30/09/2026
A LITTLE TEASER FROM THE BOOK I’M WRITING…
🐴 THE DAY I TRIED TO SELL DINKY
By the time we moved to Kaiapoi, I had decided Dinky had to go.
I was a young mum with Ricky and Matthew to look after. I loved riding and certainly wasn't frightened of a difficult horse, but Dinky was unpredictable and had already put Joe in hospital with his pelvis broken on both sides.
So I advertised her.
I got two responses.
The first people to arrive were three English riding women.
They came in a very smart car, dressed in equally smart English riding clothes, complete with a beautiful-looking English saddle.
They certainly looked the part.
I took them out to Dinky's paddock and called her.
Dinky came thundering around the corner from behind some pine trees, galloped straight up to the gate, spun around and double-barrelled it.
Then she took off again.
Around behind the trees.
Back she came, even faster.
Up to the gate.
Spin.
Double-barrel.
Gone again.
She did this several times, getting faster and more excited with every circuit.
The three women were horrified.
“What a rude horse!” one of them said.
They informed me they weren't interested.
Fair enough.
Unfortunately, Dinky hadn't quite finished her demonstration.
She came hooning around from behind the trees again at full speed, lost her footing and suddenly all four legs shot out from underneath her.
THUMP.
She landed completely flat on her side.
For a moment there was Dinky—the magnificent, fiery Thoroughbred—lying in a heap on the ground.
Then she scrambled to her feet, gathered what remained of her dignity and pranced back behind the trees.
And stayed there.
I swear she was embarrassed.
The English ladies were preparing to leave when buyer number two arrived.
He couldn't have been more different.
An old Jeep pulled up and out climbed a rough-looking farmer-type bloke wearing gumboots, old shorts and an old flannel shirt.
He went around to the back, hauled out an old stock saddle, looked at me and said:
“Now where is this damn horse?”
I explained that, at present, the damn horse was hiding.
I offered to go and get her.
“No, I'll get her.”
He grabbed an old bridle and headed off into the paddock.
The three English women hadn't left.
I think by then they wanted to see what happened too.
After a while he reappeared leading Dinky.
She looked remarkably subdued.
Possibly her recent encounter with the ground had taken some of the wind out of her sails.
He threw the old stock saddle over her back, hauled up the girth, climbed aboard in his gumboots and gave her a boot in the sides.
Dinky took off.
But this guy could ride.
Really ride.
It didn't take him long before he had her like putty in his hands.
He brought her back to the gate, pulled up and looked at me.
“I'll take her.”
And that was that.
The three English ladies drove away in their smart car with their smart saddle.
The bloke in the gumboots paid me, loaded Dinky up and took her home.
I thought that was probably the end of Dinky.
About a month later, the phone rang.
It was him.
“That damn horse is like a damn stallion. Stands out in the paddock rearing. Think I'm just gonna breed from her.”
Apparently Dinky had recovered from her embarrassing collapse in front of the English ladies.
And once her dignity returned…
so had Dinky. 😂
One of the many true stories I've been digging out of my memory while writing my autobiography. There are quite a few horses in it—and I'm beginning to realise that I had a remarkable talent for finding the difficult ones.
