Scotland's Gleneagles Equestrian Center

Exploring the beauty of the Highlands beyond the hotel's famous golf greens.

Courtesy Cross Country International Equestrian Vacations

I have to say that it never occurred to me to wonder why, when I had good horses and trainers at home in California, I would decide to fly off to a hotel in Scotland to take riding lessons. Maybe the name was enough: legendary Gleneagles, not like any other resort in the world, although known more for golf than for equestrian pursuits. And I have to say that it didn't occur to me to wonder why I'd come once I'd arrived, red-eyed from the red-eye. I just looked around my room — with its wine-colored walls and plaid bedcover and pillows, with its air of being in the best of taste and yet tucked away safely and mysteriously between Loch Lomond and the Firth of Tay, as if lost in time — and I settled in.

Maybe it was the breakfast buffet that distracted me. At home in California, I eat a California breakfast: two tostada shells, some Mexican cheese and some bits of chicken, all melted in the microwave. At Gleneagles, in the Strathearn dining room and the attached multi-windowed conservatory, the trays of smoked salmon, scones, porridge, sausage (two kinds), bacon (two kinds), pancakes, omelets, breads, cold cereals and fruit go on and on. It is very luxurious to know that you are going to sit down and eat whatever you want and then go gallop it off. Or maybe it was the spa: on the first day, since my riding lessons were in the afternoon, I spent the morning swimming in the indoor pool and then reading in the hot tub, which was outside and from which a plume of steam rose into the almost frosty air.

The riding school at Gleneagles is huge. There are two indoor arenas, the larger of which is 245 feet by 120 feet, so it's plenty big for galloping and jumping. All the instructors, supervised by Diana Zajda (whom I did not meet, because she was on vacation when I was there), are certified by the British Horse Society, which means that they have taken a series of tests and that their knowledge of riding and training meets high standards. There are seventeen school horses and nineteen ponies, and the program is large enough and well financed enough to be all things to all people. The weekend I was there, the equestrian center was putting on a hunter trial on the cross-country course, but it was also running pony parties for groups of excited little girls celebrating birthdays. The hotel, of course, offers trail rides through the countryside for guests. For me, though, the draw was — well, when I got on my horse, Dilly, a big bay mare, a Thoroughbred cross, I still didn't know.

I soon saw the downside of this vacation. I hadn't ridden horses other than my own, trained by me and my trainers, in years. Dilly felt and moved differently than they did, and I felt and moved differently than she was used to. We got along at the walk, and well enough at the trot (especially after my instructor, Carol Stanley, called me to order a bit), but as for the canter, it seemed that Dilly didn't know what I was talking about. A half hour into the ride, my sense of my own competence had taken a serious blow. I had to do that beginner thing over and over: sit down, look up, ride into the corner, ask for the canter. I said, defensively, to Carol, "My horses canter when I turn my head in the direction I want to go in and think canter." Well, sort of, maybe, most of the time. Finally, toward the end of the lesson, Dilly began to cooperate, and then we switched to a little lateral work. When I got off, I was exhausted.