On wednesday, a group of four of us decided to take a day trip in the magical world of Le Camargue. Le Camargue is a marshland set aside as a national park and safe haven for a couple larger and more charismatic wild animals. White mustangs (les chevals camarguais) and bulls (les taureaux pronounced toro) run wild across its wide expanses and flamingos (les flamants) flock to the shallows in droves. This is what the park boasts to tourists. ha. we did end up seeing all three of the park's major attractions just without so much of their illustrious imagery.
(not my photo)
Follow the jump for more details and photos.
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BUT... ze scenery was spectacular.
the group was made up of some of us from the church staff: Kelsey, the children's director; Hilary, the worship director; Burnadette, the bookkeeper; and me, ze intern. We booked an hour and a half riding great white horses through le camargue. It was awesome! we trotted around in the swamps led by the trainers eventually reaching the beach. Then rode parallel to the shore on the sand. Most of the group was pretty proficient on a horse and were allowed to do some galloping when we reached a point where there was some really soft sand.
This whole incident was pretty incredible to watch. The trainers just ask who feels comfortable galloping and then let the group go. Thankfully, a trainer held on to my horse's reigns to keep him from following the pack toward the starting line. Then, without a moment's notice, 15 horses go bursting away with no protocol at all. The sprinted about 100 meters to the other side of this sandy field and then came back. It was such a sight. Horses galloping in real life is not something that I behold very often so it was really cool. And this wasn't trotting. It wasn't cantering. It was galloping at almost fully speed. The trainers mentioned that the horses were most likely riding at about 45 km/ hour. FAST! This is why i'm so happy I didn't join them. I've never really ridden horses for real and this wasn't the time to figure out how to gallop at top speed.
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| Why the long face? you walk around a marsh all day every day 3 times a day... and you're a horse. |
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| Beautiful skies over the rice patties. |
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| Beach of the Med. |
I'm now much more understanding of where the phrase "when you fall off the horse, you get right back on..." comes from. When the group went out to gallop across the sandy beach field, the trainer that stayed back with me and Kelsey told me in French that she was waiting for one of the gallopers to fall off. She said that they don't have a lot of people fall but the ones who do fall are either teenagers or people who say they can gallop with horses but who've never really learned. It was sort of funny and sorta unnerving at the same time. The woman telling me all this was the same woman who was leading us and supposed to be the leader of our "band of horses," but she was foretelling the demise of one of my fellow riders. hmmm. There was something wrong with that. One saving grace is that they intentionally let the horses gallop on this sandy area because they know at some point someone will inevitably fall while galloping and when they do, the trainers want them to be able to fall on a soft surface. ha?
Anyway, the ride was wonderful. big horses. great view of the beach and the mediterranean sea. A couple flamingos. It was really cool.
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| Mouille Frites (Frites not pictured) |
Later we had a lunch of authentic Camarguais food: mouille frite ( steamed marinated mussels with french fries on the side) and some rosé wine from the côte de Provence. Wonderful company, food, and drink. Then to some gelato and home.
ALL THIS BEFORE 3PM. spectacular!
merci
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