Sadie and Belle at the dike

Today I arrived home from work fairly early, and quickly contacted my friend Ellen to see if she was up for a walk on the dikes in a nearby community.

Charley, who hates car rides, raced back into the house at the sight of the open car door and stubbornly refused to come, but Sadie and Belle are always up for a car ride, so off we went.

I hadn’t been to the dikes since Caleb passed away. Our last trip was in January, a short walk with an arthritic Belle and an ever-weakening Caleb. Since then, Belle’s health has drastically improved and she now shows little evidence of the arthritis and muscle wasting so apparent three months ago. Sadie, as my newest addition, had never been to the dikes as she needed to build a bond with me before venturing into new territory where reliable recall amid distractions is essential.

Today was the day to test my girls out. By the time we arrived it was starting to drizzle and was a bit colder than I anticipated, but Belle and Sadie were excited to see their friends Kinley and Toby, and off we went.

They sniffed the ground and checked out rotting fish, and Kinley (a young whippet) entertained us all by racing hither and yon – down through the reeds, up across the path, back to us, on ahead, back again……can that boy run!!!

Belle and Toby trotted along side by side, two well matched seniors out for a stroll.

And Sadie had a blast, sometimes trotting quickly with Kinley, checking out smells and interesting “things” (arrrrghhh!), sometimes walking sedately at my side, always obeying each time she was called.

We overestimated Belle’s ability a little, and by the return trip she was really dragging, and so we took turns carrying her for short distances. We joked about the new “doggy strollers” on the market and wondered what colour Belle would like. Of course, Princess Belle thinks a doggy stroller is a great idea and informed me she would like royal purple, with a nice canopy please.

I think future walks on the dike will have to alternate between long ones for Sadie and Charley, and shorter ones for Belle. However, as I now watch her Hoovering around the kitchen floor just in case I have dropped a tasty morsel somewhere, I have to conclude that she can’t be too tired from her day’s outing. I suppose the test will be how well she moves in the morning – if she can still beat me to the door, the food bowl, and the pasture gate I will conclude that her arthritis is far less bothersome than mine!