St. Louis means BUDWEISER

And Budweiser means horses! Of course, I was lucky enough to have in laws who were more than happy to take B and I on a tour of Grant Farms and the Budweiser brewery, both of which house the lovely and infamous Budweiser Clydesdale horses! Grant's Farm was PaCkEd on the 3rd of July, so though we didn't get to see the lovely park itself, I did get to tour the barn. It seems as if Budweiser (Anheuser Busch -I have no idea how to spell that) keeps the older and younger horses at Grant's farms. Inside the barn was this distinguished gentleman (see pic Below). He stood there calmly whilst people walked through and watched his every move. He's famous ya' know. The stalls were VERY heavily padded with straw and my back hurt just thinking of the work the staff put in to keep it ever so immaculate. Big horses produce big - well, you know.

Next we strolled outside where I saw this young whipper-snapper. At first I thought he was a yearling, but then I noticed that he was pastured with what appeared to be his mother and another mare and her Baby Huey-esque foal. This could possibly be a 2009 babe - hmmmm...I dunno'. Regardless, these young ladies where given' him a nice ole' scratchin'. His lips were a quivering and he was quite a ham. The other three in his pasture weren't interested. They stayed in their turn out shed with their rumps turned to their admirers. (Pic Below)

After Grant's Farm, we made out way to the Budweiser Brewery. This is a free tour, FREE and they give you two full glasses of beer at the end. If you ever find yourself in St. Louie, head to the Brewery---ha ha! Enough of that. So, of course being the absolute freak that I am, I noticed these two before anything else. Aren't they handsome? According to our lovely tour guides, the horses are rotated throughout each day into these small paddocks. These guys were having a grand old time playing tag and grooming each other over the fencing. The horses are all hand walked for an hour each day as well. (pic. below)

The first thing we did in our tour of the brewery was my favorite - the stable! The stable is circular and sits smack dab in the middle of the A-Busch brewery. The brewery and tour itself reminded me a bit of Willy Wonka's candy factory. It was really cool indeed! So, in the pic. below you'll notice the lovely horse head - these were prominent all around the exterior of this stable - good lawd have mercy, it was gorgeous!

Upon entering what I must say is a ridiculously ornate stable, are chandeliers. At this point I was desperate to see the stalls and any semblance of a normal stable environment, but alas, it was all fancified for the public. It's gorgeous though, and any horse lovin' human can appreciate a very nice, very extravagant barn and it's very well taken care of occupants!

Below is a picture of the "tack room" as you can see, the harnesses are behind the glass.

Below is one of the stalls. Unfortunately for me, fortunately for the horses, the stalls and horse areas were roped off from the public. Though I was hankering to get back and investigate the horsiness of it all, I couldn't and had to fall in line with my mostly non-horsey fellow tourists and suffer through the actual beer making tour - blast!


These are the nicest standing stalls I've ever seen - notice the straw bank. To get this picture I had to pry my way through a crowd of women and children. The men were all tappin' their feet, looking to get on to the good stuff :).

Nice stained glass windows in every stall - these horses are living the High Life I tell ya'! Don't tell the Clyde's but I'm more of a Miller Lite girl myself ;)


There you have it!