Western team building activities for your staff
Eight activities built around horses and western culture, to choose from for your seminar, team building day or company evening. They can be combined with the ranch’s meeting rooms, meals and gîtes.
Hands-on or social activities: how do you build your programme?
A hands-on activity gets people doing things: colleagues take part together, on foot with a horse or in games. A social activity gets people talking, often to music.
By bringing the two together on the same day, you create an atmosphere that strengthens team bonds. The activities are up to you: pick just one, or build a full day that runs into the evening.
Meeting rooms, meals and accommodation for your corporate event- 90 min
- “Would you make a good manager?”: horse coaching, 10 people at most
- 60 min
- Tour of the ranch: the breeding, the horses, the Salers cattle
- 90 min
- “Are you a natural horse trainer?”: liberty training
- 90 min
- Western games: pistol, lasso, horseshoe throwing
- Evening
- Mechanical bull
- 90 min
- Introduction to line dancing
- 90 min
- Western riding demonstration
- Evening
- Western evening with Les Ranchers, live music
“Would you make a good manager?”: horse coaching
Each participant is on foot, alone with a horse. The horse acts as a mirror and cannot be fooled: it responds according to whether the person comes across as authoritarian, shy, evasive, offhand or careless.
It is a fun activity that brings personalities to light: team building with horses, with no riding involved.
- Duration
- 1 hour 30 minutes
- Group
- 10 people maximum
- Format
- On foot, alone with a horse
A tour of the ranch and its stud
A guided tour of the stud: the broodmares, the stallions and the foals, what western riding is and why the Quarter Horse. Then the herd of organic Salers cattle, and the question that comes with it: why farm organically?
The tour also opens up a discussion on food, consumption, production and farming, and on rebuilding the link between farmers and the general public.
- Duration
- 1 hour
“Are you a natural horse trainer?”: liberty training
Western natural horsemanship is the ranch’s great speciality. Inspired by America’s cowboy “horse whisperers”, this approach to the relationship between people and horses is first explained to you by one of the ranch’s instructors.
Then each participant, alone with a young horse, has to complete a course on foot with it, without holding it. It all comes down to positioning: placing yourself in the right spot in order to act.
- Duration
- 1 hour 30 minutes
- Format
- Explanation by an instructor, then a course on foot with a young horse
Western games: pistol, lasso and horseshoe throwing
- Pistol: a quick-draw shot at balloons, drawing from the holster.
- Lasso: after a short lesson, you have to rope a set of dummy horns.
- Horseshoe throwing: the cowboys’ version of quoits.
It is a competition: each participant scores points in every event, and the winner receives a prize.
- Duration
- 1 hour 30 minutes
- Format
- Three scored events, a prize for the winner
The mechanical bull
Gauchos and other cowboys had better hold on tight: the rodeo simulator is a game that never fails to go down well. This bull sums up the whole world of the western on its own, and budding cowboys and country fans alike come to take each other on.
At the controls, an operator times how long each rider stays on without falling off. Whoever survives the bucking wins the admiration of the rest of the group.
- Duration
- All evening
- Format
- Each ride is timed by an operator
An introduction to line dancing
A light-hearted introduction to line dancing that everyone gets into. It opens the festivities and gets the evening going.
- Duration
- 1 hour 30 minutes
The western riding demonstration
Jacky Thomas, the ranch’s owner, is a western rider who specialises in western natural horsemanship. In his demonstration, he shows you every side of this style of riding.
Fancy having a go afterwards? The ranch also offers western riding lessons and clinics.
- Duration
- 1 hour 30 minutes
- Given by
- Jacky Thomas
The western evening with Les Ranchers
An evening of live music with Les Ranchers, Jacky and Stéphanie Thomas’s country band: two guitars and a fiddle. You dance to country music all evening, during and after the meal.
It goes hand in hand with the seminar menu, a western menu, and with the introduction to line dancing that opens the festivities.
- When
- In the evening, during and after the meal
- Music
- Les Ranchers, live
Frequently asked questions
Do you need to be able to ride?
No. Horse coaching and liberty training are done on foot, and the western riding demonstration is given by Jacky Thomas.
How many people can take part in horse coaching?
Ten people at most, for an hour and a half.
Can we combine several activities?
Yes, the activities are up to you: for example western games or horse coaching during the day, then the introduction to line dancing and the western evening with Les Ranchers.
Who runs the activities?
The ranch team: an instructor explains liberty training, an operator runs the mechanical bull, Jacky Thomas gives the western riding demonstration and Les Ranchers play for the evening.
How much do the activities cost?
The price depends on the activities you choose and the number of participants: we will send you a quote on request.
Put together your team’s programme
Tell us the date, the number of participants and the activities you like the look of: we will send you a quote.
