TRAVEL
Road testing the rides less travelled Kate Pilcher, founder of Globetrotting, one of Australia’s leading horse riding holiday travel agencies, talks to JANE CAMENS about making people’s riding dreams come true.
K
ate Pilcher was frantic. It was
Globetrotting, sharing that experience
the first week of March this
with like-minded others.
year, when countries around
the world were starting to close their borders because of COVID-19. Kate was suddenly busy rescheduling riders booked on Globetrotting’s 40 rides around the world, while trying to ensure that the horse-riding establishments that offer the holidays could still feed their horses. “We all need to escape!” says Kate,
“For the time being, during the COVID-19 shut-down, we might need to choose to travel locally,” she says. For Australians ‘stuck’ at home, Globetrotting offers a number of fabulous rides in Tassie, the Barossa, the Kimberly, Central Australia, Margaret River, the Victorian High Country (Silver Brumby territory), the South Coast of New South Wales, and Rainbow Beach in South East
and her former intern Laura Rae — have built up their portfolio of 40 rides slowly because of Kate’s insistence on riding every ride and working with the chosen
referring to horse riders who like
Queensland.
herself, love to ride and travel. She has
Kate, 39, has been running Globetrotting
experiences that meet five key criteria.
been a serial escape artist, travelling
for more than a decade. She and her
for long chunks of time to horse riding
small team — who essentially comprise
Each ride has to offer spectacular
facilities around the world then, through
her husband Steven, her dad Angus,
riding establishments to design boutique
scenery changes; must be led by charismatic and knowledgeable guides; provide level-headed quality horses that are independent thinking and not dead to the leg; offer appropriate accommodation in line with the price of the holiday, and, importantly, provide clients with a cultural experience of the region beyond the superficial experiences of what Kate calls ‘vanilla travel’. Kate wants her clients to follow the rides less travelled, and to be able to sing and dance and laugh with locals, not simply visit tourist sites. Globetrotting is run from Maleny, near
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