Nojoqui Horse Ranch, Gaviota CA

It was such a great experience! I highly recommend Nojoqui ranch! The horses are well trained, people who work there were very friendly and super professional!

I would give zero stars if it were an option. I sent my two daughters to Amber the owner of Nojoqui Riding Ranch and first off she asked me to pay before ever even going there. We payed her almost $6000 and she didn’t even show up to the first lesson to greet and meet us. Her apprentice Anna was there and was very insensitive an insulting to my ten year old daughter and had her in tears after every lesson. Both of my daughters 12 & 10 year olds told me that Amber and Anna both use explicit profanity constantly in front of them to the horses and to my daughters. My daughters said they never went on any actual trail rides. They mostly just walked around the property or in the arena while Amber and Anna gossiped saying bad things about others who go to work there. My daughters also told me of a day that both Amber and Anna were drinking hard liquor during their lesson. Any time I tried to humbly talk to Amber, the owner, she was extremely disrespectful, insulting, and degrading to me and literally told me I could not talk to her and that if my daughters had a problem with something they needed to talk to her themselves which she had made them feel extremely uncomfortable and unable to do. Both of my daughters were shaking and in tears at the consideration of talking to her.

I recommend that you do horse lessons because I went there for 4 days and learned a lot from Amber, Anna, and Amy. I hope I will go back to take more horse lessons.

EDIT: read this review and the owner’s unhinged response. I was not attacking her character, but she clearly felt the need to lie and attack mine.

After several lessons and a trail ride, I cannot recommend this ranch. Find somewhere else, especially if you are an inexperienced rider.

If you are sold a one hour trail ride, you’d think that would mean you’d go on an hour long trail ride, right? Not here.

The horses are not set up for trail rides, and you will need at least 15 mins to get oriented if you are an inexperienced rider (maybe people should be asked to come earlier?). An hour long trail ride will really only be a little over half an hour. If you are five minutes late, you’re out of luck. Don’t count on Amber to be flexible or try to reschedule. She doesn’t pick up the phone.

My group was even led through a pen of loose horses who tried to spook the horses we were on (no prior thought was given that this might be a bad idea with inexperienced riders). We had to turn around and ended up going up and down a road. The view was ok, but definitely not a trail ride. Not even worth $50/person.

This all happened after I spent hundreds of dollars on lessons here already. Lessons which were charged at 1.5 hours but would really only be about 35 mins on the horse after grooming, tacking, and saddling. When you’re an inexperienced rider, you need time on the horse to develop muscle memory for the technique. You won’t get that here. You’ll get a someone constantly yelling at you for 35 mins and not let you think or figure it to out yourself. If conditions aren’t perfect, you won’t get above a walk for many lessons.

I’m sorry to write this because these are nice people. But businesses can’t survive without feedback, and I was pretty disappointed after the amount of money I spent and the lack of any sort of customer empathy. If expectations were more clearly set beforehand it would’ve been a totally different story.

Awesome spot to board your horse, take lessons, or a trail ride. Amber & Anna are highly skilled, very caring & VERY patient. As a 55 yr old total novice, I was welcomed and set up to reach my goal. Look forward to continuing my journey here with horses

Anna and Amber are great trainers and if you want to really learn about horses and riding- this is the place to go. We are learning so much and becoming better after each lesson. And having so much fun with the experience.

I gave someone special a horseback riding lesson for Christmas. Amber was a knowledgeable, patient and friendly instructor both in person and via email. Her rates are also highly competitive and she came highly recommended by another ranch in Santa Barbara that doesn’t offer beginner lessons.