Dartfield Horse Museum

Did you know there’s a plethora (excellent word, that) of horse museums out there? Everyone knows about the International Museum of the Horse located in the Kentucky Horse Park, but there are lots of smaller, specialized museums out there as well. The Dartfield Horse Museum and Park is located in Ireland, east of Galway City and boasts exhibits dedicated to the history of the horse, live Irish horses for admiring, an art gallery and shop, mechanized horses to ride and lots of other neat stuff. It’s the brainchild of renowned Irish horseman and Connemara breeder Willie Leahy, and has only been open for a few years, but I think it deserves to be better-known. What would your ideal equestrian holiday be? I’ll be posting about more museums in the future; if you have a site you’d like to suggest, please post a comment or email me at defrostindoors at gmail dot com.

Chincoteague pony swim, July 26

The famous swim is tomorrow! Every year, on the last Wednesday in July, the feral ponies swim from Assateague Island over to Chincoteague. After a rest, some ponies are auctioned off and the rest then swim back to Assateague. The spectacle was immortalized by Marguerite Henry in her book Misty of Chincoteague. It’s a pretty popular event, as you can imagine, but you can visit the islands and view the ponies in their natural environment anytime during the year. You can learn more about the ponies at the National Chincoteague Pony Association site (warning: some pages have sound effects).

Update: here’s a news link with some photos and a video of this year’s swim.