Meridian Meadows Stories, by Dave Jones

Meeting the Legends: Resorte III, Hilachas & More
Part Four of A Series
By Dave Jones, Monticello, Florida
Credit: Paso Fino Horse World December 1996

The Pasos had been coming to us nine horses at a time. They were taken to Club Hipico in Medellin, dipped for ticks and held in clean stalls for a month. They were flown, nine at a time, to Miami, where they were tested for Dourine and glanders. When these tests were passed, they were vanned to us in Tallahassee. We'd had six shipments and I thought that aspect of the business was fininshed.

Jaime Molina sent word to my boss, Colin Phipps, that a very important stallion, Resorte III, was for sale. Colin decided that I should go back to Medellin to check the horse out. Since I hadn't had any vacations, Colin thought that I should consider this to be one, so my wife Mary, better known as "Mac" was invited. We flew Avianca to Baranquilla, then on to Medellin. Mac was "impressed" that the pilot had to try five times before he could get the jet off the ground at Baranquilla.
We had a complete intinerary to follow. First, we'd inspect Resorte III at Medellin. Next, we'd fly to Bogota where we'd inspect his offspring. The last day of the journey would be in Cali, where the stallion had been born. Looking back in retrospect, I believe everyone in Colombia knew this schedule.

Don Jaime met us at the airport. Colombians had first call going through immigration and we had quite a wait. Finally, we were cleared, so we were taken directly to La Margarita, which was a restaurant and School of Equitation.
This place was owned by Fabio Ochoa. I'd met him before and knew that he was "Mr. Paso Fino" in Colombia. His father, Tulio Ochoa, had been "Mr. Paso" before him.

Our visit fell on a Saturday evening and the restaurant was pretty full. Barbecue grills lined one wall and we were to pick our food. For some reaon, I like Colombian chow and it was first class at this place.

I don't remember the names of all the food we had. Empinados are little balls, comprised of various foods which were enclosed in a shell of ground green corn. Chucos are square chunks of meat on a stick with a couple of white cornmeal biscuits stuck on the end. They had sausages comprised of rice and blood encased in pig gut. Colombian beer "cerveza" is very good and helped the tasty morsels settle down in place. We selected our food and sat down to enjoy it.

Wham! Clickity-click! Here comes a horse and man pasoing through the room. Diners yell bravo and ole! The excited colt didn't control his bowels, so feces hit the floor and splattered the diners. A lady in an evening dress brushed herself off and clapped her hands gleefully. Exit first horse, second enters. Then a guy rides and shows his horse. This isn't a huge building, so things become pretty hectic!

Before the evening was over, we saw Resorte III and his offspring, plus a favorite mare, Danesa and her get. But the horses worked too close for us and the room was too crowded for me to formulate any sort of opinion about these horses.

Next day, we returned to La Margarita for a better look. The Colombians wouldn't let us observe the Pasos, one by one, naturally. They always had to put on a big show.
First, they produced a parada (parade) of Resorte III and his offspring. All of the Ochoas, including Tulio the grandfather, led horses. Resorte III was ridden by Don Fabio's best rider. I had two 35mm cameras around my neck and a Super 8 movie camera in my hand. I often said that what I saw of Colombia was through a viewfinder.

After that, we had another parada of Danesa and her get. Of course, the foals of Resorte III and Danesa were in both parades. Though I did shoot a lot of film, I had enough time to evaluate the horses, so I knew what we were talking about when we had our lunch discussion.

For sure, lunch was a royal occasion! The food was magnificent and there was plenty of it. Seated close to Fabio Ochoa, I was amazed at the quantity he ate. I'd heard that he could eat a whole grapefruit before a meal and, after observation, believed what I'd heard. His build was immense and I'm sure he was as wide as he was tall.
After lunch, we talked. Jorge Ochoa, then a young lad, interpreted for us.

Don Fabio said, I give you the chance now to rectify your mistakes. You have traveled all over Colombia buying Pasos that are no good, but you should have come to me first for my horses are unequalled anywhere in the world. If you find a good horse somewhere else, it is because they owner purchased that horse from me. It is not too late! You can still be the best in the United States. These horses I have shown to you are sin par (without equal) anywhere. I will almost give these horses to you for I want you to be the best. When people visit your farm, they will be amazed at the magnificence of your horses and you will honor me by telling them where these great horses came from. I will give you Resorte III and nine mares for $100,000.

I explained that I was merely observing the horses and would report to my employer that I thought they were excellent. However, I didn't see how we could justify spending that amount of money for so few horses. I explained how our tax situation was, how we must make a profit in one year out of five.

Don Fabio folded his great arms over his massive torso and stared off into space. Clearly, he'd had his say and wasn't too interested in my words. The parades were over. He was sure he'd made a sale.

Our next stop was Bogota. Dr. Pedro Nel Arango, president of the Federation of Paso owners, met us and acted as our host for the first part of our stay. Dr. Arango was a lawyer and tall enough to play professional basketball. He was to assist us in locating offspring of Resorte III, for I was supposed to check out as many of them as possible.

After Don Pedro checked his papers, he told us that nearly all of the Resorte III offsprings' owners had moved away, died or had been kidnapped by aliens. We did look at a couple of terrible geldings that were supposed to be by Resorte III.
Pedro Nel Arango did happen to own La Guala, the mother of Resorte III. She was bred to his stallion Relicario. This old mare had very good hindquarters and rear legs were Resorte's biggest problem, having the condition called "camped out." I assumed therefore, that this problem came from his sire.

Let me digress however. I'm a real "bug" about conformation and I learned most about this from my old boss, Charles G. Araujo. When I see a horse with conformation problems, I check out his bad points before looking for the good ones.
Resorte III was badly camped out behind. When ridden, he'd prance on those back legs rather than stand still. He passed this fault on. During our trip, I saw a few very good looking Resorte III offspring, but they all had this problem. In a show ring, they "camped out." When Resorte III was an old horse, he became "string halted", and I'm sure it came from this rear end weakness. More about this later though.
Personally, I'd never use Resorte III as a breeding stallion, no matter how great a reputation he had, for you'd only be breeding future problems. Sometimes, a horse will have a fault and not reproduce it, but it's bound to crop up somewhere down the line. Our goal was to produce top conformation Pasos with natural gait. Few Colombian show horses we'd seen fit our criteria. Mahoma did though; there was no better Colombian Paso Fino than Mahoma.

From what I'd seen, most of the show horses were made-over trotters. Whe we were there, Don Danilo was the top show horse. He was performing at many big horse shows but was too good to be judged, so he was "out of competition." But we saw Don Danilo ridden bareback, with just a halter on his head, and he trotted!
When we looked at horses to buy, we wanted to see them do the Paso gait in the pasture or on a loose lead rope. Only those got my approval. We ended up with some trotters, but they were shipping mix-ups. With all of the nefarious dealings that went on after my inspections, there had to be a few mistakes.

By and large, the horses I put at the top of my lists were not show horses. They were the "transportation Pasos" in use every day in the Andes mountains. The conformation had to be good or they'd break down. The gait had to be good, for they were ridden comfortable over long distances every day. They also had to be very sure-footed to survive.

Our idea was to breed, raise and sell the world's best pleasure horse. Right from the start, I told Colin that I'd have nothing to do with making show horses. The colts we trained had to travel at a good Paso gait on a loose rein, sorta like a "gaited" Quarter horse.

Dr. Arango showed us the sights around Bogota. We lunched at a restaurant high above the Black Salt Mines, at an altitude of nearly 10,000 feet. I passed out during the soup course. Dr. Arango toted me to a couch in the main dining hall where the locals filed past me like mourners at a funeral. I'd quickly come to my senses, but I lay motionless, for I was still dizzy and queasy. I heard one guy ask the proprietor Was it the food or the bill that caused that gringo to pass out?

The others thought I had altitude sickness. Heck, I'd lived up above Cripple Creek, Colorado and my home was higher than this. I'd been feeling bad every trip and later we finally concluded the cause. We were taking prescription pills to ward off amoebic dysentery. If we'd purchased the pills without a prescription, we'd have had an enclosed warning that one must never use alcohol while taking them. We were drinking with our Colombian friends nearly every night.

Next day, I was a little weak but able to travel. We had a couple days before leaving Bogota, with nothing much to do. Alberto Lleras, a friend of my employer, came by for a visit. He told us there were some beautiful Pasos on a ranch where he hunted, so we decided to look them over.

Blas Cordoni, Colin Phipps' Colombian ranch manager, joined us for the rest of our visit. Don Alberto went with us to introduce us to the Paso owner, Eusubio Vargas. Sr. Vargas was very old; professed to speak no English, but was dressed like an English gentleman. I was told that he spent a lot of his time in England and that his claimed ignorance of the language might be a sham to lull us into discussing his horses close enough for him to hear our words.

The first of his Pasos we saw was Lisana and I perked up right away. She was a knockout! Sr. Vargas told his rider, Serviano Forrero, to ride her for us, but Don Serviano refused. Sr. Vargas apologized, saying that horse trainers were very temperamental. Finally, the portly rider saddled the filly and mounted.

Although Lisana performed beautifully, I noticed that she was very nervous. The saddle could have hurt for it was a terrible old beat up relic. Again came an apology from Sr. Vargas; he said all his good tack had been stolen.

The Paso mare herd was brought in and I was astounded with what I saw. A black mare, La Cucaracha, was perfection and her natural gait in the pasture was flawless. She couldn't be improved upon, but wait! That gray is a natural fino horse with flawless conformation! I asked her name. Morita Guatacana was the reply. Then I spotted a buckskin mare that seemed even better. Her name was Sarita Montiel. They must have been very high on her, for that's the name of a famous Colombian movie actress.

And so it went. The mares were not ridden for us but it wasn't necessary, for we saw the natural gait they had. Beautiful mares, beautiful gait! Again, I digress and chastise those who lump Colombian Pasos together. If you check out horses in the mountains rather than those you see in the show rings, you soon realize that you can't say that Colombian Pasos are not as naturally gaited as those from the islands or say, Peru. Travel and look before you make such broad statements!

They showed us the stallion, Hilachas. His forehead was ultra broad with large eyes. At first, he was ridden in a stone breaking pen for he hadn't been ridden in years and he jumps around a lot (bucks). He did a little cow-hopping and then an ultra fast largo. Soon, Serviano Forerro rode him down the dirt road. Hilachas could really pick 'em up and lay 'em down!

When I had a chance to really look him over, I noticed some conformation faults, enough to make me pause and question Alberto Lleras. Hilachas was too short in the leg and too long in the back. Yet, the colts and fillies were very well built. Was Hilachas truly the sire of the young Pasos I saw?

Don Alberto had known Sr. Vargas, the owner, for some time and was sure that Hilachas was the true sire of the other horses. To placate me, he asked some discreet questions of the help and was assured that Hilachas was truly their sire. Well it ain't the horse, it's what he produces, so I added Hilachas to my list of desirables. All told, we bought 28 Pasos from Sr. Vargas.

Again, I break off from the trip to discuss Hilachas. Back at the ranch in Tallahassee, I decided to ride Hilachas, for I believe a stallion needs to exercise to stay in shape. At first, he behaved beautifully, for he was still semi-shocked at being shipped, confined, flown, confined again and vanned up to us. (But more on his behavior later!)

One day, I rode him up to the barn where Colin was standing. Colin said He's trotting. I said The heck he is! for the gait was easy and smooth. Colin said, Listen to it. That's no Paso gait. Well, it did sound like a trot, but listening carefully, you could hear a "ta-dum, ta-dum", a little hoof hit breaking up the trot sound. When I collected him, the sound was pure Paso "ticka-ticka-ticka-ticka".

Today, I believe the uncollected gait of some pasos is what many people call the trocha. If I got on a "high-lifed" colt, he might do the pure Paso Corto (or, in some cases, even the Paso Fino, with reins hanging loose). We'd head for the trails and might travel six miles. The edge was then off the colt. He'd be a little tired and would perform the gait that looked and sounded like a trot but was very smooth. If I'd push him up in to the bridle and hold him in a little, the tired colt would then do the perfect Paso gait.

During his five years spent working almost exclusively with our breed in the 1960's, Dave Jones was privileged to meet, ride and/or work with many of the legendary Paso Finos.

Although Meridian Meadows, home of the "que tal" line of Pasos and most of these renowned horses have faded into the fabric of our history, Dave continues to practice his crafts at his north Florida training stable and saddlery.

To be continued ... part 5