by One of our goals with Van Life is to seek out new experiences, and I’m here to tell you that the Willowdale Steeplechase in Kennett Square, Penn. fits the bill.
What is a steeplechase? It’s a horse race with obstacles to jump over, such as fences, bushes, or water.
The social aspect of the Willowdale Steeplechase is very important. Attendees can reserve choice parking spots on a hillside next to the course, and then set up tailgate parties that often featured full cocktail bars and catered food. There were contests for best hats, best-dressed guests, and best tailgate setups. We saw some truly impressive entertainments in process, and probably would have seen even better had the weather cooperated. There was a light rain throughout the day, but on the upside that also probably allowed us to get closer to the action than we otherwise would have.
We have near-zero interest in horse racing, and really just did not know what to expect out of the day. But we figured that chances to attend a steeplechase don’t come along every day, and the $45 per person ticket price was right.
The day started with Jack Russell Terrier Races, another first for us. The basic gist is that five dogs are lined up at the starting line, a plastic bag affixed to a rope attracts the dogs’ attention, and then the bag is quickly pulled towards the finish line with the dogs in hot pursuit.
When I tell you it was complete chaos, I’m not lying. Those dogs were yapping and jumping all over the place, and the idea of “lining them up” seemed a foreign concept to the terriers. When the bag started to move, some of the dogs followed straight away, some dogs chased other dogs and seemed oblivious to the object of the race, and some got completely distracted by any little thing in their paths and ended their race before the halfway point.
How they could tell who won was beyond me, but I laughed and laughed and laughed at the joy and absurdity of it.
There were two heats of the races, one for short and one for tall dogs (though they all looked the same to me). After these were complete, the race organizers put down a series of low jumps, and ran both races again.
When faced with these obstacles in the first race, however, every single dog simply bypassed the jumps! In the second heat all but one dog did the same. I invite you to watch this short video where you can see just one dog looking like he’s ready to go professional.
After some downtime, the next event was Pony Races. There were several heats of various ponies (including one race of just Shetland ponies) running various distances (not the entire course). We had no real idea what was going on, but it was still good fun. The jockeys on these were teens and young kids, and most of them were quite impressive in their racing silks.
Early in the afternoon, the real fun started, with six races scheduled every half hour throughout the afternoon.
Doug and I had no idea what race was starting at what location on the course, which direction the horses would be running, what the distance of the course was, or which obstacles would be included in any particular race. (Maybe we should have invested in a program, eh?). As a result, we considered ourselves very lucky with where we ended up watching most of the races, as it turned out we were often in a great spot to see the action.
We stood at the fence on the last quarter mile of the course, so the horses and obstacles were quite close to us. We got to see some jumps very clearly, and also experience the thundering final leg to the finish. It was all quite thrilling.
Every single race invariably came the announcement that “horse number so-and-so has lost its rider”. Most of these happened on the far side of the course, out of sight of the crowd. We assumed that these riders had fallen off, but we witnessed a horse fall to its knees while landing a jump, throwing its jockey and ending up completely on the ground.
The horses, however, shook it off, and always went on to finish the race, even doing the jumps sans rider. It was funny and not-funny at the same time. Fortunately, there did not seem to be any serious injuries.
We were impressed at the jockeys’ skill throughout the day. As the horses approached the far side of the course, the grassy track descended behind a hill, and all we could see was the jockeys steadily descending as if they were on a escalator, with no bouncing around at all.
All in all we really enjoyed the day, leaving thoroughly soggy after the 4th of the 6th races in the afternoon. I don’t know that it’s something we’d do again, but it was a unique experience to try once.
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