This year has been a challenge for most people in Hong Kong and around the world with the ongoing COVID-19 Pandemic. Throughout the year with the closures of special schools under the Education Bureau and the Hong Kong Jockey Club Public Riding Schools, our therapeutic riding sessions have also been significantly impacted. As we strive to return to a sense of normality and to provide the benefits of riding to our beneficiaries, we have tried to continue running some sessions between the riding school closures. During the summer we were able to run lessons for a few weeks for selected riders who did not need as much hands on assistance from volunteers. Unfortunately these sessions did not last long as Hong Kong went through the 3rd wave of COVID-19. We once again opened up sessions for some of the schools and riders in October when the situation appeared to be improving.
Regular training sessions have also been conducted for our volunteers at Tuen Mun while ensuring that all government social distancing guidelines were followed. During the training sessions our volunteers were able to practice their leading skills while also taking the opportunity to get used to leading while wearing masks. We would like to thank all of our volunteers, riders and schools for their continued support and patience during this difficult year and we remain very hopeful that lessons will be able to resume as soon as is it safe to do so.
Andrew Shellum
