Ngahiwi Horse Auction & I couldn't do it

We have spent the past 2 weekends at Gisborne. Its been a long time since I was last there, had forgotten just how much I missed that side of the island. When we lived in Hawkes Bay we spent a bit of time around Gisborne. Love the place, shame its now so far away.

The first weekend we saw 3 horses that looked like potential Summer replacements. One was too small but looked to be perfect for a friend or so I thought. Turned out she was and we bought her home with us last weekend.
The other 2 horses that weekend were pretty amazing. One was a big coloured hack. Far out, what a machine! No way would I ever give that horse enough work to keep him sane but the owner took me for a fabulous ride. I couldn't believe the places these horses were going without a moments hesitation.
The other one was a mare, nice horse but not for me. Still quite young but wow, what a walk she had on her.

So we decided to head back the next weekend for the Ngahiwi Dispersal auction. Around 100 horses, surely something there for me!

We took Pete's horse down to him just before Opotiki. We had picked her up the previous week for ourselves to bring on but Pete mentioned he was keen on something just like the mare so we handed her on to him.


The crowd was huge at the auction. Lots of horses, gorgeous property with lovely views, stunning sunny weather as well.




The coasty bred, green broke horses went for around $2000 - $4000 ish
$7000 for a buckskin by the Bay Indoctro colt
$10,000 for the Blue Indoctro Stallion. Going to Erewhon Stn in the Sth Island
$1500 - $2000 ish for lots of the young unbroken stock...
$6000 for a nice black colt by Blue Indoctro.

So good prices really. The odd cheaper one of course but not many.

East Coast StyleThe $10,000 stallion

This kid and horse were the stars of the whole weekend. One the Saturday was a viewing session and he was ripping around the place on the wonderful horse.
I couldn't help but catch this shot. Some people were looking at the horse and wanted to take a photo. They were getting him to pose, love the serious look on his face.But it was his older brother who got to show the horse in the sale ring.

I adored this lovely roan mare. Can't remember what she sold for but she just was lovely with a very kind attitude.

Unbroken horses in the yards

A nice youngster that appealed to me because of his size.

This guy was part of the crowd. He has his shepherds whistle tied in one of his dreads.

A typical sight around the area.

So no, we didn't buy anything. Just never felt right about any of the horses. Did bid on a few but we believed the prices to be unrealistic especially compared to the pony we had seen the previous week and were bringing back home for our friend. The prices made her seem like the bargain of the year.

So back to what to do with Summer? There was a message on the answerphone when we got home from a well known person.
I rang her back the next day, slightly bemused as I could not for one moment imagine what she would want with my little pony.
Turns out she has overseas clients coming next week and wanted to line Summer up for them to view. They had quite a varied shopping list of horses to acquire, an Andalusian was one of them and a horse that could do a bit of everything and needed to be about Summers size was one of the others.

Oh dear. I was having a bit of a meltdown. Did I really want to sell Summer and did I never want to ever see her again possibly? What if I couldn't replace her?
People were starting to ring and make quite serious noises about looking at her and then I decided she wasn't going to go. Well not just yet anyway.

So thats it. I took the ad off TM, told one person via e mail that she was not for sale, got several are you sure? will you change your mind e mails. Told a person over the phone I had changed my mind and then got a call from this NZ based person wanting to know where her ad had gone as she wanted to send the people overseas some photos. She was not too happy sounding when I told her I had changed my mind. Oops!

Me who is not normally so indecisive just can't get my head around this horse. Its an on again, off again thing we have. Not sure that will ever change but for now she stays. Tart repayed me by having a real tantrum about not wanting to shut a gate and next moment she's full on bucking. Never done that under saddle before. Wow did she get a few good belts for that, once I had regained my seat and reins which were all over the place! Nearly came off a couple of times but somehow managed to hang in there. It took about another 10 minutes to get the gate shut but I knew I couldn't get off and do it, that would have suited her just fine, so just had to persevere, heart pounding the entire time.

So not much has changed! We had a pleasant enough ride today with the HORSE Club at Okete. Back up when I first got on, felt like sitting on a ready to happen explosion for the first 15 minutes so I didn't let go of the safety strap for a while. A few good shies for luck and then she settled down again and we had a nice ride.

Heading over Coromandel way tomorrow to see a friend who has a horse for sale that he says will suit me. We will see........