Five Oaks Riding Stables — Attraction in Sevierville

If you have any sort of mobility life challenges, save yourself the time of even calling this place! If i could give 0 stars, I would! Let me begin by saying that I am not one to leave bad reviews, but I feel that it is necessary during times like this.

My boyfriend and I were visiting TN for a nice, long weekend! I am a manual wheelchair user and I have ridden horses before with no problem, so he decided to give this place a call for us to see if there were any accessibility options or if they were open to us giving it a try.

When the receptionist answered, he began giving her a little background on the fact that I use a wheelchair and immediately she began attempting to cut him off before he could even finish his question. Finally, she stopped attempting to talk and immediately gave him the answer " we have no accessibility. She can't do any of our activities." And ended the conversation.

Let me explain that we were NOT upset about the lack of accessibility, we were upset about the harsh and distasteful response to our simple question about accessibility.

I decided to call back and someone named Tonya answered the phone. I went on to calmly explain to her that in the future, she should let people finish their sentence/question before attempting to answer them. Additionally, I explained that if/when she encounters something similar, please attempt to deliver this information in a more respectful way, acknowledge that the business has not developed accessibility options yet, offer other suggestions in the area, apologize, etc. In response to the suggestions I offered, the only thing Tonya said was "Well you didn't talk to me" and when I asked her to show a little compassion for the situation and to pass on the message for awareness, I was AGAIN met with, "okay, but you didn't talk to me."

I was truly shocked at Ms. Tonya's response and total disregard to the situation. As I mentioned before, we were not upset about the non-accessibility, it was the way we were approached about it. With that being said, it is 2025 and I cannot understand how they do not offer accessible options for people with disabilities. If you own a business you should have access for ALL, not just MOST. Additionally, it is very evident that Ms. Tonya has not ever had to deal with the life challenges of having a disability. Even if it was not her that we spoke with (although I am pretty certain it was) she could not have cared less about our experience. She did not offer any apologies for the way we were treated and instead became defensive. ALSO, regardless if it was Tonya or not, she is the one answering the phones and representing the business. Not sure if she forgot that but she did a great job at making the entire business look like an unprofessional joke! I suggest this company seeks a person with a disability to offer some training and guidance on the proper and appropriate ways to interact with people with disabilities because it is truly lacking! There is not a single reason that excuses this treatment and I truly hope it does not happen to anyone else. It is difficult enough living with a disability, please don't make our...

Five Oaks Riding Stables offers a great beginner one hour horseback ride (this includes the time to saddle up/down and a short safety recording, so you probably get around ~45-50 mins of ride time on the trail). You should plan get there at least 20-30 mins before your time so that you can check in and get your wristband. They also have public restrooms at this check-in area (also in the gift shop you can order buy pictures from your horseback ride and/or Zipline adventure). The horse back ride itself: the horses walk super slow in a single file line over minimal inclines and declines through a forest trail that gets some shade and some sun. Children 12 and under are required to wear helmets (they have a row of helmets anyone can wear free of charge and in my opinion it is best practice to wear a helmet on a horse regardless of age, just in case). Also everyone needs to sign a waiver before riding (super quick to sign online when you book your tickets).

I got to ride a white and dark brown pinto horse named Constantine (also the horse behind me in the picture is named Sinbad) and he was a super sweet horse, such a good boy! He handled extremely well, listened and waited with the most minimum tug on the reins (I very lightly held the reins the entire ride) and followed the horse in front of him perfectly. The horse in front of him was Charlie and Charlie kept stopping every couple feet (it wasn't his fault though, I think he probably sensed his rider didn't want to be there and/or might have been feeling super hot since he is a huge dark brown horse and it was a super hot day of 100°F outside), which I think probably held up our ride and so we didn't do the whole 3.5 miles per my watch tracker (very sad, but oh well, since the horses need to have breaks after time in the hot sun to rehydrate and so the stables keep rides in that one hour slot - so even though we stopped a bunch we still got back at the allotted time).

Looks like a great experience for children (btw very small children can ride double: in front of an adult on the same horse) and I think they find it an adventure. Also, super great for novices of all ages that have never rode a horse before. If you have some horseback experience, this ride might be super slow and/or boring for you, but if you rarely ride or are scared of riding, this super easy and chill walk might paint a bright experience for your horseback riding.

P.S. They also have ziplining in the same place, so you can do a combo/both or have some people in your party do one or the other (which is what we did and it worked out great since the zipline is two hours and the horseback is an hour so if half the party goes ziplining at 1:30 and then the other party goes horseback riding at 2:30, then both will finish around 3:30). The staff are also all very friendly and helpful, I didn't have any issues with...

Worst experience here in Tennessee! I went here with my girlfriend for the nice views and calm horse ride, but got the opposite of that.

Horses were assigned by random. But when my horse was selected, I asked to have my girlfriend use the horse instead. But I was denied, and she was assigned the worst horse in the stable. What we experienced for the next hour was probably the worst hour we experienced here in Tennessee. Her horse was easily startled. And while my girlfriend kept the reins relaxed (I can easily see she was doing nothing), her horse tended to veer from side to side, making very sharp turns. At times coming very close to very dangerous ledges or going directly into the trees and bushes at the side of the trail. And instead of helping out or taking control, our guide told my girlfriend to “try harder”. And what’s worse, our guide mocked her to get cheap laughs from the rest of the group. It felt like she was being singled out. And at the end of the trip, our guide asked if this trip was my idea. Like our guide was trying to shift the blame to me and provoke our relationship. When I went to confront our guide about assigning an uncontrollable horse to my girlfriend and our guide’s mocking attitude, we were met with an “are you serious” reply. No sense of responsibility whatsoever.

Besides the unprofessional guide, the trail itself leaves a lot to be desired. The trail itself is very muddy and smelly. And that mud and stuff will easily fly to your legs. And since the trail is right next to a set of shopping malls, you can imagine the views we were getting. I recall only seeing a memorable view for all of two seconds.

All in all, the experience was ruined by our unprofessional guide and dirty trail. I do not know how this place gets as many good reviews at it does. But I guess the threshold for good online ratings should be much much...