Boxing Day

We spent Christmas Day at Audrey's kennel. Molly came with us and Kevin was there too. A little later, two of Audrey friends, Lochie and Gracie came, so there were 3 Scottish Deer Hounds (Audrey, Lochie and Gracie), 2 NSDTR's (us), Molly the Tenterfield/Jack Russell and Kevin the Suburban terrier. There were a lot of humans there too but they don't count.
After lots of games, food and drinks we all went home and vowed to meet up again next year. We were exhausted when we got home and slept like babies. Molly went to bed and we have not seen her since.
Today we got stuck into our Chews. I got a pig's ear and Hannah had a beef hide roll so that should keep us quiet for a couple of hours.

Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas everybody! Its that time of the year again when humans buy each other gifts, drink until their boots wobble, eat until the scales scream "Get off", and they dress us up in funny hats so they can take weird photos of us. Well, they did it again. We are wearing our Christmas Hats, our Christmas Collars, our dumbbells have Christmas paper on them and we are jumping a tinsel covered jump. Still, it seems to make the humans happy, and when they are happy they give us more Scooby Snacks. So Bring On Christmas.

Murray Mouth

KnK told us we were going to see the Murray Mouth. We were expecting to see a great gaping maw with poison dripping from huge fangs, but it was just where a river meets the sea. The Murray - Darling river system collects water from Queensland, NSW, the Snowy Mountains and the Canberra sewage farm and  brings it to the sea just behind us in the pic.
We are in Goolwa for a few days holiday. It has been hot so far but we have been on lots of walks when it cools down. May get a swim at the dog beach later.

Molly's Visit

Molly has come to visit for a few days, The pic shows us sitting out side with Molly. We have had a good week, Hannah won the Obedience Bitch and the Agility Bitch awards for the Gundog Club on Monday night, I got second. We both got awards for our titles too so we have quite a few trophies to add to our trophy cabinet.
The other night there was a thunder storm and a tree got hit in the park behind us. There was a big flash and a bang, we woke up and barked, KnK got up and staggered about until they realised what was going on, then took another ten minutes to calm us down. Molly was in the front bedroom and woke up Maisie, so nobody got any sleep.

Hannah's ADX pass

My baby Sister has passed her first Agility Dog Excellent course on the first attempt! She only got her AD title 22 days ago, and here she is with her first ADX pass. It was not easy for her, Kathy has an injury to her foot and it is strapped so Kathy can not move as well as she should, but they got round the course with a few seconds to spare. Hannah went visiting on her Jumping course so that was a non qualification.
I was in Masters, and we were doing very well until about halfway round when we got mixed up a bit and I passed a jump on the Agility course, and I missed an entry into a tunnel on the Jumping course, but we got round all the difficult bits. Keith is happy we are getting better, the new training system seems to be working.

Night Trial

We were at the trials last night, doing Open Obedience. The pic shows me returning over the jump with the Dumbbell in my mouth. I was going well, until we got to the 3 minute sit stay when I forgot what I was doing and lay down. Keith was not too upset, because we qualified in all the other exercises. Hannah was not happy in her heeling and did not do a sit, then she had a scratch in the Recall, and when she finished scratching she chased after Kathy. She passed everything else so maybe things are not too bad. That was the last Obedience trial for the year for us, so we get a few months break while we brush up on our skills for next year.

Grampians

The touring Tollers were at the Grampians yesterday. We went for a day out to the Grampians mountains, named after the Scottish range.The pic shows us where we stopped for lunch near Lake Fyans with the mountains in the background. The last time KnK were here was during the drought and the lake was almost dry, just a puddle in the middle, but now it is full again. That was before either of us were born. After the drive we went for a run at the dog club grounds, then back to the caravan for a good feed and a long sleep.

Warrnambool Holidays

The trials are over, we are in holiday mode now for next week.
Hannah got her AD title, the pic shows her coming out of the tunnel half way round one of her runs on the weekend. I did several runs with no course faults but with time faults, and several runs with no time faults, but 5 or 10 course faults, but no clear rounds.
We spent today recovering from the week end of 24 runs between us. We were worn out and hardly moved until about 3 o'clock in the afternoon. Luckily it has cooled down a bit so we will be doing the tourist thing for the next few days.

Hannah AD

Hannah got her AD Title today, she just missed out by being distracted on one jump in the morning trial, but got everything right in the Afternoon trial. Hopefully we will have more news tomorrow.

Hannah Passes in Novice

Hannah has her second pass in Agility Novice after a great run at the Gawler trials. There were a couple of moments when things did not look too good, like the way she clung to the Table with her toe nails to prevent her slipping off because she hit it a bit too quickly, but she made it and even got third place overall. The pic shows Hannah doing her warm up exercises before the run. Her Jumping Excellent class was good too, just two faults on a very difficult course. The faults were on the easy bits so she did do the serpentine and the 200 degree turn into a blind tunnel, but there was just those two little drops in concentration that cost the trial. I was in masters, but I was not feeling all that well, and was ill last night. I hope I am fully recovered for next week end in Wanrnambool.

Mount Gambier Trials

We were trialing again last week end, at Mount Gambier, where the world famous Blue Lake is. The pic shows Hannah clearing the last jump in her Jumping Excellent trial. She did very well, until she went to see the judge and lost the plot after that. In her Agility trial, a magpie flew right across her nose as she was approaching the dog walk and that was the end of that trial too. I did not do much better. I got a fault free round in Jumping Masters, but we lost time because Keith got in the wrong position for a Threadle, so we lost a few seconds there which meant we were over the time limit. In the Agility I went sniffing and dropped a bar too so we did not qualify again.
We left the caravan at Mount Gambier because we will be going back in two weeks on the way to Warnambool for more trials.

Tollers RN

We have another title to add to our list of accomplishments  We are now Rally Novice dogs, with the letters RN added to our names. Keith said we could get a job at the local hospital, but Maggie's mum (a Registered Nurse) said our RN was not the same as her RN.
It was an exciting day. Kathy was judging so Keith took both of us in. Tiffany went first and did well, covering for Keith when he did a Weave instead of a Serpentine. He called a Retry, and got away with losing 3 points, but still passed on 91. Then it was my turn. I usually work with Kathy, and play with Keith. It was very strange having Keith give the commands, especially as Kathy had disappeared somewhere. Anyway, I did my best trying to work out what he meant with his funny ways, and we got through with 87. I much prefer to work with Kathy.

Home

We are back home. After visiting NSW, Queensland and NT, we are back in SA ready for more fun and action.
The pic shows us at the Devils Marbles, near Tennant Creek in the Northern Territory. We stopped there for a break. There are lots of rocks piled up on top of each other, looking like a giant pile of marbles, hence the name. Dogs were not allowed in the area, we thought it was a bit discriminatory, but a closer inspection showed we were not allowed in there because of all the broken glass from the smashed beer bottles, jagged edges from drink cans and general rubbish that had littered the ground, left behind by messy humans. No wonder dogs are not allowed in there, we would cut our feet to ribbons.
We will be home for a while, but KnK are already planning the next trip, and we have lots more adventures to come.

Hot Time in the Alice

The pic shows us having a run at Alice Springs. We have been at the dog trials here, but we had to stay out of the way because we were not competing. After the trials were over we could have a run, and we made the best of it too.
KnK were judging the trials on Friday, Saturday and today. It was the hottest September day ever recorded at Alice Springs on Saturday, so we spent most of the day in the caravan, lying on our cool mats with the air conditioner blowing on us. We were dragged outside for a "water walk", and as soon as we had done it we went back in the van. There is a song about mad dogs and Englishmen going out in the midday sun, well we are not mad dogs, and we were not staying out in that heat for anybody. It was really handy to be camping next to the dog grounds.

Barkly Homestead

Where else could two dogs stop but at the Barkly Homestead?
We were traveling down the Barkley Highway and needed a break so we just had to stop here. I have been here before, after my trip to the Tip of Cape York (that is the most northern point of Australia, not the Cape York rubbish dump). The video of my adventure is still on the video links. I showed Hannah all the interesting points across the Barkly, there were not many and we slept for a lot of it, just a long straight road through the scrub. We did not even see any animals to bark at, just scrub.

Two Headed Dog

I had something in my eye at Charleville, a grass seed they thought. I went to the vet there, she stuck a needle in me and I went all sleepy while my eye was cleaned. Anyway, we could not travel that day while I recovered  but the next day we went to Longreach. It is hot here.We found a shady spot in the morning while KnK went to look at some old planes, then went to see a lagoon, then came home to lie under the air conditioner. The pic shows us lying on the bed right where the cool air blows. It looks like we are one dog with two heads, but we are both trying to get in the breeze.

Tractor Dogs

Charleville was hot today, too hot for us to do much, so we went on a drive around Charleville using a CD guided tour that KnK got from the info office.
The tour took us round all the points of interest, such as where the Ross brothers force landed their Vimy aircraft after winning the England to Australia air race, to the place where the first QANTAS flight took off in Charleville. (Longreach was the destination of the first QANTAS flight)
Part of the tour included looking at the guns somebody used to make it rain, which did not work, and there was a tractor in the gardens nearby. The pic show Hannah in the drivers seat pretending to drive it.
After a day in the air-conditioned car we went home to the air-conditioned caravan for our late afternoon nap. Life's tough when you are a Toller.

The Back of Bourke

They say when you are deep in the outback, you are at the back of Bourke. Well here we are at the official Back of Bourke site which is to the north of the town of Bourke in NSW.
We stopped here for a break on the way to Charleville. It took ages. We slept most of the way but we were glad to go for a walk when we got to the caravan park.

Peake Gold Mine, Cobar

How many times do we have to tell these humans we are TOLLERS. We are not Golden Retrievers, so why did they bring us to a gold mine? We did the best we could, sniffing at everything, scratching at likely places but we found no gold. All they did was walk along a path reading signs and looking at old mining equipment while the real mining operation was happening on the other side of the fence. We tried to get where the gold was, but they kept pulling us back, no wonder we could not find any gold.
We are in outback NSW and we had to have the tic treatment to stop nasty insects biting us. Unfortunately it makes us feel a bit under the weather, especially Hannah, so we are having a quiet day today.

Bush Tollers

We are in the Bush for our holidays. The pic shows us at a roadside stop  where we had lunch in the bush. Lots of green and flowers because of the wet winter we had, but now the sun is shining and the days are great. We got to Cobar in NSW and took the humans up the street to see the town, but then they got hungry, had dinner and drank wine so that was the end of the day for us. We went to sleep and will start exploring again tomorrow.

Hannah JD

My little sister has got her Jumping Dog (JD) title. The pic shows her just breaking the timer beam on the last jump, so it is the instant she became Champion Hannah CD, JD. Not only was it her Title, but she also got First Place, and just to make it a family affair, Fur Dad Rio and Fur Auntie Cherry got their Master Agility Titles.
Keith had to judge unexpectedly in the afternoon after the scheduled judge withdrew because her dog Max had taken ill and sadly passed over the Rainbow Bridge the day before. We were all upset over the sudden end to a good dog.
While Keith was Judging, Kathy took over the handler role in Masters, and I nearly got her round, but we had a mistake and some time faults.

Games Tollers

WE PASSED!!!
The Games trials at Gawler were on today, Hannah passed her first Gamblers Novice trial, we were in Strategic Pairs and we Qualified in Novice Strategic Pairs, and I was in Excellent Gamblers and I WON IT.
The pic shows us with the dog blanket I won.
We nearly passed in Snooker too, but Hannah missed a colour on the Scramble, and I missed a colour on the Dog Walk, which was the last obstacle of the course. So close, but no cigar.
The week has been strange. We have not been to training because of heavy rain which made the grounds too slippery for us to work at the Agility Dog Club or at home, we did not do our Tuesday training either, so we were lucky we even got round the course. The humans forget what to do if we don't put them through their paces regularly.

Hannah's Passes

Hannah has two Novice Jumping passes after the weekend in Barmara. She nearly got her title, but she knocked a bar after leaving a tunnel into bright sunshine so got 5 faults for that, and was a bit over time in the other trial. The pic shows her with her sash and qualifying cards.
She was in Agility too, but had some trouble with the weavers, and dropped a bar or two, but she is well on her way to passing Agility novice.
I had some good runs too, with some bad ones thrown in. I was 0.9 of a second over time in a Masters Jumping, and I had stopped to look at a dog with a bell round its neck for a couple of seconds. We got nearly all the way round the Masters Agility, but Keith ran out of breath with just one obstacle to go and could not call me in time to steer me on to the right obstacle so we got a DQ. Overall it was a good weekend with some good results for us in the trials and a great time playing with all the other dogs on the grounds.

Hard Luck Hannah

We were in trials again last week- end, Hannah was trying in Novice Agility and was doing very well until she missed a tunnel entry because a UFO flew over and distracted her. We have it on Video, look at Hard Luck Hannah under Video links. Its a bit grainy because it was taken on a phone. (All UFO sightings are grainy by law). She did not get a re-run, so she failed.
Sometime during the day Hannah hurt her neck and was not working too well. We thought it might be the SRMA back again, but by Monday she was back to normal.
Dopey Dad sent me over the wrong jump in Masters so we failed that one, and then I found some yummy bits of meat on the ground on the way to the ring, and then threw up halfway round the course. Keith panicked when he saw me with froth round my mouth after doing a fast section, but it was just a bit of junk  that would not stay down. Anyway, no passes again, but we are failing at a much higher level!

SuperToller at the Games Trial

More powerful than a HO scale locomotive, faster than a spent bullet, able to leap 400mm high jumps in a single bound,  is it a bird? is it a plane? No; its SuperToller. The dog of alloy that has the amazing ability to leap over any coloured contact area on dog walks and scrambles. She missed three of them yesterday to record one of her most spectacular failures in Gamblers Excellent. The pic shows Tiffany flying over the bars in the distance section, but all to no avail because she missed out on points in the points accumulation section.
We were in Strategic Pairs too. We were going well until we started playing on the dogwalk. Both of us were on the top of it while KnK were going spare trying to get us down, that was a lot of fun for us and the spectators. We were voted the Most Entertaining Pair of the day!
I had my first go at Snooker and was doing very well, until I saw Grahame who was doing the timing. He always gives us pats, so naturally I went to see him. That was where things went pear shaped and I got disqualified shortly after.
They are called Games trials, so we played games. What has qualifications got to do with it?

Hannah's Birthday

Hannah was 2 years old yesterday. We were staying at the Berri caravan park for the trials at the Riverland. I took Hannah for a run on the oval next to the caravan park just after breakfast, then we went home for a biscuit and a lie down. Freki was next door so we all went for a long walk in the bush along the river before he had to go back to Adelaide. In the afternoon we had a sleep and then went to a training session with Chocolatedog at Barmera. It was late when we got home and we all collapsed in a heap and went to bed.
Hannah had a good time for her birthday. We were worried about her health ever since she was a pup, but she seems fully recovered and fighting fit now. She has passed lots of trials and has CCD and CD titles in obedience,  2 passes in Rally-O Novice and we will be trying for our second pass in Strategic Pairs agility on the week end. Add the Champion of her Breed in the show ring to the other titles, and you can see why Hannah is such a special dog.
The pic shows us standing by the Murray River near where we went for our walks.

Barmera Trials

We both got a pass in the Rally Obedience at the Riverland yesterday. The pic shows me doing the three step backwards with Kathy. Kathy has to walk backwards and stop after one step, then two steps and finally three steps, and I have to sit in front each time she stops. There were 15 stations altogether and this was just one of them.
Tiffany passed with Keith, and so did all of our friends with their handlers, so it was a good day all round.

State Championships

We were at the SA State Championships on the weekend, I was in Masters and Hannah was in Novice Jumping. The pic shows Hannah as she just landed after the last jump. It was a long weekend, we were in the Saturday afternoon and the Sunday morning trials (Keith was judging on Saturday morning so we could not enter). Hannah ran very well and was a bit unlucky to knock a bar off but then she got over excited and started to nip at Kathy's jeans and missed a jump. She still got round the course, but did not qualify. Keith got lost in Masters Agility when we went the wrong way after the fifth time through a tunnel, and I got a bit excited and took off too quick for Keith to keep up in Jumping so it all went pear shaped very quickly. Still we had a nice week end out with our mates, and we had a go at the championships too, even though we did not qualify for the Finals on Sunday afternoon.

Painting the Kennel

We are having the kennel painted. KnK have moved out the furniture except for the heavy stuff that has been piled in the middle of the room. Sheets of plastic have been spread over the pile and we have the job of holding it down. We wanted to help paint, we have built in paint brush tails that could spread the paint faster than Mr Bean's stick of dynamite, but they declined our offer. Hannah managed to use her tail to spread a bit of paint, and I used my ear feathers, but we were much better employed in a supervisory role, directing operations from the Family room. Anyway, after day 1 the ceiling is done and the woodwork has its undercoat on and with a bit of good luck and a thorough barking at, KnK should have the first room finished by tomorrow.

Hannah CD

Hannah has got her CD title. She is now a Companion Dog after passing her third trial yesterday. We were all watching as she went through her paces, the pic shows her on the way back to Kathy with  the dumbbell during the last of the individual exercises, Retrieve a Dumbbell.
The stays had us all in a panic when the dog next to her started digging a hole and eating the dirt. The hole was very close to Hannah and she got up to see what the dog was eating. The judge decided it was too much to expect a novice dog to ignore such a distraction and gave her a re-run which she passed.
Quiet day today, KnK were judging so we just had a day out with Freki and Scout and a run round the grounds at the end of the trial.

Masters Pass

Tiffany has passed her first Masters Agility trial. The pic shows her doing the last jump, breaking the  beam and stopping the clock inside the time limit. Only 6 more passes to a title!
Overall, it has not been a good week end. Yesterday we had 7 fails between us, Tiffany missed on two agility and two jumping Masters courses and a CDX trial because she did not drop quick enough on the Drop on Recall, and I failed my CD trial when I forgot what I was doing in the sit stay, then failed my first novice jumping trial when I knocked a bar off and then missed a jump after a tunnel. Keith said I did well but was unlucky. Kathy was disappointed, and even more when I failed again in CD today. Tiffany failed the Jumping Masters course today and her CDX trial, so we had 1 pass and 10 fails between us, but that pass was the pass that defined Tiffany as a Masters Level dog at last.

Strategic Dogs

Who would have thought that I would be able to compete with my big sister so soon? but here we are in Strategic Pairs. The pic shows Tiffany at the top of the Scramble while I am racing into position to do my next sequence. Tiffany started the course, with some bars and a tunnel, I did the Dog Walk and some more Bars, Tiffany did the Scramble, Spread and Broad jump then I had to do more Bars and a Tunnel. I got a bit over excited when I saw Tiffany running to do her last section at the Weaving poles, so I went to see her, then came back over the scramble which cost us some time, but I got back on course and did my bit. Tiffany raced through the Weaving poles and over the jumps then started celebrating too soon and came to me. Fortunately she got back on course and did the last jump with less than a second to spare.

That was our first pass in Strategic Pairs, we need two more to get another title, Strategic Pairs Dog.

We will be putting the whole thing on video soon, so everybody can have a laugh.

PS. The video is under Video Links - Strategic Pairs on the left of this page'

Rally-O Dogs

Is there no end to the versatility of a Toller?

Yesterday we both passed in the first Rally-O trial held in SA. The pic shows us with one of the signs and our sashes. Hannah passed in Novice Obedience too, that is her extra sash on show at the front.
We had to do lots of stations in the Rally-O trial. A Station is a card, like the one holding up the sashes, with a set of instructions on what to do. We had to take the humans with us as interpreters because we can not read. They worked out what we had to do and told us to do it. Unfortunately they were concentrating so much on the signs they forgot to talk to us a couple of times, but we managed to fill in for them.

Hannah passed her second Novice Obedience trial so now she needs one more to become a Companion Dog. I did not go well in the Open. We did the heel exercise well and I did not freeze up, but I missed four positions and ran out of points, must have been a bad day because we do not normally miss positions.

We are Champions in the show ring, we have titles in Obedience, I compete in all forms of Agility and Hannah is learning Agility, we have competed in Retrieving and we are learning Tracking. While all this is going on, we still have to bark at the postman, warn when the phone and the doorbell rings, check out the garden and make sure the beds work. What other dog could do all this?

Freki gets his Obedience Champion.

Our friend Freki got his Obedience Champion today.  The pic shows us all celebrating Freki's title, left to right is me (Tiffany), O.C. Freki, Hannah, Billy, Gracie and Mini  Mac. We have been to the dog trials at Port Pirie for 3 trials in two days, and we all failed every one of them, except for Freki who passed with 187 out of 200 in the Utility class to qualify for his Obedience Champion Title.
We did not go very well in the trials, KnK were disappointed in us especially on the Saturday. We did do a little better on Sunday, but we do that just to encourage the humans, they get despondent so easily.
Freki is coming round to the caravan this afternoon and we are going for a long walk round the inlet next to the caravan park. The humans are going to have some pain after the walk, Sham Pain they said, but any sort of pain is not a good way to celebrate.

Busy Weekend

What a weekend we had, we were up at the crack of dawn on Saturday so we could get to the Muno Parra dog club in time for me to have a go at my first ever Masters Agility trial. The top pic shows me doing my first masters jump. We got round the course, with a few errors, but Keith was happy because we did do the difficult bits. I was in Masters Jumping too, but once again, there were some errors. Kathy took us home at lunch time because Keith had to judge in the afternoon.

On Sunday we were up BEFORE the crack of dawn, in fact we were 30 kms down the road when the sun came up. We went to our first ever Retrieving Ability Test for Gundogs near Willunga. The bottom Pic shows Hannah at full speed racing across the paddock. Unfortunately Hannah decided to visit the thrower, which was being operated by David who regularly gives us pats and treats. She forgot what she was doing and left the dummy behind. I did a bit better, I got the first dummy easily and then when the second dummy went up I tried to catch it. This meant that I did not mark the landing spot and I was searching on the wrong side of a clump of reeds so I failed that one. We watched the Novice Retrieving trial afterwards, then we went home at about 2pm absolutely exhausted.

We were glad to get home, eat our dinner and go to bed.

Scruffs Visit

Scruff is here to visit us for the week end. We posed for this picture after we were told to, but we wanted to play instead. Can you tell from our expression?
When Scruff first got here he was a little bit overwhelmed with us but he soon settled down to our games. The three of us chased toys thrown by KnK and we let Scruff get them a few times.
Three of us mooching in the garden is much more fun and we take turns being the chaser or the chasee. Scruff's little legs make it hard for him to keep up with us, but he can sneak through gaps that are too small for us and so he can dodge us quite easily. He has to go home soon, so we had better get back to playing.

Tiffany, Agility Dog Excellent

Tiffany has passed her final leg of the ADX title, and then she passed another one just to make sure.
The pic shows her with her sashes and qualification cards, while lying on the dog bed she won in the raffle.

It had not been a successful week end. We were both in the Obedience trial on Saturday, I missed out on one Heel command in the CD heel work and got non qualified for that, and Tiffany needed 2 commands on the Broad jump for the CDX class, which also got her a non qualification. We were pretty much in the dog house until Tiffany got her first pass on Sunday morning, then passed again in the afternoon trial.

We practised Strategic Pairs on Thursday, and we did quite well. KnK are going to enter us in Strategic Pairs at the next Games trial. We have to complete an Agility course where we take turns in doing sequences of obstacles until all the obstacles are completed. Should be lots of fun!

Agility Trial at Noarlunga

Keith is not happy. Tiffany knocked a bar down in her ADX trial, you can see the bar on the ground behind her in the picture. Not only that but she refused on the hoop too. Then in Masters Jumping, Tiffany refused on the hoop again. Keith is not happy.

It was a humid day and we do not like weather like that so Tiffany was feeling a bit out of sorts. We had been resting in the shade while we were waiting for Tiffany's turn in the trial but we were both hot and sticky by the time Tiffany got in the ring, and her runs clashed so she did not get much of a break between them. Even so, Keith seemed to think she should have done better. Did I mention he was not happy?

Tracking Training

Hannah an I are learning to be tracking dogs! We went out for our first training sessions today and we both found our people on the first attempt. The pic shows Hannah in her tracking harness hard on the trail of Keith who was hiding in the bush.

We not only had to find our people, we also had to identify things they had dropped. Keith had dropped his old socks on the ground so that was easy for Hannah, I had to find Kathy's socks, they are smaller than Keith's. (You thought I was going on about sweaty feet didn't you?)

After a couple of hours we decided to call it a day and went home for lunch and a lie down so we can recover for obedience training tonight.

Snooker Dog

Look what they did to me! I won the Novice Snooker trial last night, which gets me the title Snooker Dog and the letters SD after my name, and then they stick me in the bath as a reward! Well I've got news for them if they think this is a reward.

I was in Agility Excellent too and nearly passed. I went past the start of the weaving poles and got a refusal which non-qualified me, but I did not hear Keith say "Gaps" so how was I to know where I was supposed to go? We did the rest of the course well and under time. If I had got the weaving poles on the first attempt I would have passed agility excellent too.

The Masters Jumping was not as good, but I did have a nice run. It was not my fault that the judge put the numbers on the wrong obstacles.

Grandmother Nike did very well in the Snooker trial too, she qualified and got her Snooker Dog Masters title, so we made it a family affair.

Vale Ricky

It is with great sadness that we have discovered our friend Ricky the Cavalier is no longer with us. He was still a pup really, but his short time with us will be cherished.

Our hearts go out to his mum, who will miss him forever.

Under Blogs To Read, on the left side of this page, read Ricky's Ramblings and give a few moments thought for a good dog taken way too soon.

Sashes and a Pass

I got another Pass in ADX with a Second Place at Warrnambool trials today, and a Second place non qualifying yesterday! (I missed a colour on the dog walk) Hannah had a blonde moment when she stopped in the Figure 8 in the Novice trial, but still got Second Place and a sash even though she did not qualify. The Pic shows us with our sashes and my card. I was in Masters Jumping and only dropped one bar, but because I fluffed about at a tunnel entrance I was also 0.12 seconds over time.

It was hot in the sun and neither of us really felt like working, but we did what we could to keep the humans happy.

Tiffany's Birthday

Tiffany is 3 years old today. The pic shows us playing with her new toy. It was quite a good toy because it took all of ten minutes to get the squeak out of it, so now it is a tug toy for both of us.

We will be going for another walk along the coast, then back to the caravan for a nap and then tonight we are going training again at the dog club.

Tiffany shares her birth date with Rob Roy McGregor, a Scottish folk hero, David Koche TV financial guru, David Rumble SA judge and Mini Mac the Weimaraner.

Back in Training

We are at the Warrnambool Dog Club for some extra training. Tiffany had several runs round the agility ring and I went through the obedience. Tiffany did well but I was too excited by all the new sights, smells and sounds. Kathy hopes I will settle down by next Saturday.

We had a bit of excitement last night. Something went wrong with the caravan plumbing as hot water was being sprayed from under the sink. KnK were busy mopping up, shifting things and repairing the leak, so we kept quiet and waited for the mumbling to stop. All good dogs know there is a time to join in, a time to keep quiet and a time to make yourself invisible!

Seaside Walks

We are near the coast and can go for a walk along the path at the top of the sand dunes. Hannah is in the pic having a look at the sea when we stopped for a break. Everything smells different here, we get going on the walk then we have to stop to check out the wonderful new smells we find, but the humans get grumpy and don't give us long enough to do a thorough analysis.

We went to the Warrnambool dog club last night for some training and a big run.

After the long walks and the exercise, we slept like logs last night.

Holidays

We are on Holidays again. After last night's effort I am surprised we are still alive. I missed a colour on the dog walk and went sniffing in the Gamblers excellent, and missed a qualification by 2 points, then I missed a weaver and lost so much time that we failed Snooker too! The day was bad, it got to 41 degrees at 5pm and they delayed the start until 7:30pm. No wonder I did not do too well.

Well KnK still love us because they are taking us out in the caravan again. We got to Tailem Bend tonight and went for a walk by the river, then up the cliffs and back to the van park. The pic shows us at the top of the cliffs overlooking the river.

We are going to Warrnambool in Victoria, but we are taking the pretty way round, so it could take us until Wednesday to get there.

Life of Luxury

We have made another movie. It shows a typical minute from our lives where Hannah and I have fun at home.

We play chasey, we play fight, pose on our beds and I get to do my trick with the dog door. All this in just over a minute.

Click on the link under Video Links on the left of the page and sit back and watch. It is about 4 meg so it may take a while to load on a slow computer.