Appledore and District Riding Association

The charities have received their donations and the bank has been closed so ADRA is now officially closed. Thank you everyone for the wonderful memories 🐎

All the best for 2026

🌟 A Heartfelt Goodbye to ADRA 🌟

After many happy and memorable years, ADRA will sadly be closing its doors.

This has not been an easy decision, and it comes with a very heavy heart. As many of you know, I have chosen to step down as Chair, as ongoing personal circumstances mean I can no longer give the club the time, energy, and dedication it truly deserves. With no one wanting to step into the role, and with our membership numbers continuing to drop — only around 20 members and just 6 attending all events this year — running the club has become increasingly difficult. We also need a Secretary a Treasurer, a Safeguarding Officer and First Aider, as well as someone to run risk assessment reports before each event. BRC are also increasing their fees again this year, and our hands are tied and we would have to increase our fees also.

We also looked into every possible option to continue, including leaving BRC, but the insurance alone would have cost thousands and we would have had to find a new venue as the current insurance holders insurance would not cover events without us being a BRC club. With the club bringing in only around £300 this year, it simply wasn’t sustainable. As always, we wanted to be transparent, so this was put to a vote at the AGM — and it was a unanimous, though very sad, decision to close the club on 31 December 2025 before any more fees and subs are due to BRC and we are truly sorry to those who supported the club so loyally this year to help keep it going.

We do have funds in the club, which are going to be donated to charities, a local one Woodchurch RDA, Air Ambulance and Brooke.

I want to express my deepest gratitude to the incredible people who have supported ADRA over the years.
💛 Brenda and Clare, our amazing Secretary and Treasurer — thank you for your dedication and hard work. A special thank you to Brenda, who has been at the heart of the club for an incredible 37 years when it was formed by people who just wanted to get together and have low level fun. She has truly earned a well-deserved rest!
💛 Thank you to Paula, Cam, and Vikki on the committee for your continued support, as well as all past committee members who helped shape the club.
💛 And of course, thank you to every single member, past and present, who has been part of ADRA’s story and especially the founders all those years ago. You are all the reason this club existed, thrived, and created so many wonderful memories, we are very lucky to have had members that were so supportive and wanted to have fun.

Though ADRA is closing, the friendships, the laughter, the lessons learned, and the shared love of horses will always remain. This isn’t just an ending — it’s a celebration of everything we built together.

Clare will be calling BRC on Monday to let them know so no ongoing subs are taken, but please feel free to log into sport80 and cancel any subs due.

Thank you all, from the bottom of my heart, for the many years of support, joy, and community.
Here’s to the next chapter for every one of us and I'm going to leave it there as I'm welling up as ADRA has been in my life since i was 14 years old. Sue x. 🐴💫

PS The images are a few of my favs but not limited as so many, please do look through the albums and posts, there are 1000's, we have done many wonderful things and the smiling faces make it all worth it, i have enjoyed taking photos of all of you. Will leave the fb page open so you can post any memories you wish xx

Huge congratulations to our winners at our AGM and prizegiving evening last night.
Trophies went to:
1. Riding Club Pony – Ami & Meg
2 Riding Club Lead Rein Pony - James & Ginge
3 Best in Show – James & Ginge
4 Lead Rein Rider – James & Ginge
5 Junior Rider – Ami & Meg
6 Adult – Abbie & Reggie
7 Adult Trec – Cam & Aggie.

Well done all of your and thank you for all your support this year.

Our last event of 2025 will be our xmas meal on Friday so see those of you that have booked in there!

Its nearly that time of year again, AGM and Awards Evening.
The small room in Appledore Village Hall is booked for our meeting on Friday 28th November. We will be unlocking at 7pm and starting as soon as we have set out chairs etc, so around 7.15.
Trophies will be awarded and important matters re. the club discussed. Please make sure that all trophies are back with Sue or Brenda before this date, so that they can be awarded to this year's winners at the meeting.
Tea, coffee and nibbles will be provided. We look forward to seeing you.

Big shout out to my newest top fans! 💎

Abi Ginn

Drop a comment to welcome them to our community, fans

Can't believe we have just held our last ridden event of the season, this year has just flown by. Today we were lucky with the weather, but with only 3 entries in each section we were all wrapped up before midday.
Huge thanks as always to Brenda and Keith for generously allowing us to use their land and arena, thanks to Paula C and Brenda for their judging skills and giving up their time,
Congratulations to our competitors, results are as follows:
In Hand
1st Abbie and Ginge
2nd Ami and Meg
3rd James and Blue

Ridden
1st James and Blue
2nd James and Ginge
3rd Ami and Meg

Congratulations to James and his lovely pony Blue on their winning debut here with us.

Our next event is end of November with our AGM and prize giving evening. All points from the seasons events will be added up and you will find out if you are a winner at the AGM!

The course is set. See you all tomorrow 😀

Unfortunately the weather forecast has changed overnight and doesn't look great for Saturday morning for our trec comp and due to the predicted high winds we will have to cancel tomorrow for safety reasons but plan to host it the following Saturday if ground and weather permits

Thank you to all our dog show competitors today, hope you all had fun.
All your dogs are beautiful in their own right and gave our Judge a very hard time deciding, but congratulations go to Lilyanna and Moo who were our Best in Show today, a little dapple smooth coated Dachshund and our Reserves were Holly and Peaches a Fox Red Labrador. Well done to you all, I think everyone went home with lots of prizes.
Huge thanks for to our very generous sponsors for providing lots of goodie bags and vouchers:
Gladwells Pet and Country Store, Tenterden
https://www.facebook.com/gladwells.tenterden
Kent Tractors Shadoxhurst
https://www.facebook.com/kent.tractors
Off the Leash at Headcorn Place
https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61559848147186
Pure Connection Pets at Tenterden
https://www.facebook.com/pureconnectionpets
Ripleys Garden Centre Tenterden
https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61568809733078

Thank you to Brenda and Keith for allowing us to host the show, to Vikki for running round getting sponsorship and our Judge Sylvia who kindly stepped in last minute due to our original judge being poorly.

Thank you to everyone for supporting ADRA today! If you have any photos please send them over. Thank you.

Can you comment below please if you are coming to dog show on Saturday, we have a Judge, rosettes and prizes but only 2 confirmed entries

Congratulations to everyone that came to our lovely sunny fun show today. You are all champions in your own right but ADRA champion 2025 goes to James and Ginge! Thank you to Brenda for hosting and judging.
We hope to see you all in 2 weeks for our fun dog show and then our last ridden event of the year our handy pony/trec comp first weekend in October