Horse sense: Cleaning smelly stables is Shania's favorite pastime.

AVID equestrian Shania adores her four horses, even bringing one of them with her when she tours. And nothing makes her happier than cleaning out their smelly stables at her upstate New York ranch!

"She cleans out their stalls herself," says an insider. "She finds it  very relaxing." Shania and her producer hubby, Robert "Mutt" Lange, 51, also relax by practicing Sant Mat, an Indian form of meditiation. 

And while other country stars are tied to Nashville, they love to get away to their $ 5 million, 19th century manor house in Tour-de-Peliz, Switzerland. "It's far enough away for Shania to escape the fans in America and Canada," says the insider. "She's fanatical about her privacy." So fanatical, sources report, that the 33-year-old diva's been called "anti-social."

"When she hires back-up singers for her stage show she doesn't speak to them," says a source. "That's made her unpopular in the country music business. But Shania doesn't care about being liked in Nashville. She's always been a loner."

The sultry singer had a chance to truly outrage the Nashville community by being the first country queen to shed her revealing stage garb for a nude layout in Playboy.  "She's proud of her body and was tempted by their $ 1 million offer," says the insder, "but in the end she turned it down because she didn't want to upset her family."

All material ©1999 Globe, Inc.