The English Riding School

How long will I take to become a rider?
This is a frequent question the impatient novice will ask the instructor. Well, you can learn in just a month, but a lifetime is not sufficient to reach perfection!

Being a Rider

At the age of 96 years, as he lay on his deathbed, he called for his nephew to come to him so that he might bid him farewell. And so it happened: as the nephew was finally turning away to leave the room he saw, for the first time, tears in his uncle’s eyes. The old man reached out for the younger man’s hand and said softly: “It is such a misfortune that I must die just now”.
“Why?” asked his nephew, tenderly stroking the old man’s hand. “This time comes for every man, and you have had such a long, rich, blessed life”.

“Yes”, said the old one, “you are right, but it was only a week ago that I first realised what it means to truly ride a horse”.

A close relationship between man and horse should not be a difficult and long process. It is in fact a recall of an ancestral partnership as old as mankind. Riding is second nature for man, a skill that can be easily acquired in its basic form. Paramount is the respect for the horse and once discovered it becomes true love.

If you also love nature, you will then appreciate the extraordinary gift of riding into the horizon: reaching places you will have never reached on foot and enjoying a different angle on sights from the comfort of your saddle.

The English Riding School, part of the Country Club will introduce you into the magic world of riding and will help you discover a noble sport that was until not very long ago a way of life for thousands of years.

At La Mesteceni it all started with the love of horses. Constantin Chesculescu rediscovered his childhood passion for horses and founded the school to bring back in this part of Transylvania the refinement of an art as old as history.

The school is twinned with the famous Sue Adam’s Riding School from Shobdon, Herefordshire, England and benefits of instructors trained at this facility.

The philosophy is simple: riding, for those who practise it daily or at least several times a week is more than an agreeable pastime; it helps you remain fit and healthy it is an exercise in educating your patience and regaining your natural rhythm, it can become a way of life…

You must know and understand the horse; you must understand its fears and reticence because as an herbivore it has a strong instinct of survival. You must not surprise him or use abrupt gestures because it reacts instantly and you will lose control.

After all, for thousands of years it was a wild animal hunted by predators whose only defence was running. The newly born foal stands on its feet within an hour of being born and on the second day it can run and follow the mare. Mounting a horse you enter the rhythm of nature, you must observe its laws and respect the horse’s powerful instincts, yet if you love him, he will obey you…

A frequent star-guest of La Mesteceni is Sue Adams herself, owner of the Riding School at Shobdon, Herefordshire, twinned with La Mesteceni.

Cheerful, curly-haired and energetic, the Englishwoman globetrots the entire world in a humanitarian programme to teach people to interact physically and mentally with horses.

“I always loved horses and I can say that I have a truly special understanding and a relationship with them

I travel to show people that beyond the recreational activity there are therapeutical benefits that these animals can cure both physically and emotionally.



It looks like swimming with dolphins. The human brain’s area responsible with feelings and emotions, known as the limbic brain, communicates directly with the horse’s brain (they resonate in tandem). This means that if you spend a lot of time together with the horse, you calm down; you reach a healthy equilibrium and recuperate emotionally.

With the horse you interact both physically as well as mentally. In England there is a special programme for businessmen to encourage them by working with horses to choose a more direct and honest way in their profession.

You cannot manipulate horses, they are totally honest. Well, there may be 2-3 corrupt horses in the world, but I have not met them!”


At La Mesteceni a lot of children come to learn and their parents come to watch; children and horses form a very strong bond from the beginning.



Matching rider and horse is not a chance affair. The instructor who knows the horses will assist the beginner make the correct choice, safety being the first criterion.

The first lesson is introducing the horse to the student, a gentle approach, teaching safety drills and explaining how the horse will read and obey aids and commands.

Mounting the horse and the first 10 lessons are given in the safety of the sand manege 60x40m within the Club grounds.

First walking and turning, later trotting, rider and horse will learn to respect each other. The successful closing of the basic training is to exercise the new rider’s abilities in open countryside on the hills around the village of Rahau.