Christmas Looked a Little Different

Our 2023 sleigh ride event included the usual - beautiful draft horses, sleigh bells, hot cocoa, and carols around the fire, but it was lacking one key element. Snow.

In seven years of offering sleigh rides to the public at Christmas, this was the first time we’ve never had snow. There was snow earlier in December, and more snow eventually came later in the new year. But, warm temperatures and lack of precipitation meant that the little snow we had melted just 2 days before our event began.

Sleighs offer the quintessential winter experience we want our guest to enjoy each and every year. The weather is something we can’t control and it meant we had to switch our sleigh runners for wheels. Simple as that. We are equipped with 3 sleighs and 3 wagons, so the only thing we had to do was bring the wagons out of storage and add lights for our evening rides.

The rest of our event went ahead as usual. Guests came from all over the region and beyond, to experience an old fashioned Christmas with our horses. In exchange for grey skies and snowfall, we had the most amazing sunsets every day of our event. No one complained of the cold. Kids were playing more than we’ve ever noticed in previous years. People were staying and enjoying our venue longer than usual because no one had frozen gingers and toes. The decor in the venue was gorgeous and we saw many family portraits taken in front of our hitch wagon. We went through more hot chocolate than we expected, and we think it’s simply because no one was in a hurry to leave. That was a huge compliment. Conditions were not ideal, and yet everyone who came enjoyed themselves.

The horses were fantastic and our new cookbooks sold well. Our crew was amazing as usual and we welcomed some new volunteers to our HDO family. Special thanks to our sponsors Okanagan Restoration Services, Downtown Dental and Orthodontics, Rellish Transport Services, Vertex Systems, and North Okanagan Roofing. We made a donation to the North Okanagan Hospice Society and North Okanagan StarFish Pack program. We look forward to sleigh rides next season, fingers crossed, we are back on sleighs with just the perfect amount of snow.