A Day Out

Living in the county town of Staffordshire we have the benefit of living just a few miles away from the County Showground, so when there is an event that we wish to attend the travel is easy.

Recently the National Shire Horse Show took place over three days.  We attended the middle day when the classes were stallions and geldings.  Over the course of the day there were classes for different ages, as well as a competition for horse drawn farm machinery and for horse drawn trade carts, as well as the opportunity to visit the stables and get closer to the horses.

For every class the horses would parade around the ring, then individually walk and trot under the scrutiny of the judges before winners were announced and rosettes awarded.  The horses had to line up in order of their placements in order to be awarded their rosettes.

The final line up

.... and the winner is

The judges walked down the lines, awarding the rosettes.

 












The horses looked impressive, but the male judges wearing their bowler hats  made quite an impression too!









 There were were also classes for horse drawn farm implements and horse drawn trade carts. No effort was spared in preparation, the farm implements were in pristine condition  and for part of the competition they had to be shown in use.The trade carts looked like new.
















                                                                                                           
The best part of the show was being able to go backstage and see the horses in their stables.

This is where you get a real sense of the size of a shire horse.

This horse has to go back in the ring for the final parade of champions.  To make sure he doesn't need to be groomed again he is wearing a covering so that if he does decide to roll in his sawdust bedding, he won't pick up too many shavings and will look good when he goes back to the ring.

He reminded us of Spiderman.