Riding at Turtle Bay Resort

Reading my Fodor’s Guide to Oahu, I discovered that there are a few stables on the island that rent horses and provide trail rides. The stable at Turtle Bay Resort even allow the horses to be ridden on the beach - and they are the only stable on the island that do. Naturally, I jumped all over that, and called to make a reservation my first full day on the island. Matt had no interest at all in riding, but he didn’t mind sitting in the car and reading while he waited on me. So, Monday morning, we drove out to Turtle Bay and I went riding.


While I waited for my time slot to roll around, I poked around the stables a bit and met Sweetie, the official Welcome Cat.


Normally, the rides are done in groups of 8 or fewer, but I got very lucky. No one else had signed up for my time slot, so I got to have a private ride at the group rate. Alice, the guide, even let me take a bit longer than usual, since we were chatting and stopping for photo ops every so often. Alice was on Lizzie, a foul-tempered and extremely slow mare. In some ways, she reminded me of Lulu, the horse I had when I was younger. She insisted on being in the front, and snapped at my horse, Beetle, when he got too close.


When Alice found out that I had some riding experience, she asked if I’d be willing to ride Beetle. He’d only been at the stables for a couple of months, and wasn’t very solid on his trail horse training. He didn’t like to be near the water, tended to try and head home if he thought he could get away with it, and generally didn’t want to pay me any attention at all. We actually got along beautifully, once he realized I wasn’t going to tolerate any crap. Apparently, the folks at the stables will usually ride new or untrained horses for about six months before they put a visitor on them. Guess I’m just special like that.


Alice was wonderful about stopping to take pictures of me, Beetle and the scenery. We did try and get closer to the water at one point, but much like Duncan, Beetle seemed to think he’d melt if the water actually managed to touch him. Silly boy. Course, it didn’t help that Lizzie snapped at Beetle when I got close enough to hand Alice my camera...


During our ride through the woods, Alice told me that the very large Indian banyan tree on the property is commonly seen in the show “Lost.” Having never seen the show, I can’t actually verify that. She also told me that the thin shoots hanging down from the tree eventually hit the ground and become roots for new branches, and that’s how one tree can become so spread out.


The ride was wonderful – very relaxing, beautiful scenery, and a great guide. Definitely worth the price of admission. And before I left, Beetle even walked up to me and rubbed his head on my chest. I’m sure he was just scratching an itch, but we’ll pretend it was an act of understanding and affection...