Day 31,  Thursday, September 28, 2023

The Cadre Noir of Saumur , a renowned French riding academy, offers very few shows and Martinales throughout the year.   We extended our stay in Tours by a couple days so that we could see this show on the only day that it is takes place in September.

“The Martinales of the Cadre Noir are an opportunity to watch the riding masters of the Cadre Noir at work.  There are 40 riding masters, and only three are women.  Commentary is provided to give the audience an appreciation of the work involved in training the horses in jumping, long reins, the airs above the ground, and classical riding. Unfortunately it is only in French, but it really doesn’t matter… watching the horses and their riders is enough.  More information and some of the history of the Cadre Noir is available at this link. https://www.ifce.fr/en/cadre-noir/the-cadre-noir/ if you are interested,

When we arrive we are surprised to see how many people are here for the Martinales…13 tour buses and the parking lot is full of cars!  I think it will be hard to find seats… but I forgot that there was assigned seating and we have fantastic seats. We are front and centre in the arena!  The horses pass by just a couple of feet in front of us.

There are no photos allowed during the show but there are photos outside of the arena so I take photos of the photos.  We see all of the following during the hour long Martinale show.

Classical riding…

the Courbette…

the Croupade…and the Cabriole…Precision riding

The whole show was wonderful.  At the end of each segment of the show the horses would turn to the audience and their riders salute…they happened right in front of us.  It felt like we were being personally saluted, they were so close to us.

One more photo at the end of the performance.  The staircase is in the centre of the seats and these were our seats!

After our lunch we see this fellow practicing outside in one of the 18 outdoor arenas.  I missed the shot of him practicing a handstand on his cantering horse.

We also have a tour of the stables which house 500 horses!  

Behind the stalls it is busier.  The horses are fed with an automatic feeding and watering system and the waste is disposed of using a conveyor belt which runs underground at the back of each stall.  The tack for each horse is also kept behind its stall.  

There was opportunity to pet the horses. I made friends with this beauty.

A different route home took us past farmers harvesting sunflowers…

and we crossed the river on this very old looking bridge.