Horse Farms and Keeneland Race Track

Day 5

Today 13 of us pulled out of the parking lot at 8:30 heading 115 miles to Lexington KY to tour several horse farms in the area.   We arrived at 11 allowing us time to eat at the Embassy Suites, a beautiful hotel which was our pick-up location.  The first stop was a stud farm and we met “songandapray” who’s owners get paid $6500 per “event” and he can service 3 mares a day during breeding season.   We learned a stud can “do his thing” for 20 years or more and they are treated like royalty.  The barn and breeding room was air conditioned and very clean.  A vet is on hand to help through the process certainly not what I had expected; just turn two horses out in the pasture and let nature take its course.  No this is a major operation.  We were told we could feed him carrots and peppermint candy but he would bite if you tried to pet him.  And if anyone had sandals on there was a cat who loved to bite toes.  Well everyone had sneakers on but as soon as we stepped out of the van here comes the cat on a run and he went to each person and checked out their feet.  It was the funniest thing I’d ever seen; my cat was weird but not that weird.   Then they even have “birthing farms” where owners can take their mares just before they foul and there are vets on hand all the time to assist in the birthing. 

Then back in the bus and we headed for a farm to tour the “training” barns.  These colts were yearlings and scheduled to be sold in November and they needed to be trained to walk on a lead, stand still and in general behave themselves.   The barn was spotless, each stall had a fan for the horse, they are showered every day and turned out to exercise in the pastures after the sun goes down because they don’t want the color of their coats to fade in the bright sunshine.   Of course, these horses bring hundreds of thousands of dollars and the owners are hoping they will become Kentucky Derby winners or even a good stud will net millions over the course of time.   

Next stop – Keeneland Thoroughbred Race Track a beautiful track which has been around since 1935 and is a national historic site which is visited often by the Queen of England when she has her horses shipped over to the USA to race.  The history was fascinating.  After leaving Keeneland we traveled through several other horse farms and various locations where movies have been filmed.  Farms selling for millions and requiring millions to maintain them.

After a 3 and a half hour tour we saddled our steeds and headed back 115 miles to Paintsville on the Kentucky Parkway which is a great road, no stop signs or lights and cruising speeds of 65 and 70 with purple and yellow wild flowers blooming and the sycamore trees all turning golden.  Lexington, located in the middle of Kentucky is more rolling hills while heading back to Paintsville we had the Appalachian mountains in our sights with cut away sections of the mountains beside the highway displaying the vast amount of coal buried beneath the soil.  It was a pleasant day and dry – until the last 5 miles – then the skies opened up and soaked us.  Oh well – it is what it is.