This year's NARHA conference was held in Hartford, CT and was attended by seven of our staff. The sessions were all very informative but the highlight of the conference was the awards dinner.

Anthony Fusaro was awarded the NARHA Youth Equestrian of the Year Award. Sadly, Anthony passed away earlier this year. His father was there to accept the award and gave a beautiful speech in his memory. Anthony’s spirit will always be remembered by those that heard the speech that night and all those that he touched at Xenophon.

Ken Bergstresser was there to receive his award as Region 11 Volunteer of the Year. Ken was awarded a beautiful belt buckle. He has been a Saturday volunteer since the very beginning of Xenophon & we are grateful for his continued service to us.

And, finally it was announced that our beloved Cocoa had won the 2008 Horse of the Year award! Jan Bindas accepted Cocoa's award for her as she could not be there! We received a beautiful painting of Cocoa and she received some extra carrots!

Congratulations to all our award winners!

Xenophon closed its sixteenth year with our annual student horse show. It was a beautiful sunny day filled with happy students, grateful parents and a score of enthusiastic and dedicated volunteers. Xenophon honored Bill Lange for his continuing support of Xenophon and our horses. It was a fitting end to another successful season.

View many more pictures of the day's activities here.

Xenophon is proud to announce the following awards that will be presented at the NARHA Conference banquet on November 1, 2008. It is unprecedented to have three awards go to one center. We are so proud of our winners. The national awards will be chosen from the regional winners on the night of the banquet.

2008 NARHA Youth Equestrian
Recognition Award

Anthony Fusaro - Xenophon Therapeutic
Riding Center, Orinda, CA

Region 11 Volunteer of the Year

Ken Bergstresser - Xenophon Therapeutic
Riding Center, Orinda, CA

Region 11 Equine of the Year

Cocoa - Xenophon Therapeutic Riding Center,
Orinda, CA

The 2008 Gala at the Orinda Country Club appears to have been a huge success. Thank you to all those who came to support Xenophon!

To see more pictures of the finest (and best-looking) group of people you'll ever meet, click here.

Date: Saturday, March 8
Time: 6:00 p.m. - 10:00 p.m.
Location: Orinda Country Club
Cost: $85 per person

This year's gala event is SOLD OUT!
Thanks to all who purchased tickets.

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...or a $250 fence rail for our arena.

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...or a $100 brick paver.

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Once again our end of the season horse show at Xenophon was a great success! A huge thank you to all who participated and our sponsors. None of this could happen without you.

View many more pictures from the event here!

The weather was just right on Sunday for our annual family BBQ. We had a great turnout with close to 100 people! We tried a new venue this year to accommodate our special guests - Access Adventure. Thank you to Michael Muir and his team of people and horses! They provided rides in a wagon pulled by their beautiful pair of Percheron mares - Ruby and Reba. Thank you to all that attended and we look forward to more events with Access Adventure.

View the rest of the pictures from the day's event here.

Once again we would like to thank Martinez Horseman's Association for putting on a great event for which we are the benefactor. Battle of the Barns was held on July 28th in Martinez with 9 teams from different barns around the area participating in fun games. Thank you to all that participated. And, a special thank you to Jonathan Carr for being a great Master of Ceremony and to our riders Rebecca Weston and Rebecca Shirley.

Thanks!

Thank you everyone for making our 15th Anniversary Open House a success! We were so happy to see so many people show up - we almost ran out of hot dogs!The weather was perfect and the horses behaved beautifully! It was good to see the community come out and see what we are all about. We also met many prospective new volunteers and new students. Again, thank you for your support - we couldn't do this without all of you.

We would just like to thank everyone who helped organize the gala and to all those that attended. I think a good time was had by all and we look forward to seeing you at the 2008 event!

View the rest of the images from this wonderful event here.