Valley Water Mill Equestrian Center

I haven’t been here yet and I’ve already had a sour experience with them. My daughter wanted to ride a horse so for her birthday we decided to go here. Well as I’m looking at prices I thought oh it’s only $ 40 for 12 riders, that’s awesome. So I filled out the form and emailed it in only for them to email me right back saying that no, it’s $ 110 because you have to rent the room they have for a minimum of 2hours whether you want to or not! So I told them I wanted to look at other options because it doesn’t state that anywhere in their form and they need to make it clearer. So a few weeks went by and we decide on this one. I waited until a payday that I could budget this into to resend the corrected form and then my email wouldn’t send so I was already frustrated with it. By the time it sent it was 1am so I knew I would hear from them the next day. Well I realized at the bottom of the form it still said please charge me the full amount instead of splitting it since I thought it was only $ 40 so I immediately emailed again asking them to disregard that and I missed that when I revised the form. Never heard back from these people called 3x with no answer and sent 3 more emails until 4pm before I was finally answered only to be rudely told they couldn’t accommodate me the day I wanted and could I do it the next day so I agreed. Well you’re supposed to pay 50% to reserve the party and pay the rest the day of the party. For me it would have been $ 55. I budgeted for it so great I asked them please charge $ 55 to my card today and they said they would the next morning. 3 days later I receive an email receipt that they charged me for the full amount! Not half like they were supposed to or like I had budgeted so I would have gas money until next payday but the full amount like now I have to borrow money or take out a loan to get through to next payday. Are you kidding me thank you for being incompetent!
We have done the party and it was just ok. For the amount of money I paid, I expected a little bit more. So we show up about 15min early to set up before guests get there. Pull up to the house /​office to find it locked with no one in sight. I finally found an employee who came up and let us in. It was a pretty nice set up full working kitchen, party room with lots of tables and a nice yard. We set up and as guests begin arriving I can’t find any employees yet again to figure out if we should do cake and presents first or when they would come get us to ride. We did cake and presents first and the girl came up to get us to go over safety rules but she wasn’t assertive enough to keep their attention so that was a bad start. We get down to the barn and the staff they have are dim and for their so called safety rules aren’t very good about implementing them. We had 1 hour of ride time and even with 10 kids riding multiple times we finished 20min early because the kids got so bored just sitting on the horse walking in a slow circle. It was ok but I had to pay for 2 hours to rent the room and was only in there for 45min. Definitely way overpriced. The room rental is $ 35/​hr and you have to rent the room for a minimum of 2hours and then you have to pay another $ 40 for 1 horse that can accommodate up to 12 kids. If you have more than 12 kids you will have to pay another $ 40 for a 2^nd horse. Ridiculous gouging.

My 9 year old Grandson has taken HorseSHOE 1 and HorseSHOE 2 riding classes and has learned the basics — safety around horses, haltering, saddling, leading, riding at a walk and controlling the horse in turns and stopping. These are classes for children who have never ridden before, and they are taught by Greene County Sheriff’s Posse Staff. I love their attitude with the children and the children seem to love every minute of the classes — except they want to go faster. I also love that the classes are reasonably priced that I could afford to give this to my grandson for his birthday this year. He has always loved horses and animals. I plan to continue him on in private lessons, which are also offered at the Valley Water Mill Equestrian Center.

Great and affordable horse training center for children and adults. Nice outdoor and indoor arena for beginners and intermediate riders.

When my daughter decided she wanted to get into horseback riding, I looked around at different stables, and liked Valley Water Mill the best for several reasons.
First, they have a set of classes called Horse SHOE that teach the basics of safety and care of horses. These are pretty much a prerequisite for other types of lessons.
Second, Valley Water Mill is actually part of the Springfield Park Board, so their rates are reasonable, and they have a variety of different programs for different ages and stages. They’re not just focused on one type of riding (my daughter has done Western, English, and even started into acrobatic riding), or just training for competitions.
They offer summer camps and day camps when school is out, birthday parties, and a pony class for parents and littles to do together.
There is a variety of different horses at the center. Everything from the Sherif’s Department Posse horses to very old or mistreated horses that the center has rescued and are trying to rehab.
The instructors are very nice and are very knowledgeable. We’ve especially enjoyed working with Miss Lauren in a small group lesson setting this fall.
The facility includes stables, an outdoor arena, and an indoor arena. They offer open riding times for those that have their own horses.
If you have a horse, or want to get into riding, this is the place to be.