After we returned to the hotel, all the kids put on bathing suits and went swimming in the heated hotel pool. A few insane girls even jumped in the freezing outdoor pool and lazy river - but only for a moment. A wonderful an exhausting day had come to a close.

The second day was supposed to be cold and raining, but our spirits kept the bad weather away. We had sun and lots of wind - no rain at all. My old friend Mike came by to say 'Hi', it was very nice. I wish he could have stayed to see us ride, but after 20 years, maybe a few minutes of us was enough ... haha.

Jaime Huddy took over 400 beautiful pictures. She created CDs for everyone that went. Make sure if you went please ask me for yours! Enjoy getting to see our trip - we want everyone to go with us next year!