Joy
Joy. The word that sums up what Albert Claude brings to me. More importantly what I hope he feels every single day of his life. What he did not feel, I am sure, in...
Category: Walks
Midsummer
It’s past midsummer, a time usually in south-west France when our walks would be at dawn, to be home before the heat rises. This year there is no rush for us to be out...
Pup Crawl Anyone?
As Britain and France resurface from lockdown, families, friends and colleagues are resuming meeting up for drinks and meals. Café culture is embedded in French society, dating back to at least the seventeenth century....
Creating and keeping memories
I’ve been going through photographs recently. It began as a task to find one for the cover of the 2022 Schnauzerfest Calendar. Having Susie-Belle there has become a tradition. Each year when I’m asked...
What we do is what we are doing
Late spring and we’re walking a familiar path with the dogs. The sun’s warm but a nippy wind keeps us from lingering. Albert Claude is hurtling along up ahead, nose to the ground. Hard...
Not Quite The Year We Planned
It’s now nine months since a simple idea I had 6 years ago and £250,000 later became a registered charity. Schnauzerfest was a fundraising idea to get people walking their dogs with friends. We...
Angel the Nomad
Angel must have nomadic genes. She loves to travel. It would have been hell for her in the puppy farm just being confined, let alone all the other hideous aspects of that existence. She...
Why New Is Good
When we adopted Susie-Belle it was all new, for her and us. She had no concept of what life with us would be like. Or indeed life anywhere beyond the safety of the rescue...
My Mind Is Blown
In January this year I said on TV that Schnauzerfest had raised £126,000. It’s an astounding amount of money for a purely volunteer charitable effort to raise. Nobody involved with Schnauzerfest from the start,...
Who ever knows what’s ahead?
Who ever knows what lies ahead on our journey through life? Who can tell if today is the last to be enjoyed or one of many before a mortal coil is shed? What we...