Terry Tenzing - Camp Director and head riding instructor, Terry Tenzing, has a lifetime of experience with children, horses and animals as well as an extensive formal education. With an MA in Intercultural Education and another MA in Intuition Medicine, she has taught and counsels children and parents in parenting and healthy life skills development for over ten years. Terry's "other life" as she fondly refers to it involved being as Assistant Dean at Boston College, designing inter culture training programs for student exchange organizations, teaching European Au Pairs in Manhattan, working in the nonprofit sector with the San Francisco Foundation when she first moved to the Bay Area. She is a world traveler and now makes her home on beautiful Shamrock Ranch in Pacifica, CA.

Having grown up in New England on a small farm, she got her first pony at age three. Her favorite memories are of their families campgrounds, their gardens and farm animals. One of her favorite stories that her grandmother loved to tell was of the day Terry's pony Misty walked right in the back door of the farmhouse and helped herself to the freshly baked apple pie right off the farmhouse kitchen table. It is stories like this, or her fond memories of raising Misty's tiny baby foal as a girl of only seven, that have instilled in Terry a lifelong love of horses and ponies. In fact by now, she considers herself a "pony whisperer", but she would tell you that she can "whisper" to children and animals as well.

For the past thirteen years while she has been raising her daughter she has been the Manager of Historic Shamrock Ranch Horse Stables in Pacifica, CA just 20 minutes outside of San Francisco on the Coast. Her extensive experience in equine care and management, land management, and the study of people and their horses is uniquely insightful. The herd of 25 horses who peer inside her bedroom window every morning each day begins, have taught her more about horse's feelings, their minds and needs that any book ever could. She is an accomplished rider, but prefers to think of herself as being one with the horse and believes that it is the connection that the horse and rider share that makes the ride.

Terry subscribes to many of the Natural Riding principals of Sally Swift and Natural Horsemanship concepts in teaching a child to ride. More though, Terry's style of teaching which focuses on the child building "their" own sense of confidence with their pony, guiding her students to feel at ease, comfortable and own new found confidence and skills set in their new special relationship with their pony. Terry wants a child to go away from their time spent with her and her staff, more confident in themselves, with a sense of pride and accomplishment, a base riding skill set, and a love of their time spent.

Terry's goal is for them to develop their own "horse sense"...to sense and read their pony's mind, reactions, feelings and needs. Terry feels that this is the necessary foundation of every good horse and human relation and is the very cornerstone of building not only the child's confidence and own intuitive sense of trust and awareness, but that it is the very basis for eliciting a gentle, calm and trusting response from their pony toward them.

Terry understands ponies deeply for, in addition to managing the Ranch, then fueled by her commitment to being a stay-at-home parent to 2 1/2 year old daughter, Terry founded "Friendly Pony Parties and Barnyard Pals considered by many as the premiere pony party and petting zoo business in the Bay Area for the past ten years. Terry and her now 12 year old daughter Olviia, take great pride in their ponies and animals health, happiness and well-being. They raise their animals from babies, and Olivia has an egg business and raises guinea pigs, bunnies and baby goats which she sells to local pet stores or children involved in 4-H.

Their animals are their family, and both Terry and Olivia feel that the kindness and respect shown them directly translates to their capacity to trust and enjoy interacting with people. They are regularly told that their ponies and farm animals are happiest and healthiest animals people have ever seen. Nothing could make Terry and Olivia happier.

Olivia Tenzing - Olivia is an accomplished equestrian. A member of the United States Pony Club of America, Olivia participates in horse shows on her Arabian mare, Karanita and her mom's Morgan horse, Spring throughout California. Olivia friends have all learned to ride under her apt instruction for she is an expert at putting a young rider at ease while guiding them in their mastery of riding and pony and animal care. Olivia also rides all of our ponies and has trained them over many years. One of her first experiences on a pony was when she was five years old when her mom took her packing with llamas and ponies in Yosemite riding on one of their ponies with pillow pilled high on either of the saddle so she could sleep as they hiked for three days! Olivia intuitive connection with animals is amazing. She can spend hours watching her chickens going about their life making insightful and pensive observations about their relationships, their personalities, and their proclivity for being a mother. So much of the gentleness, reliability and patience our ponies and animals exhibit is in large part to in thanks to Olivia time and dedication to them and how much fun she and all her friends her have playing with them.

Susie...Ever since her mom took her horseback riding on her 7th birthday, Susie has been in love with horses. Now 16, she still remembers that first ride. She had gone on a guided trail ride to the beach, and had absolutely no clue how to ride a horse. During that ride she had dropped her reigns to where she couldn't reach them, survived her horse taking off on the beach, and had been absolutely terrified the entire time. When she got off her horse however, the first thing she did was turn to her mom and say, "hey mom, do you think I could get a horse?". Susie's actually learned the basics of riding at a horse camp. After several years of riding she began taking lessons to polish her horse skills. At the age of 12, she was teaching and helping at horse camps. Ever since then she established herself quite nicely in the equine community. Exercising people's horses, teaching lessons and camp, and doing pony parties, are just a few of the "perks" that come with becoming an accomplished rider. Away from horses, Susie is also a swimmer, a basketball coach for her younger sisters basketball team, as well as a nearly-straight-A student. 

JAKE MONTZ...Jake is a 15 year old high school student who will be spending his second summer with Friendly Pony Parties and Barnyard Pals Summer Camp. Jake has had lots of farm experience working on his cousin's farm in Ireland helping with the lambing season over the years, so Summer Camp came easily for him. In addition to helping with the kids and animals, Jake serves as camp photographer taking pictures of the kids with their favorite pony and animals. Jake also works in the pony business with Terry throughout the school year.

REBEKAH MONTZ...Rebekah is a 13 year old who is also spending her second summer with Friendl Pony Parties and Barnyard Pals Summer Camp. She had experience on her uncles' farm in Ireland working with sheep, lambs, cattle and working dogs before starting with Terry last summer. She loves working with the kids and animals and enjoys the opportunity to be outside on those beautiful summer days in Half Moon Bay. She also compiles Jake's pictures into a fun power point presentation that she shows the kids on the last day of camp. Rebecca also works in the pony business with Terry on the weekends during the school year. Both Jake and Rebekah have traveled extensively both in the United States and internationally and bring a good deal of enthusiasm, intelligence and humor in dealing with the children in our camps.

CAREME YEUNG...Careme is a 13 year old who started 3 years ago as a camper. She returned the following year as a counselor. Ever since her mom took her riding at the age of 3, her love for horses started. She constantly begged her mom to take her to riding lessons, but due to her many outer-curricular activities, that wish cannot be granted. Finally, at 10, her mother asked her if she wanted to go to pony camp that she found in a magazine. She happily signed up for it. She enjoyed the week of camp greatly. There, she also bought a black and white buck (male bunny), whom she named Yukinko and who is now a dear friend to her.

Jaden Rhodes

Cory Rhodes

Holly Stotts