Horse Life Stories - Bertie

Hello again folks, here is another of my 'horse life stories', this time its all about Bertie and his amazing quest!









Love Pilgrim x

Bertie was born in 1999 and is now 17 years old.  He's a piebald cob gelding and he stands at 14.1 hands high. Piebald is horsey phrase; it just means Bertie is black and white.

Bertie

Before Bertie lived here at Calvert Trust Exmoor he had quite an exciting life; he was imported from Ireland as a youngster and lived in the Welsh hills at Plas Equestrian. 

When Bertie was old enough he started his training to be a riding horse, training alongside the endurance horses at Plas Equestrian. This training made him the perfect horse for Bertie’s first adventure!

His rider Becky had always dreamed of travelling internationally by horse back.  Becky planned a trip that was not only going to be great fun but also raise money for a wonderful charity.  The route was London to Tokyo, covering 15 countries, 15,000 miles and lasting for 4 years! 

Bertie and Becky

On April 1st 2009 Bertie an Becky set off from London, sometimes sleeping under the stars, sometimes stopping off with people along the way who had heard of the wonderful adventure Becky and Bertie was on. By the fourth week they had made it to France, and with a few ups and downs they travelled through France, stopping off to explore the local areas. They even managed to visit Belgium via a a slight unplanned de-tour!

By week 18 they had travelled 1,083 miles and had been staying in Besançon, North East France for a couple of weeks.  Becky  had a slight re-think, and now wasn’t planning to ride the whole way, she decided to convert a cart into a caravan.

Whilst staying in Besançon Bertie learnt how to pull a carriage, and soon they were ready to set off on the next stage of the trip.

By the 25th week they arrived in Switzerland, having  completed 1,526 miles. On their travels through Switzerland they encountered some horrible weather, so rather than carrying on Becky and Bertie set up camp to explore the local area.

By week 29 they had travelled through Switzerland and covered 1,712 miles, but Becky had fallen ill and this was where their journey had to end. Bertie and Becky returned to the UK towards the end of 2009, what an amazing adventure they had both been on.

Bertie joined Calvert Trust Exmoor in the winter of 2010; after a month’s trial to introduce Bertie to his new surroundings and all the new experiences he would face Bertie was ready to work. He was soon becoming a fast favourite with the centre guests and our regular riders.

Although Bertie is now 17 years old he loves to play with the other horses and can quite often be seen winding us all up in the field! He especially loves to play with Milo as he is a youngster and will play back, unlike some of the others who get a bit fed up with him!

 Bertie has been here 5 years now and he is wonderful at everything he does, he has given many guests fantastic experiences and we’re sure Bertie will be here for many years to come, making people smile.

Pilgrim's horseshoe icon was created by stolkramaker from Noun Project