First day of our 3-day horse riding trip across Peninsular Malaysia!
We decided to have Bidaisari Stables in Janda Baik, Bentong (Pahang) as our first stop. It is a track that Jaclyn wanted to go since last year but never had a chance.
Suki and I rode in Bidaisari Stable once in September last year. It was a reasonably relaxing ride so we were really looking forward coming back again after 6 months.
Jackly got on Pampa, the first endurance horse she ever had; Suki got on Zaafa, an anglo Arab that has pleasantly light and smooth canter; while I got on Bella, an easy-going grey horse and she is really good looking.
Our guide, Raju came along with us on his horse and guided us to finish through the big loop in the trail.
We crossed 2 small streams and spent fair amount of time allowing the horse to rest and eat, while the riders took the time to take lots of photos!
We covered 12KM and it took us slightly more than 2 hours to complete the trail.
Next stop, we are heading over to Kuatan for Pusat Equestrian Pahang!
Endurance training continues in Batu Arang for 2-3 sessions a week. Last Thursday Jaclyn Seng and Suki Low joined me for a ride. This was the week right after Hari Raya.
As usual, Abang Iskandar came to town to pick us up with his pick up truck. This is the clearest shot I have. You can probably tell how shaky it was in the truck while going up the stable.
It was 7-ish A.M. when we arrived the stable. Looks like Abang Suhairi (on Mizumo) and Sara (on Danit) were even earlier than us!
Abang Suhairi always has a big wide smile on his face. It was his first ride after the month of Ramadan and Hari Raya… to trot off all the delicious lemang, rendang and ketupat obviously.
Sara just done flatworking Danit. I took the chance to play with Danit for a little while.
And thanks Sara for the portrait shot with perfect filter!
Shortly after, we head off to the trail. Here is a video of our trail ride.
And here are some more photos that are not included in the video.
Wefie of the Raya riders! Yeeeeehar!
When we were exiting palm oil farm.
A photo from my helmet camera.
On our way back. The sun is much brighter but cloud also gathered in the sky. Jaclyn has the fully matching attire, including her whip.
The background made Jaclyn look like she was filming ancient Korean drama on a horse.
On our way back, Suki’s horse (Joker) right shoe came off. Abang Is exchanged horse with Suki. So Suki was riding Shadow on the way back and it was really cute to see Suki bouncing on the little pony.
Abang Is shared a trick with me that if a shoe came off, we should either walk or canter. When we canter, we should canter on the lead where the shoe is still on.
More photos on the top of the hill…
Everyone with their signature pose!
On our way walking back to stable.
Jaclyn looked like having a really good time with Love while Suki has been “bouncing” all her way back 😀
When we got back to stable, Abang Iskandar wasted no time and brought out Jack for jumping practice.
How well can Jack jumps? A photo speaks a thousand words.
The little fans who has been admiring at the side just now decided to give it a try to jump herself!
Looking good jumper!
Great job! Keep going!
Go Jaclyn, go!
The face Jaclyn made after a really awkward jump.
Jacklyn getting a bit more coaching from Abang Iskandar.
Satisfied with her virgin jump. Finally getting off Jack.
It’s now Suki’s turn to jump with Jack.
Woop! Looking good Suki!
Since it was the week right after Raya, everyone was still in Raya mode. Abang Is prepared Teh-O with Raya cookies for us in the stable. Yummie!
It was a fun time training with Suki and Jaclyn. We covered 15KM which was a really comfortable yet satisfying distance for an outride.
Looking forward to ride with you both again, until next time~
Empayar Sunnah Archery & Riding (ESAR) at Bukit Beruntung has always been my favourite track to ride. I especially like their challenging track and my chatty guide, Boy. Last Sunday I went there with Suki.
We got there about 8.30AM. Wasted no time, we mounted on to our horses. Suki got Love. Her name is Love because she has a love mark on her head. Love is a lovely Anglo-Arabian.
While I mounted on Joker who is a tall retired horse from police force. He is like the model among the horses.
We got ready at the back of the stable and ready to head off to the trail.
On our way heading to the trail. We were cantering on the grass.
We were walking slowly at the entrance. In front of me is a Abang who recently started riding. This is his first time going for an outride.
Here is where the track started to get exciting. We arrived to a little slope where we (I mean the horses) have to climb up. The horses will automatically canter up. All we had to do were to bend a little forward to lighten the seat.
Then the horses can trot freely at the open field.
We cantered deeper into the greener part of the trail.
Since this is the first time Abang going for outride, he got tired quickly. Suki and I overtook him to meet boy in front.
Boy was waiting for us in front of a junction.
We walked passed the tall grasses. As always, Boy is happy to explain to us where does each trail will lead us to.
This is one of my favourite spot in this trail. It is a long straight path where I could canter without much worry about the path condition.
We took a turn and move into another farm path. This is also another favourite of mine – thanks the beautiful scenery. Tall coconut trees in front, variety of vegetables at both side and straight clear path ahead of us. This is also a path where some horses can get into galloping!
I was doing slow canter at this point. Suki overtook me with fast canter.
We make 2 loops in this path. On another loop, Boy was galloping with his horse, Faraz. It was as if he just bounce by. He overtook me and got out of sight in less than 5 seconds!
We ended the trail by dropping by the pond. The pond was not fill with deep water but it was good enough for Lizaz, Love, Joker and Faraz to get a drink… and have some fun playing water. The Faraz and Love got a little cozy on the water and decided to take a bath! They lied down on the water and got Suki and Boy wet. Too bad we didn’t get to take any of their embarrassing photos!
We head back to the stable after a satisfying ride.
Empayar Sunnah Archery & Riding – Daniel & Suki
Further Details
If you would like to do a similar outride, please drop by Empayar Sunnah Archery & Riding (ESAR) at Bukit Beruntung. The outride fee is affordably at RM120 per session. Please contact Boy (018-918 8871) to schedule your ride. Check out my other trail riding experience with Empayar Sunnah Archery & Riding (ESAR) at Bukit Beruntung here and here.
It was my 3rd jumping lesson with Aqil in AS Equestrian Center. It was a fun session together with Suki. Having a buddy certainly certainly gave us a bit of competitiveness in the game!
In the video @2.02, Suki’s horse, Nix got excited and started cantering. I got really worried for her. Luckily Suki is a solid rider and managed to calm Nix down in just a few seconds. I have a chat with her afterward to find out she released the reins a little too early hence the little drama.
At @2.14, I was attempting the second jump and Marco decided to move to the right to avoid the poll. It caught me by surprised and I felt off from Marco. The good news is, I manage to hold on to Marco’s neck and land on my foot, phew!
My hacking buddy, Suki Low whom I met in GHRCtexted me out of nowhere “U keen on jumping?”. Jumping has always been at the back of my mind. I have always been impressed by how professional show jumpers elegantly cantering and jumping over tall fences. Throughout all my visits to different stables, I particularly like AS Equestrian Center when I went hacking with Aqil few months back. I replied, “Yup, let’s give it a try!”
Sunday, we met up in AS Equestrian Center for our first jumping lesson. Well, it was my first jumping lesson but not for Suki. She was jumping back in Netherlands 20 years ago. In one jump, her pony (1.35m tall) and her were jumping an oxer of 1.10m got his belly stuck in mid air. He felt down, rolled over her and the obstacle collapsed. You can imagine it was quite a chaos. Since then, she has lost her confidence in jumping and has not been jumping. Last Sunday was her first jump since 20 years!
Aqil started the lesson by explaining the basics of the equipment.
Aqil got Marco for Suki to ride on to warm up.
Aqil got me another horse, Nixs Bahamdan to warm up. A fairly tall and slightly slim dark brown horse.
While trotting at one particular corner, he consistently likes to start cantering. Probably due to his previous training that got him cantering at that corner.
Then, Aqil taught us about sitting 2-point to get ready for our jump.
Here go Suki’s first jump on Marco!
Suki made a turn at the corner and go for another jump.
She continues to go on for another 10-15 jumps throughout the lesson.
We exchanged horses. Suki definitely looked super happy for making so many jumps after 20 years!
First I trot on Marco for a round or two. Then, Aqil arranged the jumping pole for me to trot over. Next, he made a low barrier for me to jump over.
Here goes my virgin jump!
And another jump…
The poles are there to make sure we pass through the yellow section to stay in the middle.
At one jump, Suki was walking across the landing area. I was shouting “Horse coming!” to make sure she knows I was approaching.
Aqil was explaining a similar experience he had while he was training in Europe doing a 1.6m jump. There was a person standing and chatting right in the middle while Aqil was approaching fast. The horse was too fast to stop. Since he knew his horse could jump over that person, so he jumped!
After a jump, Aqil coached me on what could be improved further.
Aqil showed me I was hunching my back.
Aqil showed me I should be straightening my back instead while jumping.
People say horse is the reflection of the rider. I didn’t really quite understand that until I do jumping.
Obviously, I was a little unsure and worried in my first few jumps. When Aqil asked me if I was scared, I acted and responded confidently that I was not. However, Marco could picked up such subtle hint and amplified the emotion by 10 times. This is a time when Marco moved away from the jumping poles while I was approaching with an unsure emotion. A little worry on the rider has such an impact on the horse.
To be fair, I’m sure Marco is a very well trained horse for jumping. If it’s not for such a well trained horse, I wouldn’t be able to make so many jumps in my first lesson. Well, instead of saying I learn jumping, I should say Marco taught me how to jump.
Aqil was taking a photo of my jump. How thoughtful!
After making about 10-15 jumps, we slow walk to let Marco rest.
Final Thoughts
Jumping is not as hard as I initially thought. I often see people falling off from horses on YouTube videos. That gave me really bad impression how dangerous jumping could be. Well I’m not saying jumping is not dangerous, it is just not as bad as I initially thought. In fact, throughout our jumps in our first lesson, none of us felt down.
Big part of the reason for such a satisfying and pleasant jumping lesson has to do with Aqil and Marco. First, Aqil is a very experienced jumper himself and he still actively jumps. He breaks down the transition so seamlessly to the point it felt so natural for us to jump 80 cm at the end of our first lesson. Second, Marco is a fantastic jumping horse. Like I said earlier, instead of claiming I’m learning how to jump, the more accurate way to say is Marco was teaching me how to jump.
Obviously, our hands might not be in the right position, our heels might not be pointing down, our back were hunching (okay probably just me) and I’m sure there are still a lot to improve. But the important thing is we did jump. A lot of jumps!
Frankly, I did not have much expectation before stepping in. It took me a long time to trot steadily and to canter when I first started learning horse riding. I thought jumping is going to be another steep learning curve. However, it was surprisingly easy with the right coach and the right horse. Thanks Aqil! Thanks Marco! Also thanks Suki for giving me a kick to get me started in jumping!
It was a really pleasant jumping lesson, really looking forward for my next lesson!
If you want to learn jumping, I highly recommend you to visit AS Equestrian Center. The fee is pretty affordable at RM80/lesson. Give Aqil (017-620 0027) a call and he will he happy to assist you further.
Here is the location. Please note that the location in Waze is incorrect.
