The Household Cavalry experience

April tells us about her Household Cavalry experience

The Household Cavalry is split into two regiments, one being the Household Cavalry regiment, (the eyes and ears of the army) and the other the Household Cavalry mounted regiment (carry out ceremonial duties and attend royal occasions'.) Each solider is expertly trained to ride and care for their houses in a ceremonial role, however in the armoured role you can train to be a driver of a scimitar armoured vehicle. Part of The Household Cavalry is to guard the queen in London, in order to do this; it takes a high degree of training, during one of their training sessions they hold an open day in Norfolk.

Recently the open day took place and I attended it full of expectation for a great day out. Starting this day on a high I wondered around the stables feeding the beautiful houses in their stables. Afterwards I headed towards the arena waiting for the first event (show jumping) to begin. I was fascinated watching these gallant horses jumping over high fences, many were successful although some competitors failed to complete some of the jumps meaning that their faults were counted up and added to the time taken to complete the course, the riders with the least amount of time and the least faults are the winners of this competition.

Tent-pegging seems to me like an interesting sport as it consists of pulling pegs out of the ground using lances. This may appear futile however there is a useful explanation. Years ago when the Household Cavalry invaded an enemy camp at night they would pull out the pegs of the enemy's tent and the tents would fall on them, giving the invaders a better chance at defeating the enemy.

Although it was not all about horses there were other entertainments in the main arena such as; eagle's presentations, and motorbike races. My overall favourite part of the day was the musical ride, containing the members of Household Cavalry. They were riding around to the many different kinds of music, new and old, performing difficult cross over's between the houses, and laying the horse down at a precise moment.

I would recommend this day out for all the family, though the performances are similar each year the excitement continues. Seeing shows like this one makes me proud to have such a talented group of riders in our country.

April Lister