They say that miracles happen at Christmas, and it is with a heavy heart that I am launching this fundraising campaign to raise funds that I will donate towards the establishment of the "A Dignified Life for Injured and Retired Sport Horses", with all funds to be spent in a fully transparent manner on full board for the months of January to June for the 8 horses and 1 pony I have rescued.

A brief history:

Horses have been my childhood dream and passion, and so three years ago I started riding.I quickly became captivated and decided I would buy my own horse and, to take it to the next level, compete in show jumping. I fell in love at first sight with a beautiful 4-year-old mare named Magia and bought her straight away, but she turned out to be too young and spirited for a rider like me. I sent her to be trained by a professional trainer, and I bought Ikar, an experienced older horse called Professor. We rented an equestrian centre with a café and a children’s play area, and for two years we organised children’s birthday parties with pony rides; this business successfully supported both ourselves and the horses, whilst in the meantime we rescued a filly from a gypsy cart, and a retired, injured racehorse. Whilst involved in the sport, I also suffered a serious injury, and then Ikar, as it turned out, suffered three strains to the same leg. Magia got off to a brilliant start in her first season, but she got injured in training, so I gave up on a professional career in equestrian sports, retired my horses and, in the meantime, took in another three retired sport horses. Everything was fine until, at the end of October, the landlord decided that we were making too much money from children’s birthday parties, to look after so many horses and staff, and said that he would run the equestrian centre and the restaurant himself, and that we had to leave within a month.

Luckily, an acquaintance of ours owns the only available centre in the region, 50 km from Burgas in a seaside resort village, and we moved the horses there. The good news is that there are plenty of tourists in the summer, and we’ll be able to support ourselves through rides in the riding arena and out in the countryside, but we urgently need funds to survive until June, when the tourist season begins!

I am running this campaign with the great hope that this will be our Christmas!