Dotty Dalmatians: A letter to Celia

Perfect Harmony: Dalmatians working at axle

Photo by Dotty Dalmatians http://www.flickr.com/photos/dotty_dalmations/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/dotty_dalmations/4974050863/


Dear Celia,
At last I am sitting quietly and looking at Paul's photographs! The "Snowy Dalmatians" are just lovely. I love all of Paul's action photos; feet off the ground, bodies suspended, elongated bodies, bodies compressed like a spring! I am getting used to the Dally shape on the run now! There is something so fascinating about watching them running...but my favourite photo so far, even more than the action photos and the beach photos, is the one of you at the 2010 Irish Trials. This one I absolutely love...actually I love them all...but the Irish one is like a photograph reconstructed from someone's retelling of a dream: the little wooden bridge and the pebbled stream bed, the three Dals all perfectly in position with the carriage and the misty background!! 

I remember the first few times that we went walking off leash and Lusi had the chance to run; for a long time as a pup she would run and then go head over heals in the grass because her rear end was propelling her ever faster until she could no longer keep up with herself! She is a good runner now and these past two weeks of her going with the K9 Expeditions has been a wonderful way for her to keep in top shape and socialize with the GSPs too. She has been a very happy Dally! You can see from the K9 Expedition blog how the trips are organized but basically the dogs are carefully vetted for suitability and training, especially recall, and then introduced to one another one at a time, before they go out together. The hikes are arranged on a fitness level basis and Lusi is now doing about two hours, (running like a wild thing after the other dogs!). I can't tell you how much she is enjoying it.

Yesterday we both went down to the barn. The ground is still quite white over there though there is not much of a snow covering more ice than snow. The thermometer hovers around a few degrees below to one or two degrees above freezing by midday; clear blue skies make one think it is Springtime and that one should try and get ahead with the driving. In fairness, we are now driving three times a week but still restricted to the arena. I have been hitching to a Meadowbrook style cart and would really like to get the marathon cart out soon so that we can  stand on the back-step and guide Lusi from there. Still, every trip to the barn allows us to make some kind of progress and I am just so pleased that Dande is recovered from his injury. I had an excellent drive yesterday; it was so nice to see his body well rounded in the back and the neck muscles supple. A friend was also driving her mare in the arena and had attached some bells to her cart which seemed to intrigue him!


 Lusi is getting quite comfortable and familiar with barn life too. White on a snow white  background she disappears before your eyes. I must put a bell on her!

Today we  have snow again. The early morning snow etched trees are now heavily laden and snow clumps break off in the wind. I had a most marvellous drive and lesson Morgan horse carriage driving lesson with Dande and have permission to take Lusi up and use the arena now! I was really surprised to see how well Dande looked on video; the few minutes of the lesson on video showed a big difference from last year, lots of progress despite his being off so long from his injury.


So sorry to hear about Poppy. I do hope that she has made a recovery by now. Those skeletal and muscle injuries are so persistent and seem to take forever to heal! I think that one of the problems is that the body automatically compensates for these injuries and uses different muscles and this in turn causes further stress and injury to other sets of muscles, and ligaments!
love E