i’ve always loved horses...
when i was about four years old my father won a pony on a bet and brought it home to the family.
he was like that.
...anyway, my early memories of riding around on that pony on the common land which surrounded our village linger to this day.
since then, apart from one or two chance encounters, i never really connected with horses again.

that is, not until a few weeks ago, when deva, manose, some close friends and i, visited the ASVANARA HORSE ACADEMY ((www.asvanara.com), run by our friends edwin and ariane.
asvanara is no ordinary riding school.
edwin and ariane are world pioneers in the area of horse communication.
they are real ‘horse whisperers’ (although they themselves wouldn’t use that term).

you don’t need me to tell you that for centuries horses have been terribly mistreated by us humans.
work horses, race horses, cavalry horses, driven into the heat and horror of humanity’s ridiculous battles, or forced into unnatural and neurotic racing schedules, where they last no more than a few years before being thrown to the knackers yard.

asvanara, which lies in the heart of toscana, italy, has a herd of 30 horses, free to roam across vast areas (the ranch is huge) and relate naturally to one another.
no ‘horse shoes’ needed here - and no metal bits which eventually distort their mouths and cause such pain.



edwin and ariane are revolutionising the way people in the ‘horse industry’ - as they put it - think about horses.

of course, they are not particularly popular in the ‘industry’, because their understanding of horse welfare conflicts sharply with mainstream concepts, where the horses are, albeit unwittingly, badly mistreated.

something we learned: strangely enough, despite our terrible track record, horses are the only flight/prey animals that enjoy hanging out with us humans.
horses seem to like us! - always available and ready to communicate.
they must be very compassionate people.
ariane and edwin believe that there was a time when we had a natural, loving communication with horses, somewhere in the distant past.
they see their work not only as a benefit to the horses themselves, but also as a potential healing tool for us humans.
i can tell you now, from my own experience, magic happens you hang out with a horse .. they naturally take on the role of both teacher and friend.

but they don’t suffer fools, so you have to be present, aware and alert when you’re around them.

sounds like being with your guru?
it is!

they act as a mirror to our interior world.  

deva and i spent a week at asvanara.
the experience was deep and nourishing – as if we’d been on an extended meditation retreat.

...so...meet ariane and edwin, and their best friends, study (left) and barney



so with the news that we would be riding within six days (i had my doubts about that!) we went to meet the herd.

our week began here with ariane, edwin, ninya and federica.



“...so...this, is a horse..”



here’s deva strolling through the herd with her mother, viten, who came along to keep an eye on me...



it didn’t take us long to realise that the horses, in fact, chose us.

i meet cheridwen and fall hopelessly in love!



as does deva...with fretcha...here she is back in the stalls with her beautiful white arabic mare