Horse Riding Holidays: The Four Kinds, and Which One Suits You
The same phrase is sold for four completely different weeks. This is what each of them is actually like in the saddle, who each one suits, and the questions worth asking before you book, written from a farm in west Cornwall where we keep horses.
Which kind of horse riding holiday should you book?
Book by how many hours a day you want to be on a horse, not by the destination. A centre-based week is one to three hours a day from one base. A trail holiday is five to seven hours a day, moving on each night. The two are sold under the same phrase and they are not the same holiday.
We keep horses at Noonvares Farm in west Cornwall, and this page is the part nobody explains before you have paid: what these holidays are actually like from the saddle, and which of them is the one you want. It sits under horse holidays, which is where the wider picture is.
The four kinds of riding holiday
They are sold under the same phrase, photographed with the same horse on the same beach, and they are four different weeks. The difference that decides whether you enjoy yourself is not the country. It is how much of each day you spend on a horse.
Centre-based
You stay in one place and ride out daily, usually one to three hours, and come back to the same bed. Lessons are normally available and often included, so this is the kind that improves your riding rather than just using it. It suits beginners, families, mixed groups where not everybody rides, and anybody who has not been on a horse for a few years and would rather find that out gently.
The thing to ask about a centre-based week is what happens on the other twenty hours of the day, because you will have them.
Trail, or point to point
Five to seven hours in the saddle and a new bed most nights, with your luggage moved for you. This is the holiday people mean when they talk about riding across a country, and it is a physical week rather than a restful one. It suits riders who already ride regularly and are used to time in the saddle rather than lessons.
Dartmoor is the clearest example of a place deciding the holiday rather than the operator — the going, the season and the navigation all come from the moor itself. Horse riding holidays on Dartmoor sets out what that means from the saddle.
It is also the kind with the least room to change your mind. If day three is not going well on a centre-based week you sit it out by the pool. On a trail you are twenty miles from where you started.
Ranch and working weeks
Mostly North and South America, western tack, and a day built around stock work rather than scenery. You ride long hours but at a different pace and in a different saddle, and a good deal of the appeal is doing a job rather than being shown a view. It suits people who want the work, and it is the friendliest of the long-hours holidays to a rider who is fit but not especially schooled.
Spain is the counter-example, and the one where the horse rather than the country is the reason to go — see horse riding holidays in Spain.
Riding days bolted onto a normal holiday
A beach ride, a trek, a morning in the hills, taken as one-off days rather than as a holiday. This is the sensible answer for a family or a group where one person rides and three do not, and it is how a lot of people find out they want one of the three above.
Our own four categories, from keeping horses and from riding here. There is no official taxonomy and operators use these words loosely, so the useful question is always which of the four a given week actually is.
What a week in the saddle does to somebody who rides for an hour a week
The brochures are never blunt about this, so here it is. If your normal riding is an hour once a week in a school, then five hours a day across five days is a different activity, not more of the same one. Different muscles, different balance, and a horse that has your measure by lunchtime on the first day.
Day two is the hard one. Most people are fine again by day four, and most people underestimate how much the ground matters: an hour of sitting trot on a moorland track asks more of you than a canter on sand.
And then, somewhere around day four, it turns. You stop thinking about your hands and your legs, the horse stops testing you, and you start looking at the country instead of at the ground in front of you. That is the part people go back for.
Ours, at sunrise in west Cornwall. Rugged, fed, and carrying a cat, which is the honest version of a horse holiday photograph.
The fix is not fitness training. It is booking the right one of the four, which is why that list is at the top of this page rather than the bottom.
What to ask before you book any riding holiday
- How many hours a day in the saddle. The single question that decides whether you enjoy it, and the one most listings answer vaguely.
- How they match a horse to a rider. Ask what they need to know about you. If the answer is nothing, that is the answer.
- What the weight limit is. Every operator has one, and not all of them publish it.
- What the guide-to-rider ratio is. Six to one on open ground is a different holiday from twelve to one.
- What happens if you cannot ride on day three. On a trail holiday that is a real question, and a good operator has a real answer.
- What is included. Hats, insurance, transfers, and what happens to your luggage while you are on a horse.
Our own list, written from keeping horses rather than from selling holidays.
Tell us what you have ridden, how many hours a day you actually want to be on a horse, and roughly where you fancy going. We will tell you which of the four you are describing and point you at the people who run it.
Message us to talk through the optionsWhere in the world people ride
Riding countries are not interchangeable, and the differences are bigger than the marketing suggests. Each of these gets its own guide as they are written; this is the short version.
| Where | What the riding is | What is different about it |
|---|---|---|
| Britain | Beach and moor in the south west, fell country in the north, genuine hill riding in Wales, and the longest wildest routes in Scotland | The region decides the holiday far more than the operator does |
| Spain and Portugal | Schooled Iberian horses, and often some classical work alongside the hacking | The horse underneath you is the point, rather than the view around you |
| Iceland | Small, tough, five-gaited Icelandic horses across open country | The one destination where the animal rather than the landscape is the reason to go |
| The Americas | Ranch weeks, western tack and stock work, from Montana and Texas up into Alberta and down to Argentina | You are doing a job rather than being shown a view |
| Africa | Riding safari, among game on horseback rather than in a vehicle | The riding standard demanded is genuinely high, because of what you may have to do at short notice |
Our own summary, from horse knowledge rather than from brochures. A starting point for a conversation, not a ranking.
For riding in this county, including the beaches and Bodmin Moor, see horse riding in Cornwall.
What riding holiday insurance covers
Ordinary travel insurance often excludes horse riding, or covers it only on a led hack. Check the policy wording for riding as a named activity, and check separately whether you are covered riding without a guide, because those are two different questions and a policy can answer them differently.
Cover exists and several insurers sell it. We are not insurance advisers and we are not going to tell you which policy to buy.
Elizabeth’s view
Almost everybody books one rung harder than they should. Elizabeth Adey’s view, from keeping horses on this farm, is that the best riding holiday most people will ever have is a centre-based week somewhere unremarkable, ridden well, and that the trail across a country is the one to book the year after that. A horse will find out inside an hour which of the two you are ready for, and it is a much nicer discovery to make on day one of the right holiday than day three of the wrong one.
Elizabeth Adey, Noonvares Farm, west Cornwall.
Saddle Notes
What people ask before they book a riding holiday.
Can beginners go on a horse riding holiday?
Yes, on a centre-based holiday, where you ride out for an hour or two each day and go back to the same yard, and where lessons are usually available. A trail holiday, where you ride five or six hours a day and move on each night, is not a beginner holiday whatever the brochure says.
How fit do you need to be for a riding holiday?
Fitter than for a weekly lesson, and it is more about being used to time in the saddle than about general fitness. If you ride an hour a week, book a centre-based week rather than a trail.
What should you take on a horse riding holiday?
A hat that fits you and meets a current standard, boots with a heel, gloves and layers. Ask whether hats are provided, because a hat that has been dropped no longer offers what it was made to offer.
Do horse riding holidays include lessons?
Centre-based ones usually do. Trail holidays usually do not, because the day is spent covering ground rather than schooling. Ask directly rather than assuming, because it is one of the commonest disappointments.
Can you go on a riding holiday alone?
Yes, and a good number of riders do. Ask about single supplements and about the size of the group, because a solo rider in a group of four has a very different week from one in a group of fourteen.
How long should a riding holiday be?
A week is where the riding starts to change how you sit, and two or three days is enough to find out whether you want more of it. A fortnight is for riders who are already out several times a week.
What is the difference between a trail ride and a trek?
Very little, and operators use both words loosely. Both mean covering ground rather than schooling, and both usually mean moving on each night. Ask for the hours in the saddle rather than the label.
Can you take your own horse on a riding holiday?
Yes, at properties with stabling and grazing, which is a much smaller market than the guided one. What to check before you travel is set out on take your horse on holiday.
More on horses, from this farm
Horse holidays · Horse riding in Cornwall · Take your horse on holiday · Our Cornwall horse family
About this page
Written from keeping horses at Noonvares Farm in west Cornwall. The four categories, the questions to ask and the judgement on what a week in the saddle is like are our own. Photograph of the arena by Christine Benton; the others are from Pixabay. Where a figure is not on this page, it is because we had not read it. Reviewed 8 September 2026.