The best of times! I owned my 1st horse in 2004 and the barn was right in the middle of the far turn. Only a very short walk up the hill to the fence. Used to chat with Bruce Ranger and others right before the race went off!!
However, when you had Vince Silvestri’s ‘hot to trot’ show with the fireworks and Roman candles, the barn wasn’t the best place to be. If you didn’t tranquilize your horse, they did circles in their 10 x 10 stalls and you had a fear of getting your horse injured or killed because of the explosions on the track!
