Its official - gazebos and gusty winds do
not make for a good combination! However, apart from our ad hoc wrestling with
the gazebo on Saturday (thanks to Becky and David for bringing theirs!) accompanied
by the ad hoc wrestling of Blue and his new best friend Iris, our merry band of
SEA members enjoyed a relaxed weekend among many curly-tailed and fluffy-bottomed
dogs!! We were rather spoilt by Harriet bringing some delicious cupcakes not
only for us, but also for our four-legged friends. Sif’s new girlfriend was
briefly thinking of changing owner, but only very briefly.
To say we (Eurasiers) were outnumbered was
an understatement. However all our dogs were on their best behaviour - great
ambassadors for their breed among the unruly throngs of yipping and
yapping Poms, Japanese Spitz and Finnish Lapphunds, which accounted for a large
proportion of the dogs on site.
Throughout the day there were lots of
enjoyable things to do, including some serious or not-so-serious dog shows, resulting
in places for several, all of which included wonderful, larger-than-life
rosettes. Gustav first won Handsomest Dog in the Fun Show and then went on to
win Best Novelty! Sheeba came second in Veteran. Annie and Sif were both
entered in the ‘serious’ Pedigree Dog Show and Annie won the big Open Spitz
class (males and females of all Spitz breeds) and then Reserve Best in Show
(like mother, like son)!
Good citizen assessments and eye tests by a qualified ophthalmic
vet were also available. Maybe the best result of the day was both Gustav and
Blue passing their temperament tests with ‘excellent’.
To keep us all entertained, on site there
was a lovely canal-side walk along with a fabulous supervised agility course
- tickets just £1 along with an assortment of other fund-raising
activities e.g. raffles, ‘guess the number of biscuits in the jar’ to just name
a few.
For those that chose to, overnight camping
was available, or alternatively there was also the option of a local dog-friendly
hotel, so no excuses for next year!!!
By Ann Winter
