A big “thank you” goes to Mary Louise Sprague and her family for once again inviting carriage drivers to enjoy the beautiful trails of Spurwink Farm in Cape Elizabeth. We greatly appreciate all the work that goes into marking trails and guarding the road crossings. The marked trails encompass about ten miles of beautiful carriage roads with smaller loops available for those drivers (or horses) who preferred a shorter outing. The route took us past beautiful ocean views, through woods awash with wonderful fall colors, several ponds and fields.

This was the year for pairs as we had everything from pairs of ponies to pairs of large drafts enjoying the drive. Two groups from New York State joined us after a week in Acadia and one couple came from New Hampshire. The rest of the crowd was made up of Maine drivers. There were several Morgans, Standardbreds, Trottingbred ponies (a small cousin of the Standardbred), Rocky Mountain Horse, an Icelandic horse and a small spotted pony. We had two pairs of drafts on the drive, one Belgian and another a pair of black Percherons. There were several other horses in attendance and many other breeds as well.

Patsy O’Brien hosted a clinic with Andy Marcoux at her Pownal farm, Snowfields, on September 5-6. The clinic consisted of private driving lessons from morning through late afternoon. Andy tailored each lesson to the interests and abilities of the driving students – both human and equine. Some lessons were held in the arena, some on the adjoining grass field and some on the trails at Snowfields. The feedback from participants was very positive, and we are hopeful that Andy will be traveling north to Maine again in the near future.

The juniors were active this past fall. Their biggest effort was to host a pleasure driving show on August 30 at H.E.P. Unfortunately, although the weather was fine the actual day of the show, it was wet and stormy the days and the night before which greatly reduced the number of entrants. So overall as a fundraiser it wasn’t a particularly successful show, but everyone who did attend seemed to enjoy it, and it looks good for this to be an annual event. We hope next year for great weather and a larger showing from the general membership of the club!

I was really pleased with all the work the kids and their parents did to make this show happen. We had almost 100% participation from the junior membership, between site preparation during the afternoons in advance of the show and all the jobs that happen during the show. If the kids weren’t competing they were being very helpful and pitching in wherever needed, even if it wasn’t the job assigned to them. I applaud their flexibility and great attitudes. Almost all of them stayed after the show and went into “overdrive cleanup mode,” and we had it all done in a short period of time. We wish to thank again all the class sponsors, advertisers and volunteers from the general membership. Your support enabled the show to actually happen.

In the late summer the juniors benefited from lessons from Judith Bean-Calhoun,Patsy O’Brien and Robin Cuffey. We are in search of an easy access (i.e., large parking lot), low cost (very low cost or donated use) indoor arena for some winter lessons. The club is also looking for a set or two of orange traffic cones that will become property of the club and can go to every lesson with us.

The juniors enjoyed seeing the MDC hazard that they painted this summer in use at Maine Carriage Days. Two of the juniors participated in the event, Anna Bigelow and Olivia Fowler. As a nice testament for all their hard work in their lessons – they both won their divisions. Since they were the only juniors competing, the junior division was not run, and Anna went in VSE and Olivia went Open Single Pony. Congratulations to both girls!