How A Horse Impacted My Literary Career: Meet Author Jacqueline Lambert

I was born and spent my early years in Blackburn, Lancashire, an industrial town in the rather damp north west corner of England.

Blackburn is not pretty, but has incredible natural beauty on its doorstep. It’s a short hop from the Forest of Bowland, the Pennine mountains, and three national parks: the Yorkshire Dales, the Peak District, and the Lake District.

My Dad was a keen mountaineer, who instilled within me a great love of the outdoors. We spent many weekends and every school holiday in a remote Lake District cottage, from which we scaled some of guidebook writer Alfred Wainwright’s favourite summits. (Wainwright is one of Blackburn’s famous sons!)

It was In Ennerdale that we met Bob Orrell: author, smallholder, TV and radio presenter. To my great joy, he moved in next door to our holiday cottage when I was in my early teens. The two neighbouring forestry cottages had no electricity, and the water came from the nearby stream. I spent many a splendid summer there, looking after Bob’s menagerie of ponies, goats, chickens, ducks, and dogs.

Bob has written several books about his amazing life. Saddle Tramp in the Lake District documented his journey following ancient drovers’ routes with a brace of fell ponies, Thor and Jewel. Fell ponies are one of the nine native British pony breeds, and a favourite of the late Queen Elizabeth II. In later books, fell pony Lucy joined Bob and Thor in place of Jewel.

As it happens, Thor and Lucy had a profound effect on my literary career!

Aged 14, Bob took me and a couple of other young lasses on a four-day trek across the Lake District along the old pack pony routes. The plan was for me to ride Thor, a solid and dependable veteran, a couple of years my senior. His summer coat was shiny black, and, bred to carry lead from the mines, he was built like a mini carthorse, with shaggy hair or ‘feathers’ on his heels. His rump and back were as wide and flat as a table. Sometimes, I would lie on him and sunbathe while he stood contentedly, or munched grass. In Saddle Tramp, Bob described Thor as having two speeds: ‘slow’ and ‘stop’ – with a preference for the latter.

Me aboard Thor in front of the 400-year-old barn & bothy in Ennerdale, next to the cottages where we stayed. All the buildings are now part of the Ennerdale Youth Hostel. The mountain in the background is Pillar.

In the honeyed golden hour of many a summer evening, I would stand for hours with my arms draped along the top of his field gate. Thor would clop over slowly and rest his head in my embrace. Often, I would feel him release a deep sigh of contentment, or nuzzle his whiskery muzzle into my neck.

It was love.

Me aboard another fell pony, Destiny, at the gate where Thor & I enjoyed our sunset rendezvous.
My audience is the reason I won a goose egg fry up on my first ever caravan adventure, documented in my book Fur Babies in France – when I showed the site owner how to milk her new goat.

Unfortunately, at the last minute, the promise of a loan pony for Bob fell through. That evening, Bob broke the terrifying news to me. Thor would be his mount, and I would have to ride Thor’s stable mate, Lucy, on our trek. Besides being younger and much more lightly built, Lucy was a bit of a handful. As such, I had never ridden Lucy, and on Bob’s original quests, Lucy had been led, not ridden, bearing the pack saddle.

There is a saying, “100 Falls Make a Rider.” Lucy contributed generously to my total!
Bob calls this photo ‘The Victory Leap’, since Lucy & Bob’s daughter Allison had just won first prize in a fell pony class at Ennerdale Show.

There is a saying, “100 falls make a rider,” and Lucy contributed generously to my total. With my stomach churning, in the week before our trek, Bob sent me out on practise rides to get used to Lucy. If you wonder why a young teenager was dispatched solo on kill-or-cure missions to master an unruly equine in a deserted Lake District valley, all I can say is, it was the 1970s. Kids got on with stuff.

On every outing, Lucy bolted and threw me. The most notable occasion involved a terrifying gallop downhill through a pine forest.

Lucy suddenly decided our ride was over and she was going home. Without warning, she took off with me. Rather than following the serpentine forest track back the way we’d come, she opted for the shortest, most direct route, and leapt straight into the forest at full gallop. To avoid low branches, which would have swept me off her back on to the boulders and stumps on the forest floor, I had to keep low and press myself forward on to her neck. I was well aware of a few general rules of horsemanship. Even a controlled canter or gallop downhill can be highly dangerous, as the horse can easily stumble and fall, particularly on rough uneven ground like, say, a forest floor. Plus, you’re supposed to lean backwards, not forwards, while descending steep slopes. Just watch the show jumpers as they tackle Hickstead’s Derby Bank.

Unbalanced and unable to haul on her reins to stop her, I clung on to handfuls of mane for dear life as she zig zagged crazily and dodged violently between the close-set tree trunks at full pelt. My strategy kept me aboard until we reached the edge of the forest above the next bend of the descending track, where instead of applying the brakes as I’d hoped, she launched herself into space down a sheer 12 ft bank. She landed hard on her forelegs with her head between her knees. With my forward position, the impact sent me straight over her head. I landed flat on my back on the stony forest track, winded, but still holding on to her reins. With her triumph complete, at least she had the courtesy to stop dead and wait for me to remount, which was, at least, preferable to being dragged along the gravel.

When I got back to the cottage, Bob noticed my chin wobbling, “What has that horse done to you now?” he asked gently.

That evening as we sat by a crackling wood fire, surrounded by the fug of paraffin from the whooshing oil lamps, I could tell we all had our reservations. But I was doggedly determined. I knew that if I gave up on Lucy, I would miss out on a fabulous adventure – four days riding across the Lake District, camping in tents at night, and cooking over an open fire. As a horse-mad youngster, there was no way I was giving up on that dream.

On the first morning of our expedition, everyone collected their their calm, familiar mounts from the field and rode them up to the cottage bareback with a halter and lead rope. I had severe misgivings about this. No saddle and no stirrups for balance, and no bit or reins to steer or exert control, but I mounted up, because I didn’t want to lose face. I’d only just met Margaret and Ingrid, my fellow explorers, the previous evening.

Of course, Lucy picked her moment very carefully.

I swear she was grinning haughtily at me down her slightly Roman nose as she contemplated me, still holding her lead rope, with my backside splitting the icy cold waters of the clear mountain stream where she dumped me.

My best friend commemorated this incident on my next birthday, by presenting me with a ceramic model of one of Norman Thelwell’s famous pony cartoons – of a rider ditched in a puddle with the caption, “Talk to your pony, he will know what you mean.”

That morning, I had no words for Lucy. It was all I could do to hold back my tears.

“Talk to your pony – he will know what you mean.”

After subjecting me to this humiliation, I think Lucy felt she had asserted her dominance. Thankfully, she and I arrived at an uneasy truce. Since we had to navigate steep mountain passes together, this was just as well, although Loony Boots, as I had christened her, certainly added an extra dimension of excitement to an already thrilling adventure.

That was, however, the last time she threw me.

Each evening, after we’d set up camp, Bob encouraged us to write about our experiences. Then, he entered our scribblings – my first ever memoir – into a national competition open to all age groups.

I’m very proud to say, I won second prize!

It was my initial foray into keeping a travel journal, which has since become a lifelong ritual. These diaries led to my blog, World Wide Walkies, which I ultimately honed into a manuscript for my debut travel memoir, Fur Babies in France: From Wage Slaves to Living the Dream.

Read here why I think everyone should keep a travel journal!

Fur Babies follows what happened when my husband, Mark and I quit our jobs, accidentally bought our first ever caravan (RV trailer), then decided to rent out the house, sell most of our possessions, and tour Europe full time with our four dogs.

Since then, I’ve published six light hearted travelogues in my Adventure Caravanning With Dogs series. They have all received multiple five-star reviews, been category bestsellers on Amazon, and my third book, Dogs ‘n’ Dracula, won a Chill With A Book PREMIER Readers’ Award, and was a finalist in the Romania Insider Awards. The British Ambassador to Romania and Prince Charles (now King Charles III), who has a special connection with Romania, both have a copy!

In May 2024, I launched my seventh book, the first in my new Wayward Truck series.

Building The Beast: How (Not) To Build An Overland Camper documents how we upgraded our caravan to a 6×4-wheel drive 24.5-tonne army truck we bought sight unseen from the internet to convert into an off-grid tiny home on wheels.

Thank you Bob, Thor, and Lucy.

Without you, all this might never have happened!