Wildhorse Mountain Ranch

04/01/2026

🏆 Consistent high scores 🏆
A calm, focused mind.
Enjoy riding your test.

And not by training harder.

Because the difference isn’t in doing more.
It’s in how your mind responds when it matters.

If you:
– Keep riding below your ability in the ring
– Feel tension or nerves taking over
– Know there’s more in you, but can’t show it

Then it’s time to train your mindset like you train your horse.

I help riders develop calm, focus, and confidence under pressure — so you can finally perform the way you know you can.

Ready to make that shift?

Contact me, and I’ll share the details of my program 💪

03/25/2026

What a Bad Trainer!

So you send your horse in for training. It’s got bad behavior, a bad gait, or it’s just bad-bad. Like “I found it in a kill pen and thought, ‘Perfect first horse!’” kind of bad. Excellent life choices so far.

You decide you need help. (Good start.) You pick a trainer and ship your discount dragon off. If the trainer’s good—and spoiler, not all are—they fix as much as they can in the tiny, ridiculous little window you gave them. You hand them 30–60 days and say, “Hi, can you please turn Satan into a kid-safe babysitter? Thanks.”

This trainer pours their entire heart, soul, spine, and possibly a few internal organs into your horse. They spend 2–6 hours a day with it. They ride it, lunge it, desensitize it, pray over it, negotiate with it, and occasionally reconsider all their life choices—all because you gave them two months to undo years of mystery trauma and bad riding.

They get bruised, stepped on, bitten, sunburned, and emotionally damaged. They are out there trying to turn water into wine, except the water bites and kicks.

And the great ones? They actually make it work.

You show up, climb aboard like you’re mounting a bar stool, do literally everything wrong—lean forward, yank on the reins, clutch with your legs, flop around like a fish in a dryer—and the horse still goes, “Okay… I’ll try.” It stops, it turns, it doesn’t immediately launch you into orbit. Miracle.

You’re thrilled. Trainer’s silently wheezing inside. They smile, say, “You’re doing great!” and cross every finger and toe they have as you load the horse up. You drive away buzzing, and where do you go first? Straight to Facebook: “BEST TRAINER EVER OMG!”
And then… it happens.

You get home. You’ve had one lesson. Maybe seven, if you’re fancy. You now consider yourself a semi-professional. Then life shows up: work, those damn kids, the hubby or wife, the dog, the neighbor, Netflix, the couch. You don’t practice. Or when you do, you do it… creatively.

Because let’s be honest: seven lessons doesn’t make you a trainer. Seven riding lessons barely makes you a competent passenger.

You don’t book more lessons. You don’t buy a Pivo. You don’t video yourself. You just head to the arena and freestyle your way into chaos.

Slowly—or very quickly, lol—you start peeling the training off that horse like duct tape off a hairy leg. A wrong cue here, a missed correction there, some accidental punishment for the right answer, a reward for the wrong one… and boom. The poor animal is speaking Spanish, you’re yelling in French, and nobody knows what’s happening.

Then you pick up your phone:

“I don’t know what’s wrong with this horse! It was PERFECT with you! Now it’s dangerous and won’t listen!”

Trainer: “Send it back in, and you need more lessons.”

You: “That’s stupid. I already did that and it didn’t work.”

Plot twist: It did work. You just undid it.

Because guess what? It’s not the horse.
It’s you.

You’re not a trainer. Your timing is off. Your feel is off. Your balance is off. Your reins are uneven, your legs are doing the Macarena, and your core took a personal day. You give the wrong cue at the wrong time, then get mad when your horse doesn’t psychically guess what you meant instead of what you actually did.

But wait, it gets better.

Now you have another genius idea: Facebook.

You log in and type, with righteous fury: “My trainer RUINED my horse. It’s DANGEROUS now. I can’t even ride it!”

Yes, clearly the problem started after the professional, who rides 5–10 horses a day, fixed your bargain-bin dragon and handed it back in working order. Definitely not when you, who rides twice a month on a good year, climbed aboard and started pressing buttons like an unsupervised toddler on a nuclear control panel.

That trainer did everything right—except maybe one thing: they didn’t sit you down, look you in the eye, and say, “Hey. Even if I turn your horse into a saint, you still need training. Lots of it. Repeatedly. Forever.”

Because here’s the truth nobody wants on a T-shirt:
I can train your horse. I cannot magically install skills in you via Wi-Fi.

A trainer can start the process. They can put on the buttons, explain the settings, and hand you a freshly updated model. But you have to learn how to ride it. You need to learn balance, timing, feel, leg aids, hand softness, body control, and the advanced art of “not becoming a flying lawn dart when things go sideways.”

You need experience. You need to make mistakes, fix them, fall off, get back on, cry a little, laugh a little, and do it all again. That’s how riders are made.

I always tell clients:

“I can train your horse. I can put all the right buttons on it. But you can rip them off in a week. If you don’t also get trained, you will need a full-time trainer to fix your horse every week so you can un-fix it again every weekend.”

What a sad little loop for that poor horse.

Honestly, I’m shocked horses don’t kill more people. Not because they’re mean, but because we are:

• Lazy
• Inconsistent
• Overconfident
• Undereducated
• And somehow offended that riding actually requires effort

We expect them to be:

• Calm after two months off
• Polite while they’re young and stuffed with rocket fuel
• Perfectly balanced while we flop around like a sack of laundry in a windstorm
• Totally fine with us yanking on their face while gripping their sides like a nutcracker

Then we’re shocked—shocked!—when they say, “I’m uncomfortable and confused” in the only language they’ve got: bucking, bolting, rearing, or just tuning us out.

If the trainer does everything right and you do everything wrong, it’s not that the trainer failed. It’s that you didn’t do your job.
It’s your horse. It’s your responsibility. It’s your riding.

If you can’t or don’t want to put in the work, that’s your choice. Totally valid. Get a pasture pet, get a horse you pay someone else to ride, or don’t ride at all.

But don’t you dare blame the trainer who:

• Got on your bargain-bin dragon when you were scared to
• Risked getting launched into low orbit
• Poured their heart, soul, time, and body into making it safer

All so you could go home, skip your homework, and then bash them on Facebook.

What a bad trainer, huh?

Sure. Let’s go with that.

Credit to Gaye Derusso

02/18/2026

If this isn’t bombproof then I don’t know what is.

01/06/2026

Dear Wildhorse Mountain Ranch guests:
First, I want to thank each and every one of you for 25+ years of support. We have had an amazing time fulfilling trail riding dreams and sharing our beautiful back country with tourists and locals alike.
As our horses are reaching retirement age, they have earned a more quiet, slower life which means that for now, we are not offering trail rides. We hope to continue in the future once a new group of trail horses have been purchased/ trained.
For 2026 I will be following my passion and offering horse training while planning for future endeavours.
We are sorry to no longer offer trail rides but truly hope to get back to it in the near future.
Thanks for so many years of happy trail adventures!
❤️ Carolin and the Wildhorse Mountain Ranch Team

11/27/2025

✨ Now Offering Horse Clipping Services! ✨
Serving Oliver → Kelowna

Is your horse looking a little too woolly for winter? Are they rocking the full “mountain yeti” look? I can help! 🐴✂️

I’m now offering body clipping for horses—perfect for keeping your equine partner comfortable, tidy, and ready to work.
I’m new and still learning, so I’m offering affordable rates while I gain experience and build my clipping portfolio.

✔️ Patient and calm with all horse personalities
✔️ Will take my time to make sure your horse feels safe
✔️ Great option for trace clips, tidy-ups, and riders wanting to ditch the fluff
✔️ Discounted rate while I perfect my skills!

If your horse needs a spring shave, a winter trim, or just wants to glow up from “feral forest creature” to sleek and sporty, send me a message!

📍 Traveling from Oliver to Kelowna
💬 PM me to book or ask questions or
📞 Text/ call Carolin: (250)864-0150

Because every horse deserves a good haircut… even if they secretly think they don’t. 😉

10/29/2025

Post shared from R. Brown 🥂✨

👉🏻30 days doesn't mean 30 rides
👉🏻60 days doesn't mean 60 rides

“I'll be honest this has been the biggest lesson I've learned watching Mark the last year. And I'll be even more honest, it's changed the way I look at what I expected of trainers for so many years of my life.

I spent YEARS sending c**ts to trainers to be started and I thought 60 days meant I was getting a 60 ride c**t back, Looking back now I realize how absurd that is.

I've been watching Mark for a year now. And what I've learned the most is, a c**t might have 20 rides in its first 30 days. It might also have zero rides... he isn't who determines how far a c**t makes it in those 30 days.

THE C**T IS 👏🏻

Mark spends so much time ground driving them, that by the time he ACTUALLY rides one, they already know how to stop, back, turn a pivot and give to pressure with a bit in their mouth.

Why is that so important?

Because that means he isn't trying to teach a c**t to STOP that first time he is on their back. They already know that by the time he swings a leg over. Which keeps him safe. It keeps that horse safe!

Most of all it prevents a WHOLE mess of wrecks because that horse already has a concept of control.

Because Mark spends so much time "building a face" before "swinging a leg" a 5 ride c**t will ride like 30 ride c**t by most standards a 30 ride c**t is already outside being worked on. But it's because he MAKES A FACE before he SWINGS A LEG.

I get not everyone does that;
And that's ok.
Training methods are basically opinions …

But I will say it's made me have a whole new respect for what starting a c**t looks like with Mark. And why he requires 60-90 minimums with c**ts he starts. He's not going to mash a c**t through to riding just to appease what absurd industry standards have been set before trainers, that set horses up for failure.”

30 days doesn't mean 30 rides👈🏻
60 days doesn't mean 60 rides👈🏻
90 days doesn’t mean 90 rides👈🏻

SUCH AN AMAZING WRITE UP, we could not agree more and what we base our program around!
We cannot please every owner - that goes without saying, and we cannot always hit deadlines we are given by owners. But with the correct tools, time, and patience we can surpass it, or get very darn close!

10/10/2025

09/20/2025

One of the biggest mistakes you can make as a rider is selling or passing on a horse you love riding and being around for something that’s more fashionable or “suitable” for your discipline!

I’m not talking about outgrowing your horse in this statement but never underestimate how much better your experience is with a horse you love working with!

Even if it’s not a world be**er, you will get so much further and love the journey so much more if you enjoy your horse.

You don’t need to go and buy a rocket launcher for dressage, you don’t need to buy the flashy mover. You need to buy the horse that suits you the most and then embrace the journey.

Train well. Ride as beautifully as you can.

No horse is perfect and every horse has their strengths and weaknesses, don’t underestimate how far you can go with a bit of passion, love and belief 💪✔️

08/20/2025

🍂🐴 Fall Trail Rides at Wildhorse Mountain Ranch 🐴🍂

Crisp air, golden leaves, and breathtaking views — fall is the perfect time to enjoy a scenic horseback ride at Wildhorse Mountain Ranch.

Whether you’re a beginner or an experienced rider, we have 1, 1.5, and 2 hour guided trail rides that wind through the hills and forests, showing off the best of autumn in the Okanagan.

✨ What’s Included:
✔ Friendly, experienced guides
✔ Well-trained, gentle horses
✔ Stunning fall colors and mountain views

📅 Available all season — don’t miss the most beautiful rides of the year!
📍 Wildhorse Mountain Ranch, Summerland

Book your ride today and experience fall like never before! 🍁
📞 250-864-0150
[email protected]

08/20/2025

🎃👻 Haunted Hill is Back! 👻🎃

Dare to enter… This Halloween season, Wildhorse Mountain Ranch transforms once again into the spookiest hill in the Okanagan! Join us for our annual Haunted Hill event filled with thrills, chills, and haunted surprises around every corner.

✨ What to Expect:
👀 Spine-tingling haunted walk through the ranch
🎶 Eerie atmosphere & Halloween fun
🍬 Treats and tricks for all ages
🕸 Costumes encouraged!

📅 Dates: to be announced
📍 Location: Wildhorse Mountain Ranch, Summerland

Bring your friends, bring your courage… but beware, not everyone makes it out without a scream! 😱

Stay tuned for ticket details and more spooky updates.