Road Tripping Dogs - Dunsborough, WA

Last weekend we went on a 3 hour road trip with the dogs, down to Dunsborough WA for a wedding. We stayed in a dog friendly house so that we could leave the dogs there while we attended to the wedding formalities.

There was a problem with the house though - it was two stories, and both the sets of stairs were scary! Out the front of the house, they had what Honey the Great Dane calls 'skeleton stairs'. They are scary for doggies because they sort of 'disappear' when the dog looks at them.

If you look at them from this angle you can see what I mean. Barbie hates this type of stairs. She tends to lack confidence putting her back feet down. She did manage to get up and down these stairs many times but she really did not like it.

Inside there were shiny, steep stairs.

We drove to Dunsborough after work, and the traffic was shocking, so we were all tired and it was dark by the time we got there. I let Bender run up the front stairs, and N got into the house. I went back down to get Barbie.

While I was coaxing her up the stairs, and we were about half way up, I heard a monstrous crash. N started yelling at me to come and help her. I thought something really bad had happened but Barbie got spooked and refused to move.

I got her up the stairs in another minute or so with a lot of excited happy voices, and discovered Bender and N at half way point of the shiny stairs. Bender had just charged into a dark room and fell down them. He was OK, and he came up the stairs when I called him.

Unfortunately, no-one has ever accused Bender of being a fast learner. He fell down the steps a second time that night. After that he didn't go near them again.

When they needed to go for their toilet break, I had to leash them up and get them up and down the front stairs. I had to do this twice, once just before bed, and a second time at dawn.



The dogs did enjoy the little backyard though, which of course, was down stairs and around the back.

We decided after the first night that the dogs and I could live downstairs and save all the dramas. It was much more convenient.

The wedding was in the evening, so we had all of Saturday to take the dogs exploring. We found a really lovely dog beach with a sand bar, and Barbie and Bender loved it so much.



Bender spent at least an hour just fetching his ball, over and over and over and over and over and over.

Barbie and I went for a walk, and then I decided, after checking out the beach that it would be safe for her to go for a bit of a sprint. I had my GoPro, so I managed to capture her in action. There was a group of people up the beach, and I could hear them cheering her on, though as usual they assumed she is a boy dog.



As she ran towards them I heard them saying 'go, go, open it up big fella!'



She decided she needed a rest, so she dug up the sand a bit to make it nice and soft. After a while, we packed them up into the car and went to the next dog beach. We went for a wander along the second beach without Bender's ball. It is always a bit strange having him trot along side us without having his eyes fixed on a ball. We can only do this on deserted beaches, as if any other dogs have balls and he doesn't he will go and steal theirs.

After all the running they were very happy to settle down on their beds whilst we went out.



The wedding was on the beach, and it was lovely. We popped back to the house before we went to the reception just to make sure everyone was behaving. They were.

Sunday morning the dogs were keen to go out on another adventure. We were intending on coming back via Dwellingup to check out the Murray River at Baden Powell, as we had a great December storm and the river was up.

We went out for breakfast first though, and the dogs were very patient with us. We drove to the Gecko Cafe and Gallery in Quindalup which seemed like a lovely laid back place.





Bender did decide he wanted to greet everyone who came in though! They were all very nice to him. Breakfast was expensive but yummy.

When we drove to Dwellingup after breakfast with a stop for the doggies to stretch their legs at a road house.

Turns out the river was too high for the dogs to swim, and I got scared off taking it on in my kayak as well.



We drove home from there without much more than a little walk. There were a lot of horrible March flies around and they were trying to eat us all.

The dogs were so exhausted when we got home that Barbie went into this pose for at least 48 hours.

Back from NZ

The dogs are tired after their exciting two weeks in the kennel, and the kitties are being somewhat demanding, but we are now home from our flying two week visit to the North Island of New Zealand. While we were there we met up with Beryl, Frankie and Sue from Greyhounds Can Sit. We also met a few of their friends.

I met a lot of kitties on our travels as well, N likes to call me 'The Cat Whisperer'. I will do a bigger post with photos of everyone soon, but in the mean time here is the holiday video. You will spot the other blogging doggies at the end, but there is also footage from the Bay of Islands, a lot of stuff around Rotorua, snow at Whakapapa, basically all the great bits!

More Road Trip (Day 6, 7 & 8) Exmouth - Bush Bay - Geraldton - Perth

After our last coffee at the homestead, we packed up and bid farewell to Yardie Creek Caravan Park. We headed back down the coast towards Carnarvon. We stopped briefly in Carnarvon to take the dogs for a walk and a wee break.

We saw a group of young indigenous fellas jumping off a bridge and swimming near a housing estate in town, and we decided it would be a good place to walk. When we got up there though, Bender didn't want to walk over the bridge - it was a weird bridge, an old railway bridge which seemed to be a drawbridge. It freaked him out. Anyway we were surrounded by the young guys, they were most interested in Barbie.

I suppose I should explain a bit here. Greyhounds seem to have a different reputation amongst country dwelling Aboriginal people than they do amongst urban folks. We live quite close to a train station, and often there are young Aboriginal guys hanging around the train station, the shops, or the nearby park who see Barbie and I stroll by. They always say 'hey, roo-dog! get 'im a good feed of roo.." Most kangaroos would be no match for a savvy Greyhound, that's for sure. Anyway it's happened so often that I have the idea there are at least some Greyhounds being used to hunt kangaroos in outback Australia.

Back to our stroll in Carnarvon...the now familiar "hello roo dog" was voiced as they all came in for a pat. They were less sure of Bender, but as Bender stayed calm some of them patted him as well. After a lot of questions about our "roo dog" we went on our way, bundled back into the car and headed towards our camp site in Bush Bay.

By the time we got to Bush Bay the sun was pretty low in the sky. It's a popular fishing spot and a few people were pulling their boats out and leaving by the time we had set up.

The tide was heading out as the sun was going down, so we went for a stroll along the beach. Barbie was being driven crazy by the small, zippy little birds that were on the mud flats hunting. She could only see them when they moved but she really wanted to give chase.

Both the dogs seemed to enjoy the walk.... and then we went back to cook dinner - but there was a huge problem - the gas hose for the stove had sprung a leak. No cooking for us! We had to eat the mangoes that they had given us up in Exmouth for dinner. We didn't really have much food left!

The dogs lying politely on their beds - got a good night's sleep despite being a little hungry. I even munched on some dry pasta - it wasn't particularly satisfying. Next camping trip I think I will bring some 2 minute noodles to eat in case we have issues with the stove again - at least you can chew them more easily dry than pasta.

Barbie woke me up in time to see the sunrise, though Bender didn't seem to want to go anywhere. I took Barbie for a wander around so that she could toilet, and then ran into N and Bender down on the beach - I guess he wanted to come after all!

We packed up as quickly as possible because I was hungry - we stopped at the first roadhouse we came across (which I think was Wooramel Roadhouse, 100ks South of Bush Bay). There was a scraggly little Jack Russell dog there who came trotting over to me and the dogs while N was in the road house getting our food.

We had lunch at Billabong Roadhouse, which has become a favorite of ours, and the lady there remembered us. She said 'wow, quick trip', and chatted to us about her dog - apparently he catches budgies (which are a small Australian native bird) and buries them on his walks. We sat in the shade near the roadhouse and watched her big dog in his backyard. Bender and Barbie were very good, not trying to get over to him or bark at him. He was a big brindle mastiff type dog.

After a fair bit of driving, we pulled over for a break at the rest area at the Murchison River. There is free camping here, and I think if we didn't have a house to stay in at Geraldton, this is where we would drive to on the first day heading North.

This lizard decided to pose for the camera - he was very cute and he wasn't afraid of the dogs at all.

Barbie decided she was hot, so she lay down in the water. The water was pretty stinky!!!

We let Bender offleash as there weren't many people around and the ground was hot - so I thought it would be better for him if he could choose where he put his paws. When I took his leash off he looked around at me, surprised, like he was saying "really?..... thankyou!"

It was just a short drive to Geraldton from the Murchison rest stop, and we stayed again at the house with the neighbouring horse. Bender kept asking to go out the back but he wasn't allowed. We had a great night's sleep, and headed back to Perth the next day.

The kitties both greeted us enthusiastically when we got home, and the dogs passed out. I think they slept for two days straight!

So that's it, our road trip up North with the dogs. Overall pretty successful if I do say so myself!

Dogs & Cats of Europe

I find it hard to be away from my pets for a long time, though sometimes if I can pat and play with other doggies and kitties, it helps a little. The problem was that in France, the dogs weren't interested in talking to me. Firstly, they didn't understand what I was saying to them! I learned that the French word for dog is 'chiot', or the plural is 'chien'. I found I could get their attention by saying that word, but the problem was I couldn't really speak to their owners without an elaborate pantomime.


I met this dog in the Pyrenees in a town called Bareges. We were in town looking for somewhere to get dinner, and I decided to check out an outdoor store. I had decided I needed a new rucksack, because the kit bag that I bought to carry my clothes around in was showing signs of breaking at an inopportune time (maybe when I was trying to haul it to a tight train connection, along with rolling the massive Samsonite suitcase which contained my Bike Friday). He was hanging around outside the shop, and seemed totally disinterested in me until I called him 'chiot'. Then he came trotting over for some attention. I saw him again the next night, and I called to him. He trotted towards me but then got distracted by another dog which was with it's owner in the nearby park. I never figured out who his owner was, he had a collar but he seemed to just wander freely all over town.

This kitty was the first campsite-kitty that we met. We were hanging out in the common room in Olonne-Sur-Mer, and watching Sarah Connor Chronicles on my tiny netbook. We then heard fireworks (it was the pre-tour-de-france party), so Nic went rushing outside. I saw kitty sitting on a tree stump just outside, so I started talking to him. Unlike the dogs, the cats didn't seem to have a language barrier. I think maybe cats don't recognise as many individual words, and go more by body language than dogs do. Anyway, he came into the common room and had a good smooch. After the fireworks, one of the campsite staff came to lock up the common room, and he told me the kitty did many 'bad things' around the campsite. He couldn't really specify what those bad things were, language barrier again, but regardless of his alleged misdeeds, I thought he was lovely, if a little dirty.

We met this kitty when we stopped for lunch - we had been to the local patisserie and bought lunch, and sat down on a park bench to eat. I spotted this kitty staring us down from it's position on a nearby side street. After I'd finished eating I decided to say hello. It didn't take much before this kitty was purring and carrying on! There was another cat nearby who was sitting underneath a parked car, but it didn't want to chat. It showed a passing interest but when N tried to get near it, it retreated further underneath the car.

We took a wrong turn trying to follow the bike path to Karlsruhe and ended up meeting this kitty. She was strutting along the path, probably on patrol, or on the hunt. She actually acknowledged us as we were riding towards her with a little 'brrrt', so I had to stop for a pat.

This kitty was also in Bareges. We stayed at that campground for 4 or 5 nights, and we only saw this kitty once. It came to investigate our tent and figure out if we were approved to be on it's turf. Turned out to be a friendly kitty, but it went home after it was satisfied we should be permitted to camp on it's land.

Thoughts on Travel without the furkids

My pets are all young. The oldest is Froufrou, turning 5 in December. Still, it is very clear to me how short my time with them is going to be. I expect that the cats will live to be ancient, bony, goddesses, I don't expect the dogs to last that long. My first dog died of a mysterious neurological illness after just a year, and so while they have their expected life spans, anything can happen!

Time away from us is hard for the fur kids as well. I have found a really cool kennel that allows them to run around in a fenced paddock all day, but there's only so long you would want your dogs in that kind of environment. I left Bender and Barbie there for a few days and they had gone a bit feral when they got back home.

Most people I know view travel as a 'knotch on your belt', and do all those Facebook apps where you plot all the cities & towns you've been to. Peru was the latest 'must go' location, and quite a few people have fairly new albums. All the photos look similar, just different faces in them.

Not to say I am totally devoid of wanderlust, but when it means being away from the creatures I love, it is tempered somewhat. That doesn't seem to be the case for N, who hadn't been overseas when she met me. Trips are also limited by the fact that I only get 4 weeks leave a year. N has a more flexible roster that allows her to take more time off. She seems to accumulate Days In Lieu far more easily as well. They discourage that kind of thing at my workplace, stating that we must have a good work/life balance. I would be happier if we knocked the working week down to 35 hours though.

Anyway we are going on an overseas holiday next year. The longest I could manage is just over 6 weeks. Mainly limited by the leave available to me, but also by my desire to be near my fur kids! I'm not sure N understands. I also want to travel within Australia some more. The country is vast and there are many places we haven't been. It would be most awesome if we could do some kind of mega road trip and take the dogs with us at least. I joke that I want to be a 'grey nomad' without the grey, but N isn't super keen on Australia-travel.

I will get 3 months worth of long service leave if I stay at my current organisation for another 5 years. That might be the soonest I could go on such a road trip. By then Barbie will be 8, and Bender will be 9. Probably good ages if they are still fit and strong and healthy.

In the meantime I need to organise a first camping trip for Barbie. I can't believe we haven't been camping together yet! We need a bigger tent so that both the dogs will fit without forcing me to curl up like a echidna.