Crufts is labelled as the greatest dog show in the world and having not been to any others I can only confirm that it is a great event if you are interested in dogs.
As well as the top breed dogs the Kennel Club have gone a long way to include many other dog activities that all dogs pedigree or not can have fun with.
I was told Wag and Tone would not be able to be included in displays as there are no rules and as such it is not governable. Part of the essence of it is that it is non competitive and everyone and dog can work at their own pace. The dog would never be under pressure to perform better than it wanted to. It may be that somebody will come up with some kind of competition equivalent as has happen with Rally O. For us it will continue to be marketed as just fun
Mark and I had a busy week starting with the arrival of his parents for a couple of days as they were looking after our boys while we were away. The down side was preparing extra bedding and cooking for more the total upside was they not only love dogs - they love gardening too. With the great weather we had the dogs spent all the time out in the garden and our garden is ready for spring.
Crufts had many areas for us - Agility 1st has been awarded KCAI preferred educational provider status and we had a pod on the KCAI zone, watching the squad preform ready to help Mark's decision on the Teams had the Performance weekend and the Wag and Tone ebook was featured on the dogbooksonline.co.uk stand. Possibly a good thing neither of us had qualified this year Agility was in the arena and the KCAI zone was in Hall 5. They were at opposite ends of the NEC so we had plenty of exercise going between them. Saturday was too busy on the Agility 1st stand to be able to see any of the agility at all.
Mark was given passes to get into the collecting ring so was able to observe how the squad was doing. Very interesting viewing. I try to keep a relative low profile.
Greg had 2 dogs in the singles and as I know them and his requirements I gave a hand by holding Rehab whilst he ran Detox. It is great knowing you played a part in someone's success. A few years ago we looked after GT whilst Greg was away and so also felt part of that win :)
It is great for Team GB that 3 members of the squad won the main events.
There was so many great runs and the atmosphere was brilliant.
It is all over so quickly and it's all back to normal except for the inspiration given by those fantastic dogs and handlers to get out there and do the best with our own dogs and who knows next year.
From having a long old nearly forgotten dream of being an author come true with help from my friends I know anything is possible.
Amongst all this excitement I had my birthday celebrations. Mark had arranged a lovely hotel with flowers, champers and chocolates plus a lovely meal (sorry to turn you down Howard). We had cake on the stand and then on Monday we had a meal with our closest friends and another cake.
My niece Donna also sent a cute photo of my great nephew but forgot to write some important words on it. I'll forgive her this time.
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