Horse Riding in Hungary

Hungarians are known as warrior horsemen who arrived from the steppes of Asia. Even if we are not warriors on horses anymore, Hungary is still a country where you can find a lot of opportunities to ride horses while enjoying the natural lifestyle and the closeness to these great animals.

Nowadays, there are more and more services like riding centers, equestrian tours, horseback excursion training centers or riding farms in Hungary.

I will try to give you an impression of the available opportunities:-

Special features are castles, so-called 'castle hotels' where you can have an accommodation in a romantic setting and where usually you can enjoy the nature, outdoor activities including horse riding.

A place like this is the is Hedervar Castle Hotel. Castle Hotel Hedervar is located between Györ and Mosonmagyarovar, only 85 km from Vienna, 60 km from Bratisava and 160 km from Budapest. The castle hotel offers a renaissance atmosphere where you can spend unforgettable days.

Another example is the Gerebi Mansion Hotel and Stables  in the Great Plain. The Mansion was built at the end of the 19th century by one of the large landlords of the region, Gyula Öttömösi Gerébi. This prominent landowner, who also acted as a benefactor of the poor, established a stud-farm in the manor that was even recognised internationally. The Stables offer the guests a variety of riding services. Lungingrein and cross-country rides, riding tours, carriage driving and carriage driving courses are available. A horse carriage trip around the countryside is a pleasant experience for a company of friends.

The specialities of Castle Hotels is that they usually provide a service of high standard - some of them on premium level too and you can enjoy the closeness of nature combined with all the comfort of modern tourism.

You can find here more information about Castle Hotels.

If you wanna focus on horses, horse riding and horse-related sport, only you can visit one of the horse farms, horse villages or schools. These places usually offer different types of Equestrian programmes.

In Tápiószentmárton, the Kincsem Equestrian Park is more for those who rather enjoy to see horse shows, attractions.

The park and its surroundings are available for short-, middle-, and long-distance steeplechasing /1hour, 3hours, half a day/, mounted and carriage excursions (with attendant, guide, driver) on a formerly agreed route and program. You can visit the indigenuous park with 'puszta-taxi', together with a delicious meal at the 'Csárda' tavern. For groups, they offer herdsmen's show with 5-10-12 horses (on demand) and also the opportunity to compete in an amateur coach driving race. For children and adults, horse- and pony-riding is available on long rein, round-and-round.

The Virág Tanya in Ruzsa offers horse riding vacation in the southern Puszta of Hungary. A family run business providing an ''All Inclusive Equestrian Holiday'', wellness features and horse trails amidst European Southern Great Plain.

EPONA is a traditional riding school with Spanish-Arabian stallions 42 kms away from Budapest.

If you prefer something that is 'really hungarian', you have to visit the National Stud in Szilvásvárad

One of their greatest program is the riding from the stud farm up to the Bükk plateau and Csipkéskút, a highly protected area of the National Park mountains (appr. 2-3 hours). Here you can look at the young stallions playing with each other and have some lovely trout fish made on the fire. You can either then ride down on a different route or stay overnight on the lovely cottages of Csipkéskút then ride back the next day.