How a Tech Bro Bought a Horse on Craigslist—and Became an Internet Villain

On its face, Cyril Bertheau seems to be on a journey that feel-good adventure stories are made of. The 24-year-old announced in March that he was quitting a six-figure tech job to purchase a horse off of Craigslist and ride it more than 2,100 miles from his home in Austin, Texas, to Seattle, Washington, in just 100 days.

He claims he’s doing it because of a tradition in his family where the oldest son on the father’s side embarks on a big adventure as a rite of passage. “I want to carry on the torch of my family tradition,” Bertheau told The Daily Beast. “This is the fourth generation of this tradition. I’m set on completing my original goal. I just feel the need to complete what I started.”

In early March, Bertheau—who has a history of show riding horses when he was younger—found a 13-year-old Tennessee Walking Horse named Falcon for $3,000. Bertheau crowdsourced a new name for the horse on social media, and eventually landed on Shiok after a user on TikTok suggested it, claiming the name was “Native American for horse that would fight monsters for you.”

(Shiok is an alternative spelling for Seu’ku, a trickster spirit known to the Alsea tribe who transformed from a whale into a monster-slayer, according to legend.)

On April 9, just a few weeks after he purchased the horse, Bertheau embarked on his journey during a kickoff ceremony at Zilker Park in Austin. His trip was covered by local news stations, The Daily Mail, The New York Post, Fox News, and even a segment on Fox & Friends. Videos of him riding Shiok—donning leather chaps, spurs, and a cowboy hat like a modern-day folk hero—appeared on TV screens all across the U.S. The stories are brimming with romanticism, depicting a young man fulfilling his birthright with nothing but a loyal horse and the road stretched in front of him.

But critics fear the truth might be far less rosy. Since starting his journey, Bertheau earned the ire of horse experts, veterinarians, and equestrian TikTokers who accuse him of abusing a horse in order to garner fame, money, and an eventual deal to sell the rights of his story to Netflix. Critics have a growing laundry list of accusations against Bertheau: inadequate training of the horse for the long journey; poor preparation; and even neglecting the health and well-being of the animal.

“He thrives in drama,” Ailen Garcia Gorrita, a TikTok and Instagram creator and professional ranch hand and horse wrangler in Montana, told The Daily Beast.

CuCullhaine O’Reilly, founder of the Long Riders’ Guild, an organization dedicated to equestrian explorers and history, called Bertheau an example of what he jokingly termed “Equestrian Narcissistic Disorder.” He told The Daily Beast: “Stunters like Bertheau can buy a cowboy hat, borrow a saddle, and then set off on a mute equine victim.”

Bertheau’s journey has sprouted an ecosystem of content on TikTok, Facebook, YouTube, and Instagram from people attempting to stop him from continuing his journey. A Change.org petition titled “Stop Cyril Bertheau 2Raw2Ride Horse Abuse” was even created two weeks ago, and has gathered nearly 1,800 signatures at the time of reporting.

Some have offered to purchase Shiok from Bertheau. They’ve attempted to track him down—with one person allegedly stalking him, according to Bertheau. At one point, he said that he even got into a “physical altercation” with a man at a barn dance he was invited to in Carlsbad, Texas, who was enraged by Bertheau’s alleged abuse and neglect of Shiok.

Yet, despite all this, Bertheau said that he’s taking care of Shiok, feeding and watering him enough, and regularly taking him to the vet—with each visit allegedly resulting in a clean bill of health. In videos, he’s shown interacting with animal control and law enforcement who, on at least one occasion, assessed that Shiok was healthy. One equine veterinarian even told The Daily Beast that Shiok appeared healthy in the videos and pictures she saw of him from after a few weeks into his journey.

Still, this has done little to abate the concerns of his critics online—many who fear he could be riding Shiok into his grave.

Silent Alarms

Mariah Hendrickson first came across Bertheau after her sister sent her a video of his send-off party for the trip. The horse trainer from North Dakota said she instantly felt alarm bells going after watching it.

“Just in that video, there were so many red flags that I thought it was a joke,” Hendrickson, who goes by the handle @lezbequestrian21 on TikTok, told The Daily Beast. “I thought he was just going to go ride around the park. I was like, ‘There’s no way that this guy is going to make it from Texas to Seattle, with what he’s currently got going on.’”

Among the list of concerns that Hendrickson and other TikTok creators had were Bertheau’s outfit—he had on spurs and leather chaps, which add an unnecessary amount of weight to Shiok and, in the case of the spurs, could harm him if used incorrectly or for too long.

Follow-up videos of Bertheau’s gear underscored Hendrickson’s concerns. To her, he seemed to carry excessively heavy and unnecessary items like corn oil, a GoPro with a mount, two battery packs, and Lululemon shirts; while lacking necessary equipment, like electrolyte paste, sunscreen for the horse, and enough food.

As he posted updates, “people really started seeing the condition of the horse,” Hendrickson said. She added that his equipment wasn’t properly fitted, the horses’ bit was upside down, and he was even using the wrong kind of reins. “You could just tell that he didn’t know what he was doing.”

“When I look at these videos, I see so many red flags,” concurred Garcia Gorrita.

When asked about these claims, Bertheau called them “baseless claims and don’t warrant a response from me.”

In the past month, Hendrickson and Garcia Gorrita have dedicated a good portion of their content on TikTok to criticizing Bertheau. They both stressed this was not an indictment against long riding: the practice of riding horses on journeys of typically more than 1,000 miles. Instead, they describe it as an attempt to save the life and well-being of Shiok, who they say is just an innocent horse caught up in the ambitions of Bertheau.

They’re not alone either. Scrolling through the TikTok videos with the tag “2Raw2Ride” reveals a community of users who have created hundreds of videos for the purposes of exposing what they say is the abuse and neglect of Shiok. Many users still call the horse Falcon as a symbolic rejection of Bertheau’s journey.

One commonly raised concern is whether or not Shiok is lame, which describes injury or pain that changes the horse’s gait. At its most severe, lameness can result in the permanent loss of mobility and often requires the animal to be euthanized.

Best Laid Plans

In rural Texas communities, word travels fast—especially in the internet age when social media and cellphones keep even the most remote ranching communities plugged in. So when Jo, a Texas rancher who asked that their real name be withheld so they could speak freely about their experience, first encountered Bertheau on the road, they already recognized him from the internet—though they weren’t aware of his online infamy.

Jo invited Bertheau and Shiok to stay at their ranch for a few weeks so the two could rest and recuperate (though the pair would stay only a few days). Jo, who has cared for and rescued abused horses for years, said that they began to notice red flags sprout up during Bertheau’s stay.

“He didn’t feed his horse while he was here,” Jo said. “He didn’t bother checking on his horse. Instead, Shiok’s care fell on Jo, who claimed they fed the horse roughly $400 worth of their own feed and supplements during the pair’s stay. Bertheau expressed skepticism about this dollar amount when asked for a comment, adding that Jo now has a GoFundMe with a goal of $2,000 organized by other users who want to reimburse her for the cost of the feed.

Jo also noticed Shiok looked skinnier compared to older videos and photos. They said they found a crack in the animal’s hoof, and saw him wince as they ran their hand along his back—a sign that an improper saddle has been making the horse’s back and neck sore.

When asked about the injuries, Bertheau acknowledged that Shiok has a “small crack in his hoof,” but said it has been “examined by multiple farriers and it doesn’t require any action at the moment.” He added that he monitors it daily.

Bertheau also said that Shiok’s “weight has dropped a bit” but is now back up. “My team and I monitor it constantly and adapt according to his needs,” he said. “He’s not injured and has been cleared by vets three times already.”

Still, despite these claims being made publicly on his TikTok and Instagram videos, it has seemingly done little to nothing to quell the fears of equestrians and horse trainers online—including the rancher who he stayed with.

“[Bertheau] has no idea what he’s doing,” Jo said. “His horse is hurt, and his horse hates him. I watched that horse walk away from him but when I went out there, he walked up to me.” Jo later took videos and photos of Shiok and shared them to Hendrickson who, in turn, shared them with her followers.

Jo also claimed that Bertheau acknowledged to them he was looking to make money off the journey, including selling the horse later on, and hopes to sell the footage of his journey and rights to his story to Netflix.

When asked if he had entertained any offers to purchase his horse, Bertheau told The Daily Beast: “I’m not going to say yes, and I’m not going to say no.” He also declined to comment on whether or not he was attempting to sell footage and rights to his story to Netflix.

O’Reilly, the founder of the Long Riders’ Guild, said he believes Bertheau represents a long line of amateur horsemen who have attempted long rides without the careful planning and consideration needed for it to be done safely and successfully, often in a woeful attempt for fame. The result of such poor planning can end with the death of the horses. A professional horse trainer at Wes Weber Performance Horse’s in Oakville, Texas, who spoke with The Daily Beast on the condition of anonymity agreed.

Typically, a journey of more than 1,000 miles on a horse requires months if not years of planning, according to the two. It’s not unlike preparing to hike the PCT or the Appalachian Trail. You need to be physically prepared. You need to have specific places to stop to feed, water, and rest the horse.

Bertheau has avoided such preparation. “Most of the training actually has been on preparing the horse mentally,” he said. “Because, if you think about it, how do you train a horse to get more endurance? Well, it’s by riding and so I’ve just been gradually increasing the mileage since I started.” He added that there have been “plenty of rest days so that [Shiok] gets enough time to recuperate and make sure his hydration levels are good.”

O’Reilly, who has had decades of long riding experience, expressed his horror at this training approach. “If you think about it, this single discovery confirms the magnitude of Cyril’s ignorance,” O’Reilly said. “Saying he was preparing the horse mentally is rubbish. What he admits without saying so is that he gave the animal no physical training prior to departure. This is an admission of enormous ignorance.” Bertheau declined to comment on these accusations.

When asked about his route planning process, Bertheau said that it was “more of a feeling-out process.” He explained that the details of the route are based on “energy expenditure” and “mileage that I can cover in a day, food and water for my horse, and stuff like that.”

O’Reilly thinks Bertheau’s statements “prove that he is riding blind and making it up as he goes. [As] Bertheau proves, horses continue to be ruthlessly exploited by individuals who are increasingly using social media to turn horses into disposable props.”

He bluntly added: “Cyril Bertheau is… a disgrace to every horse-loving American.”

A Provocation and Altercation

Bertheau said he wrote down a list of responses to his “haters” when he spoke to The Daily Beast. Though he wouldn’t disclose his exact location, he implied he was still in Texas despite being nearly a third of the way through his 100-day goal.

He began by saying that “99 percent of people have been just super supportive and offered me water, food, money, and a place to stay” despite what the backlash online seems to represent.

“Most of the big TikTok creators that have been big critics of me and my trip and how it’s been going about it, do not care whatsoever,” he said. “Some content creators have started making products to sell and going off my grind.”

Bertheau noted that he is stopping at the vet to get Shiok checked up every two weeks, claiming each visit has issued a clean bill of health. He has also been stopped multiple times by law enforcement officials and animal control who have been contacted throughout the course of his trip by the digital community that has banded together to stop Bertheau’s journey. Each time, he said he was released without issue. The Daily Beast could not independently verify these claims, but Bertheau has been seen on video interacting with law enforcement and animal control who seemingly haven’t confiscated Shiok and, in at least one instance, have noted that the horse looks healthy and fine.

While he wouldn’t go into detail with what specifically these check ups and interactions have resulted in, Janice Kritchevsky, an equine veterinarian and researcher at Purdue University, told The Daily Beast said that Shiok seemed to be in relatively good health based off of the videos and pictures provided by both Bertheau and Jo—though they added that there was only so much they could assume without physically examining the horse. Pictures and videos only tell part of the story.

The veterinarian did note a few causes for concern, such as his gear check video in which he commented that he packed a screwdriver to remove Shiok’s shoes. When asked about this, Bertheau said that he only lets professional farriers work on Shiok and included the screwdriver in the video intentionally.

“That was me poking fun at haters online and giving them something to talk about,” he said. “I would obviously never do that and have access to a network of farriers along my route.”

In all, Bertheau seemed taken aback by all of the backlash he has received. He said Shiok has been eating and drinking very well, consuming an average of “about 12 pounds of grain” and “20 pounds of forage” a day. “This horse is spoiled as much as I can spoil him,” Bertheau said. “The closest thing I can compare him to is a professional athlete. He has all of his protein, fiber, electrolytes, and forage.” Bertheau also said that he has a team of people behind him every step of the way, though he declined to go into detail of who was in this team and what their roles were.

These counterarguments haven’t assuaged some people’s concerns, and Bertheau continues to receive threats. He was physically attacked at a barn dance in Carlsbad, Texas, on April 22 (Jo told The Daily Beast they were present for the party and witnessed the altercation). In a video posted to Instagram more than a week later, Bertheau said the man who attacked him was immediately escorted out of the party, and added that the man was a firefighter whose girlfriend allegedly worked as a vet technician at a veterinary hospital in San Angelo, Texas, where he took Shiok/Falcon. She had allegedly told the boyfriend about the signs of abuse she had seen from the horse.

In the video, Bertheau doxxed the identities and Facebook pages of the person who had been following him, the firefighter, and the vet tech, and added he would be “planning legal action against both of them.”

Bertheau said the altercation hasn’t slowed him down in the slightest. “I’m prepared for any situation,” he said. “Let’s just put it that way.”

Double Down

In fact, Bertheau seems to be more emboldened than ever. Before he got off the phone with The Daily Beast on May 8, he said that there was “big news coming very, very soon.” That night, he revealed he had obtained a second horse dubbed Ol’ Pete for the rest of his journey, much to the chagrin of TikTok.

“Pack horse makes it easier on my lead horse during the day and packs most of the gear,” Bertheau told The Daily Beast in a text message. “It also allows me to carry much more grain for my horses and I can swap lead [horses] every couple days to give the other one a bit of rest.”

He added that the additional animal would provide “better morale” for his horse. “Horses are pack animals and it gives Shiok a friend,” he said.

Responding to this update, O’Reilly still stressed his concerns. “The pack horse, like the road horse, requires special training,” he said.

Bertheau set out to chart his own adventure story—but, if critics like Hendrickson, Jo, and O’Reilly are to be believed, he’s pulled viewers into a horror movie instead. It’s one that they fear will end badly for Shiok, all while people watch from the comfort of their smartphones.

Bertheau still has thousands of miles to go between Texas and Washington—and like any captivating story, anything can happen between now and then. “There’s a whole lot more of me coming—so get strapped in,” Bertheau said. “This is just the start of my journey.”