Waffles
Well-Known Member
What great times/dangerous things did you do back then?
The heady days of pony fun in the 1970s
- Thread starter Waffles
- Start date
ozpoz
Well-Known Member
Swam with our ponies in deep rivers.
Didn't wear hats for riding bareback to and from the field, although we always wore them for hacking (along the same road).
Didn't wear hats for riding bareback to and from the field, although we always wore them for hacking (along the same road).
saalsk
Well-Known Member
Bringing ponies back to the riding stables from their fields ( they had 2 days off each week on full turn out ) - riding one bareback with a headcollar, leading 2 or 3 from each side, taking up the entire road. Luckily it was so early in the morning that the sparrows hadn't started farting yet, so there were no cars around.
I did have a hat on though, my Mum insisted on me being "safe" !
I did have a hat on though, my Mum insisted on me being "safe" !
Waffles
Well-Known Member
The hat I had in the 70s always fell off before I hit the ground - this was before they introduced those chinstraps you could put on your hat as an extra.
Clava
Well-Known Member
I always wore a hat but I went for miles on our ponies with my friends and my mother rarely knew where I was.
Waffles
Well-Known Member
Yes - we were just "up the farm for the day" getting picked up at 5pm or something
Clava
Well-Known Member
ozpoz
Well-Known Member
Yes, no one knew where we were - we had absolute freedom all day and did miles and miles of hills, forestry and meeting up with friends.
The Fuzzy Furry
Getting old disgracefully
I used to ride with 2 or 3 other friends all similar age.
Memories are of:
Going off with picnic of sandwich & a biscuit in our pockets - off exploring on adjacent commons all day.
Playing cowboys & indians - meant we hared around all over our local patch whooping etc
undoing the reins so when you stopped you could ground tie (never worked as often we had to go 2 up to go & retrieve a pony) the braver ones swinging over the pony & trying to hang on when crouching - on 1 side so it looked from the other that the pony was riderless.... my mum went bonkers at that one when a dog-walking friend told her what we were doing
Riding the ponies to the local shop & tieing them up on their reins to a pole so we could all go in & buy sweets at the same time.
Swimming in the local stream after riding & then having to cycle home soaking wet.
If I had found my daughter doing the same........
Memories are of:
Going off with picnic of sandwich & a biscuit in our pockets - off exploring on adjacent commons all day.
Playing cowboys & indians - meant we hared around all over our local patch whooping etc
undoing the reins so when you stopped you could ground tie (never worked as often we had to go 2 up to go & retrieve a pony) the braver ones swinging over the pony & trying to hang on when crouching - on 1 side so it looked from the other that the pony was riderless.... my mum went bonkers at that one when a dog-walking friend told her what we were doing Riding the ponies to the local shop & tieing them up on their reins to a pole so we could all go in & buy sweets at the same time.
Swimming in the local stream after riding & then having to cycle home soaking wet.
If I had found my daughter doing the same........
sally259
Active Member
Leaving the saddle and bridle on the fence at the edge of the field while I went to 'find' my pony amongst the herd the big field. Gallop back to where the saddle and bridle were with just a head collar. I did end up in a pond full of frog spawn one day when my pony and I had a difference of opinion between riding through the pond and dry land.
Old Bat
Well-Known Member
saalsk
Well-Known Member
Ditto - but to be fair, I was always quite happy that it did, as it scuffed the velvet less ! I eventually had a harness to add to it, that had a chin strap - with a big plastic chin cup thing that go hot, sweaty and uncomfortable. And seeing as you had to have it so loose you could actually talk to your friends whilst riding, I don't think it helped keep the hat on anyway !
saalsk
Well-Known Member
Complete ditto! Were you in East Sussex?!
South Devon, and still keep in touch with some of the girls I used to hang around with as a kid. We had a meet up last summer, back in Torquay, plus horses, and went onto one of the rides we used to go on. We got to a bit we always used to gallop on..... and suddenly there was muttering about " the ground is quite hard" and "well, he's really not that fit given the weather we have been having" etc etc
So we had a sedate canter
MochaDun
Well-Known Member
As was too much of a goody two shoes to actually get on a horse when they were doing it but accompanied my friends on their ponies to the newly being built M5 in Somerset when the construction crews had left of an evening...at that stage it was just earth and yes the signs said Construction Site: Do Not Enter Can you imagine how nice and flat and wide and firm it was to ride on though they had a blast. I think I only went with them once as was a bit of a goody two shoes to really enjoy it
Beyond that hopping on friends ponies riding them in their field in headcollar with no hat...
The hats I did wear though as I had weekly riding lessons for years were all secondhand and either handed down from sister or got from someone else, elastic under the chin, barely fitted...that kind of thing But that's how it was then. And survived even with a handful of falls.
Can you imagine how nice and flat and wide and firm it was to ride on though they had a blast. I think I only went with them once as was a bit of a goody two shoes to really enjoy it Beyond that hopping on friends ponies riding them in their field in headcollar with no hat...
The hats I did wear though as I had weekly riding lessons for years were all secondhand and either handed down from sister or got from someone else, elastic under the chin, barely fitted...that kind of thing
But that's how it was then. And survived even with a handful of falls.
WelshD
Well-Known Member
I was an 80's child but I remember doing most if the things here. Hacking all day and meeting friends at crossroads along the way will always stick in my mind
If you didn't go for a hack you spent the day in the field appropriating various things from various placed to make jumps. I remember dragging half of a scrap five barred gate over a mile once.
You were kicked out of the house at 8am on weekends and told in no uncertain terms not YO appear back before 7pm lol
If you didn't go for a hack you spent the day in the field appropriating various things from various placed to make jumps. I remember dragging half of a scrap five barred gate over a mile once.
You were kicked out of the house at 8am on weekends and told in no uncertain terms not YO appear back before 7pm lol
WelshD
Well-Known Member
*to. Not YO - stupid phone
ribbons
Well-Known Member
All of the above. Those days produced real riders.
The health & safety worries of today often result in passengers not riders, usually with limited confidence, which I thinks causes more accidents than the harem scarem antics of 70's kids.
The health & safety worries of today often result in passengers not riders, usually with limited confidence, which I thinks causes more accidents than the harem scarem antics of 70's kids.
WelshD
Well-Known Member
As for dangerous well jumps seemed a heck of a lot higher back then, I remember jumping benches and small-ish picnic tables on the common on ponies and even the local show had classes starting at 2'9
Aarrghimpossiblepony
Well-Known Member
Why else would they put them there?
One year we went to Hyde Park to take part in that open air "animal blessing" service held outside a church round there. We took a lorry down with 6 of us.
Hyde Park has sooo many benches to jump.
The police were not amused.
Patchworkpony
Well-Known Member
Galloping bareback on Epsom Downs and jumping the barriers, wearing no shoes on my feet - pretending my welsh cob had bolted when I was stopped by the 'warden' who said he was going to tell my father about my behaviour. I had to hide my wedding ring!
Alyth
Well-Known Member
What lovely memories!! Mine go back even further - to the 50s!!! Life was good then!!
zippo
Well-Known Member
I cringe when I remember this but we used to jump our ponies over the arena fence,if they tipped it the PC instructor used to say"well they'll pick their feet up next time"!
Going to PC rallies with the horses loose in the back of a cattle truck.
Gretna Green races,when the pony was not keen on two passengers and pigrooted all the way to the finish.
And finally the day when you were deemed ready to have your own horse,not your Father's old,semi retired stockhorse.
ann-jen
Well-Known Member
Riding and leading 2 or 3 from the field in just a head collar. Rounding up cattle. Jumping park benches or any other fixed obstacle that would pass for a jump. Wading through the river. Grid work as a ride with no stirrups or reins. Pooh poohing jumping anything under 3'6.
None of which I'd be brave enough to do now lol!
None of which I'd be brave enough to do now lol!
Gloi
Too little time, too much to read.
We were always getting told off for jumping the park benches too
Our favourite place to ride was a large derelict farm/tip. There were big areas where buildings had been demolished and people had dumped stuff so we made our jumping courses out of whatever rubbish we could find. We always competed to see whose pony could jump highest over the old bedsteads, doors and oil drums we'd built. Both our ponies managed to haul themselves four foot plus in terrible style, especially mine who cat leapt everything.
One day I got knocked out but I wouldn't let my friend tell anyone in case I got in bother.
I also remember swimming my pony across the local river.
Our favourite place to ride was a large derelict farm/tip. There were big areas where buildings had been demolished and people had dumped stuff so we made our jumping courses out of whatever rubbish we could find. We always competed to see whose pony could jump highest over the old bedsteads, doors and oil drums we'd built. Both our ponies managed to haul themselves four foot plus in terrible style, especially mine who cat leapt everything.
One day I got knocked out but I wouldn't let my friend tell anyone in case I got in bother.
I also remember swimming my pony across the local river.
ann-jen
Well-Known Member
Haha there was a park near us (that did not invite horse riders in!) that had a load of telegraph poles set in a line that kids were supposed to shimmy under then over, under then over etc. obviously not set on any sort of stride pattern for a horse but looked soooo like XC fences it was just far to tempting not to sneak in :-@
PucciNPoni
Well-Known Member
Hopping on my pba bareback, no bridle or even head collar - getting clotheslined off the cheeky mare by the single strand of electric wire that she knew she could get under.
honetpot
Well-Known Member
No Transport, no school, so could only hack so you went everywhere. Cantering down the grass verge of busy dual carriage ways, because where we lived was so flat a treat was charging up the railway embankment and then doing an emergency stop before you hit the track.
We would often get on strange ponies straight out of a field and would hack them home about five miles along busy roads. You had one saddle, if you had one, that went on every pony and a lot where 'frying pan saddles' from the 1930's.
We would often get on strange ponies straight out of a field and would hack them home about five miles along busy roads. You had one saddle, if you had one, that went on every pony and a lot where 'frying pan saddles' from the 1930's.
Shantara
Well-Known Member
This thread makes me so jealous!
Not only was I born in 1990 (so missed out on all the fun years!), but I didn't have a pony either
Still, I've had some gallop fun on Ned, we even did an XC "course" when I last rode him on a hack
It was a bench, a ditch, then a gallop up the hill!
Not only was I born in 1990 (so missed out on all the fun years!), but I didn't have a pony either
Still, I've had some gallop fun on Ned, we even did an XC "course" when I last rode him on a hack
It was a bench, a ditch, then a gallop up the hill!
babymare
Well-Known Member
All day rides over pendle hill with beeef paste sarnies shoved in pocket. just fond fond memories
Merlin11
Well-Known Member
It must have been great then to be able to ride everywhere. I really envy that. I got lessons at a riding school in the late 70's and remember riding the horses back to the fields bareback. Can't remember if I wore a hat or not but don't think the hats were as safe then anyway. Came to no harm none the less! A friend near here remembers riding all day and taking a picnic for the beach. Where you can ride now is really limited due to all the housing development and roads. Wish I could have experienced that.