If you happened to be in downtown Keremeos on Sunday, March 20 you might have seen something out-of-the-ordinary for 2022.
Sabrina Fedorak and friend Alysha Krebs turned some heads when they decided to ride horses Silver and Juice from Fedorak’s Morning Star Ranch and do some shopping by horseback along the way.
Silver is a seven-year-old Gypsy Vanner and Juice is a 17-year-old Quarter Horse.
The response from the community was heart-warming, she said.
“People love seeing the horses and petting their soft noses,” said Fedorak. If the weather cooperates, she’s thinking of doing another ride into town this weekend.
It’s about one and a half hours to get to the village by horse, she said.
“We took our time, but we also cantered a good kilometre,” said Fedorak. “We had a snack in the park as a nice break.”
Both of the horses did ‘fabulously’ on their ride despite lots of ‘scary’ stuff around,’ she added.
Normally you can find Fedorak and her horse Silver riding the many trails in Keremeos.
“I personally compete in reining and I love to hit the Keremeos mountains with my trail horse, Silver,” she said.
While it used to be commonplace for horses to be the dominant form of transportation 100 years ago in Keremeos, it’s a rare sight these days.
“We definitely could have used a hitching post,” said Fedorak.
Lots of people joked that the reason Fedorak took her horses shopping was due to the cost of gas.
But the ranch owner countered that actually horses are far more expensive than gassing up and owning a vehicle.
“The cost of owning horses is about three times that of a vehicle,” she said.
Morning Star Ranch is an equestrian boarding facility right in town. She provides full-service board for people’s equine friends. The ranch is equipped with an indoor arena, outdoor arena, round pen and even heated tack rooms for boarder’s use.