Summer Camp FAQ's

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If you’ve been outdoors in the Valley of the Sun between June and August, you already know it’s not only hot, but it can be dangerous...  Our team takes care to mitigate the impact of summer heat on campers as much as possible to keep everyone safe and healthy. First, we limit outdoor/barnyard activities to the cooler part of the day, only in the mornings. All afternoon activities take places indoors, with the exception of supervised pool time (which the kids don’t seem to mind!)  For the barnyard portion of each day, we split the campers into small groups rotating them thru shaded and non-shaded activities to help limit their sun exposure.  We also take frequent breaks for the kids to cool off, refill their water bottles and hydrate, hydrate, hydrate. Please send your camper in temperature appropriate clothing and with a reusable water bottle that they can refill throughout the day. We encourage long pants (i.e. jeans, leggings) while participating in barn activities before lunch, however, campers may wear shorts while riding as long as they understand that saddles do get warm. Many campers also bring their own cooling towels and we have Cadence-branded cooling towels available for purchase.

 Possibly, yes! We have riders ages 7-13 and consider a number of factors when putting groups together including horse and saddle availability. This may mean that a group is mixed in age and experience!

Daily Group Activities: 

• Education & Games (~1.5-2 hours) [parts of the horse, parts of the saddle, brands & branding, horse health, rodeo events, equine communication, horse colors, markings, gaits, measuring a horse, equine nutrition & more!]
• Tacking, Riding, and Untacking (~1.5-2 hours)
• Craft (~45 min - 1 hour)
• Lunch/Snack Time/Daily Wrap Up

Other Activities Available Daily:

• Swim Time (~2 hours) [pool is open daily for 2 hours with a lifeguard on duty]
• Movie (~2 hours) [an age appropriate, horse themed movie is featured daily]
• Games & Free Time [an assortment of board, card and yard games are available to encourage social interaction with other campers.]

Not necessarily. We believe that riding different horses accelerates rider development by improving adaptability and balance.. It breaks bad habits formed by riding only one horse, forcing riders to improve communication, and building confidence by requiring navigation of various temperaments, sizes, and training levels. This practice creates a more versatile, effective, and well-rounded rider.

We have lots of tasty snack choices to give our campers during frequent snack and water breaks we take throughout the day. We also take care to plan and prepare a kid-friendly lunch menu for the week that our campers really enjoy. From burgers to tacos, pasta and quesadillas, we prepare all lunches on-site while offering all the various accompaniments and topping that kids like to eat. In fact, we take pride in the fact that our campers really look forward to lunch time each day!  We always provide a detailed lunch menu along with camp prep info to assist our camp families with their planning. And, while our ability to accommodate specific dietary needs is limited, we invite families with specific needs to send food items with their camper which we’re more than happy to keep refrigerated until lunch time.

No. While we introduce lots of campers to horseback riding annually, this number of new campers far exceeds the number of available lesson spots we have each fall. Current lesson program families have the option to return before we open spots to new riders.  When a lesson spot does open up, new riders are invited to join the lesson program at a level suitable for their riding ability. For example, if an advanced level opening is available, we will not fill that spot with a beginner student.  While we are fortunate that our lesson program experiences very little turnover, this means only a handful of openings for new students come available annually.  If we are unable to accommodate you in the fall, we do have a current list of local barns who offer riding lessons that we can provide should you like to reach out directly to learn about their program(s) and lesson availability.