All the way to Oz to ride a horse!

On our return from a two year posting in Bahrain, my wife, Diane, and I purchased a bungalow in Chawleigh, North Devon, a lovely little village with a marvellous primary school which my son, Ian attended, and which has now become one more victim of the “not enough pupils so close it down” brigade. Being based at the Naval Air Station Yeovilton I was able to come home each week-end and of course, for leave periods and there was nothing I liked better than taking the dog for a long walk and in the evenings going down to the local pub, the only problem I had with that was the conversation was mostly always about pigs, muck spreading and swedes, fortunately the landlady was also an “outsider” and we could chat about all things non agricultural! Although we were in the heart of the countryside with plenty of riding stables in the area I never had the opportunity or maybe inclination to hop on the back of one of those beasts and go galloping around Devon. However, when I was eventually posted to H.M.S. Scylla (now sadly the home to divers and crustaceans at the bottom of Whitesand Bay) the chance to go riding came unexpectedly during a courtesy visit by the ship to Perth in Western Australia.

When warships go on these goodwill trips an officer generally goes on ahead and arranges entertainment for the crew. This is generally in the form of sports fixtures and sight seeing for the lower deck ratings, cocktail parties for the officers and gentlemen! and whatever else can be fitted in. For instance, Scylla had what was considered to be the finest hockey team in the Far East Fleet, counting aircraft carriers, cruisers and umpteen frigates (we did have some ships then!) amongst our scalps. For my sins I was captain of the hockey team and a match was arranged with what we assumed was a local amateur Perth team, we thought that this might be easy meat but were to be proved very wrong. After only about 5 minutes and losing 3 – 0 it was obvious that our opponents were no ordinary amateur side. The umpires (2 in hockey) stopped the game and suggested that to avoid a rather embarrassing result we may like to change things around a bit to make a better game of it, we agreed and restarted with their forwards and our defence playing our forwards and their defence. The onslaught of goals then dried up and it turned out to be a very enjoyable match. It was only afterwards when they had whipped us away to a ranch outside Perth for a wonderful barbeque that it was revealed that the Perth team consisted of just about all of the then Australian Olympic team, somewhat above our standard! Damn those Aussies, always ready to put one over us Pomms.

The following day I was sitting in the communications office and this young lad came in and asked if I would like to go horse riding. I said, “Sorry, I’ve never been on a horse in my life and wouldn’t have the faintest idea how to get it in gear or to apply the brakes”. He said “Don’t worry Chief we’ll show you how to do it but we desperately need one more to make up the 10 required so that we can get a discount rate from the riding stables”. Ever game for a laugh I said alright then, on condition I get some instructions before hand, to which he agreed.

The mini bus duly turned up in the afternoon and transported us some distance out of Perth to the riding stables. The stable owner greeted us and introduced each of us to our broncos and up we mounted and he told us to go around the paddock a couple of times to get used to our charges. I did say to the guy that I hadn’t a clue how to work this beast and he said just tap him with your heel on one side and tug the rein on the other side and he would turn that way and if you wanted to turn the other way tap him with the other heel and tug the rein on the other side, easy, and to stop him just pull back on the reins. So off we went into the bush, the clever devils, which were the other nine in the posse, leading, with me bringing up the rear. All seemed to be going well until, the smart Alecs broke into a gallop, therefore my horse decided that he was going to follow suit, whether I wanted to or not. I should mention here that in addition to my proper job as a Chief Radio Supervisor I was also the ship’s photographer on account that being a small ship we didn’t qualify for a “proper” professional snapper, and being a keen phot. I always took my camera with me wherever I went, even on horseback! Big mistake, try riding a horse with a heavy camera swinging from your neck especially when galloping and trying to get into sync. with the horse’s movements so that we both went up and down together, it’s no joke, as I was coming up the camera was coming down, resulting in a few sore ribs. After a while we came to a clearing in the bush and everyone dismounted to have a fag and water the Bush. The time came to move off and we remounted and the smart Alecs moved off but for some reason my nag decided he (or was it a she?) wasn’t going anywhere. No matter how many times I “touched” him with my heels or muttered “gee-up” he stayed put. In despair I dismounted and it was then I realised what the problem was, there was a two strand plain wire fence which was flat on the ground and the blasted horse wouldn’t step across it, but after a bit of gentle persuasion and pleading he eventually allowed me to lead him across the wire and I remounted, then realised that every one else had disappeared out of sight. I shouted out to them but the only response I got was a voice from behind a bit of thicket which said “it’s ok Chief, I’m still here”, big relief, but not for long because when he saw that I was ok he vanished into the Bush also. Now I began to panic, which way had they gone? I was alone in the Australian Bush. Would I die of thirst? Would they send out search parties for me? and to make matters worse the blasted nag had decided to ignore all my frantic commands, orders, instructions and pleadings and just galloped off into I don’t know where, he wouldn’t stop, slow down or turn left or right even though I ordered him in my best C.P.O.’s voice.

After about 15 minutes of this and with my camera pounding my chest black & blue we suddenly burst out of the Bush and would you believe right at the place we had started from, the riding stables. This charger was no fool, he had obviously done this route a thousand times and knew his way around blind folded, and decided that he had had enough of this stupid git on his back and headed for home! The smart Alecs of course were already back, guzzling bottles of Fosters and waiting for me.

That was my first and last time on a horse, and to be honest I would much prefer to go and just look at the donkeys at the donkey sanctuary in Tedburn

Some of the Posse

Franki Detori I am not

Frankie Dettori I am not!

David Hanson

Jufair