Silvermist Equestrian Center

yep :-)

Get ready to trot into a world of fun, friends, and four-legged adventures at Silvermist Equestrian’s Pony Camps! 🎠🌈

We’ve got three action-packed camps in June/July, and you’re invited to join the ride! 🐾✨ Whether you're crazy about horses, love crafts, or want to learn more about ponies, there’s something for every little rider!

📅 *Camp Dates:*

- 30 June - 3 July: Pony Day Camp
- 7 - 10 July: Pony Day Camp
- 14 - 17 July: Pony Day Camp

🕗 Time: 08:00 – 14:00
📍 Where: Silvermist Equestrian Centre

🎨🐴 *What’s in store?*

-Daily horse riding fun
-Theory & horse care
-Arts & crafts
-Games & outings
-Loads of learning and laughs!

💸 *Camp Costs:*
- please enquire by emailing [email protected]

If you enroll for all 3 weeks at once it will be at an even more DISCOUNTED PRICE!

We can't wait to welcome all our pony-crazy campers this July! 🐴💖

Stop worrying that everyone else is “ahead”.

Some people are sprinting. Some are healing. Some are surviving. Some are building quietly behind the scenes. Some are still trying to work out what they even want.

And honestly? Life isn’t a race round an arena where only one person gets a rosette.

We’re all heading in different directions, carrying different stories, different griefs, different privileges, different fears, different dreams.

Comparison steals so much joy. Especially now, when social media makes it look like everyone else has: ✨ the perfect horse ✨ the perfect life ✨ the perfect relationship ✨ the perfect business ✨ their s**t together

Meanwhile most of us are just trying to remember why we walked into the tack room and whether we paid the farrier 🤣

You do not need to rush your becoming. Your path does not need to look like somebody else’s to still be meaningful.

There is room for all of us. Different lanes. Different timelines. Different versions of success.

And thank goodness for that really… Because imagine if we all wanted the same stable, same horse, same parking space and same Starbucks order. Absolute chaos 🤣☕🐎

A very cute bird in our arena today having a little sand bath 🛁 ❤️

📢 IMPORTANT UPDATE: NEW DATE
Silvermist Annual Dog Show 2026 ✨🐶
Fundraiser for Grace Animal Sanctuary

Due to recent storm damage at the venue and in the interest of giving everyone (two-legged and four-legged 🐾) the best possible experience with hopefully kinder weather, we have made the decision to reschedule the dog show.

🌟 NEW DATE: Sunday, 23 August 2026 🌟

We truly appreciate your understanding and are using this time to ensure the grounds are safe, comfortable, and ready for a properly paw-some day out! 🐕💛

───

📍 Location: Silvermist Equestrian Center, R304 East Rural Matjieskuil Farm, Joostenbergvlakte

🕘 Time: Starting at 9AM

Join us for a fun-filled, family-friendly day celebrating our beloved canine companions, with prizes, food, laughter, and community spirit! 🐶🎉

🐕 With classes for every kind of dog (and owner!), you can enter just for fun or compete for prizes and rosettes 🏅

Even if you are not entering, bring a picnic blanket and enjoy the day, spectators and non-competing dogs enter FREE! 🧺☀️

✨ 100% of proceeds from selected classes will go directly to Grace Animal Sanctuary, a local organisation doing incredible work rescuing and rehabilitating animals in need.

───

🐾 CLASSES INCLUDE:
• Best Rescue (Small & Large)
• Best Trained Dog
• Fancy Dress 🎭
• Most Mongrel-Looking Mutt
• Best Pedigree (Small & Large)
• Cutest Puppy 🐶
• Best Trick
• Utility / Obstacle Course
• Horse & Hound 🐴🐕
• Best Veteran

───

🎟 ENTRY FEES:
• R120 per class for 1–2 entries
• R80 per class when entering 3 or more classes
• Horse & Hound: R120 per entry (horse + dog combo)

───

🎪 PLUS:
✔️ Catering 🍔🌭
✔️ Fun stalls
✔️ Rosettes, sponsored prizes & a GRAND CHAMPION 🏅
✔️ Donation station for gently used pet items (toys, leashes, beds, etc.) 🎁
✔️ Free entry for non-competing dogs
✔️ Spectators welcome, bring the whole family & a picnic blanket! 🧺🐕

───

📧 Want to enter?
Email: [email protected]
Request an entry form PDF, complete it, and send it back to secure your spot!

───

💫 Thank you for your patience and support, we can’t wait to welcome you all in August for an even bigger, brighter, and tail-waggingly good day! 🐶🌟

Please continue to share this event with friends and family to help support animals in need 🐾

Every school had one didn’t it…🤣🐴

The horse girl. The weird horse kid. (I mean weird in an endearing way 😘) The one who:

✨ drew horses on every school book ✨ knew 47 horse breeds but not basic maths ✨ smelt faintly of hay and stable ✨ spent lessons doodling tack sets ✨ read horse magazines hidden inside textbooks ✨ turned every conversation back to horses somehow ✨ got emotionally attached to random ponies after one ride

The one who’d rather spend weekends at the yard than literally anywhere else.

And honestly?

Most of us are STILL that kid… just taller, more tired, and now financially responsible for our obsession 🤣💸

But looking back now… maybe we weren’t weird.

Maybe we just found our safe place early.

Because horses gave a lot of us: 🖤 confidence 🖤 routine 🖤 identity 🖤 connection 🖤 escapism 🖤 purpose

In a world where many of us felt misunderstood… horses made sense.

So here’s to the "weird" horse kids. The daydreamers. The muddy boot wearers. The ones who never really grew out of it.

Turns out that “phase” became a lifestyle 🤣🐴

Children of billionaires. Seven-figure horses. Private planes. Wellington gated communities. Champagne sponsors. Showgrounds built like temporary kingdoms.

This is the vocabulary mainstream media reaches for when it decides to write about the horse world.

And to be fair, the vocabulary did not appear out of nowhere.

There is a version of equestrian sport where horses are flown like executives, bought like art, insured like real estate, and discussed with the cool detachment usually reserved for automobile assets. There is a version of the horse world where the barns look like boutique hotels, where a season in Florida is treated as a given, where the cost of admission is not just talent or work ethic, but proximity to capital.

That version exists.

But here is the problem: horses are not assets.

Not in the way the financial world wants them to be. Not in the way glossy magazines photograph them. Not in the way billionaire-backed league decks may need them to be.

A horse is not a speculative object whose value can be separated from its body, mind, soundness, fear, trust, appetite, history, and willingness to keep showing up for us.

And the more the outside world is invited to see equestrian sport through the lens of wealth, the more the horse world becomes alienated from the very people who actually keep it alive: the boarders, lesson kids, working students, backyard owners, farriers, grooms, volunteers, 4-H families, Pony Club parents, small barn trainers, adult amateurs, adult re-riders, and barn owners quietly trying to make the numbers work.

The horse world already lives in two realities.

In one, there are elite show grounds, global leagues, luxury barns, paid riders, branded hospitality tents, and horses whose prices sound like real estate listings.

In the other, there are people stretching one more season out of a pair of boots, hauling themselves to the barn before work, splitting vet calls, crying over board increases, negotiating with hay shortages, trying to leave toxic trainers, and loving horses with a devotion that has very little to do with status and everything to do with survival.

These days, it would not be much of a stretch to compare the horse world to The Hunger Games: the Capital gleaming under lights, the districts keeping the whole thing fed, shod, mucked, taught, patched up, and emotionally alive.

And yet, when the cameras come, they almost always go to the Capital.

Vanity Fair’s recent Wellington feature is a perfect example of what happens when mainstream culture discovers the horse world through wealth first.

The piece describes Wellington as a gilded equestrian enclave, with mansions, elite stables, polo fields, and horses that can cost up to seven figures. It also reports that the Winter Equestrian Festival draws more than 300,000 spectators, more than 4,400 competitors from 55 countries, and produces a $536.2 million economic impact. In other words, this is not an imaginary elite ecosystem. It is real. It is enormous. And it photographs beautifully. (Vanity Fair)

The Financial Times piece on Frank McCourt’s Premier Jumping League offered another version of the same story: horses as sport, horses as entertainment property, horses as the next possible global content play. McCourt has promised $300 million over three years, including $100 million in prize money in year one, for a new showjumping league built around 16 teams and 14 global events. The article also notes that many existing showjumping events function partly as shop windows for valuable horses and rely heavily on wealthy amateurs paying to compete alongside professionals. (McCourt Global, Inc)

That last part matters.

Because when the outside world looks at showjumping and sees a marketplace with jumps in the middle, can we really pretend to be shocked?

The mistake mainstream media makes is not that it notices the money.

The money is real.

The seven-figure horses are real.

The private clients are real.

The billionaire-backed leagues are real.

The mistake is treating that world as if it explains the horse world.

It does not.

It explains one wing of the mansion.

It does not explain the farm...

Continue Reading Noelle’s full Part 1 essay on her substack
https://noellefloyd.substack.com/p/super-wealth-could-be-the-horse-worlds?r=30na3m&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&triedRedirect=true

Silvermist Annual Dog Show 2026 🐶
Fundraiser for Grace Animal Sanctuary

When: Sunday, 23 August 2026

Join us for or a fun-filled, family-friendly day celebrating our beloved canine companions, with prizes, food, laughter, and community spirit!

📍 Location: Silvermist Equestrian Center, R304 East Rural Matjieskuil Farm, Joostenbergvlakte

🕘 Time: Starting at 9AM

🐕 With classes for every kind of dog (and owner!), you can enter just for fun or compete for prizes and rosettes 🏅

Even if you’re not entering, bring a picnic blanket and come enjoy the day-spectators and non-competing dogs enter FREE!

✨ 100% of proceeds from the following classes will go directly to Grace Animal Sanctuary, a local organisation doing incredible work rescuing and rehabilitating animals in need:
• Best Rescue
• Fancy Dress
• Horse & Hound

Learn more about Grace Animal Sanctuary on their page 🔖

🐾 CLASSES INCLUDE:
• Best Rescue (Small & Large)
• Best Trained Dog
• Fancy Dress
• Most Mongrel-Looking Mutt
• Best Pedigree (Small & Large)
• Cutest Puppy
• Best Veteran
• Best Trick
• Utility / Obstacle Course
• Horse & Hound

🎟 ENTRY FEES:
• R120 per class for 1–2 entries
• R80 per class when entering 3 or more classes
• Horse & Hound: R120 per entry (horse + dog combo)

🎪 PLUS:
✔️ Catering 🍔🌭
✔️ Fun stalls
✔️ Rosettes, sponsored prizes & a GRAND CHAMPION 🏅
✔️ Donation station for gently used pet items (toys, leashes, beds, etc.) 🎁
✔️ Free entry for non-competing dogs
✔️ Spectators welcome- bring the whole family & a picnic blanket! 🧺🐕

📧 Want to enter?
Email: [email protected]
Request an entry form PDF, complete it, and send it back to secure your spot!

💫 Let’s make it a paw-some day while raising funds for a wonderful cause! 🐶🌟

Please share this event with friends and family to help support animals in need 🐾

Silvermist Annual Dog Show 2026 🐶
Fundraiser for Grace Animal Sanctuary

When: Sunday, 23 August 2026

Join us for or a fun-filled, family-friendly day celebrating our beloved canine companions, with prizes, food, laughter, and community spirit!

📍 Location: Silvermist Equestrian Center, R304 East Rural Matjieskuil Farm, Joostenbergvlakte

🕘 Time: Starting at 9AM

🐕 With classes for every kind of dog (and owner!), you can enter just for fun or compete for prizes and rosettes 🏅

Even if you’re not entering, bring a picnic blanket and come enjoy the day-spectators and non-competing dogs enter FREE!

✨ 100% of proceeds from the following classes will go directly to Grace Animal Sanctuary, a local organisation doing incredible work rescuing and rehabilitating animals in need:
• Best Rescue
• Fancy Dress
• Horse & Hound

Learn more about Grace Animal Sanctuary on their page 🔖 GRACE Animal Sanctuary - 170-288 NPO

🐾 CLASSES INCLUDE:
• Best Rescue (Small & Large)
• Best Trained Dog
• Fancy Dress
• Most Mongrel-Looking Mutt
• Best Pedigree (Small & Large)
• Cutest Puppy
• Best Veteran
• Best Trick
• Utility / Obstacle Course
• Horse & Hound

🎟 ENTRY FEES:
• R120 per class for 1–2 entries
• R80 per class when entering 3 or more classes
• Horse & Hound: R120 per entry (horse + dog combo)

🎪 PLUS:
✔️ Catering 🍔🌭
✔️ Fun stalls
✔️ Rosettes, sponsored prizes & a GRAND CHAMPION 🏅
✔️ Donation station for gently used pet items (toys, leashes, beds, etc.) 🎁
✔️ Free entry for non-competing dogs
✔️ Spectators welcome- bring the whole family & a picnic blanket! 🧺🐕

📧 Want to enter?
Email: [email protected]
Request an entry form PDF, complete it, and send it back to secure your spot!

💫 Let’s make it a paw-some day while raising funds for a wonderful cause! 🐶🌟

Please share this event with friends and family to help support animals in need 🐾