Yesterday there were a couple of school classes all around the neighbourhood planting trees. The kids where around 8-10 years old.

Since I like to show of Booker and Tula I took them out for an extra walk for a little attention.

As a teacher, Steve will love this...

They were all sitting in a circle in the square, being told about the planting (I presume) when I arrived. Of course I stopped right behind them, and as soon as one kid carefully got up and petted them, the whole class came up and circled us, carefully petting them. Tula was a little unsure for a while I think with her tail almost starting to go between her legs, but when I called her and offered a treat she was fine...

I had to apologise to the teacher afterwords...

Good effort!

I fed them again Yesterday. They seemed a little less weary of me this time, although I still had to get back to a respectable distance before thy would come to the food. Greg suggested I mixed some sardines in their food, which I did and this time they licked their bowls clean.

It is raining today, (for a change...) but only lightly. I saw them again during the walk this morning, curled up under a tree. I might take some food out to them again.

I took tree pics so can see what they look like.

It was time for their vaccinations again. We took them to the vet yesterday afternoon where they got the usual vaccine, Rabies booster, worming tablets and Advantix for tics and flees etc.

Booker did not seem to mind, but Tula was not happy. After countless visits, she knows "vet smell" and what a syringe looks like... She whimpered a little when the needle went in, but I think it was more in anticipation than actually pain.

The we got them weighted...

Last time we checked their weight was in Glasgow. Booker weighted 41kg's and Tula 36

SInce then we have tried to feed them a little less to avoid having obese Greyhounds.

Booker now weighs 39 kg's

Tula on the other hand: 37 kg's

Two days ago we were gone for about 5 hours. We took them out just before we left, but it was during their normal walk and feed time we were gone. We came home and found not one or two, three puddles... And they were sooo well trained before...

Yesterday we met the Staffie/Boxer mix Lua again. She is extremely hyper, jumping all over them. After a good sniff behind, Booker turned around and walked out of range.

Tula on the other hand, grabbed and held her by the ear. Lua squealed but Tula did not let go before Greg corrected her.

The instant Lua was "free" all was forgotten and she kept at, but was now kept at a safe distance.

The two stray dogs look like a labrador and akita mix. Look at their eyes and tail...They have something in common with the dogs of the North (husky, akita etc.). Anyway, beautiful dogs! Hopefully they will find their home in the end.

What a lovely day today. All over (even Scotland) by the looks of it.

Spring is definitively here. Again there is lots of new impressions and smells that absolutely MUST be investigated...

After yesterdays rain, there was a lingering smell of flowers in the air. It was lovely. On the walk the two of them were like mine sweepers. Everything had to checked out.

The sightings of lizards are becoming more frequent. Today Tula saw it as well as it skipped along the stone wall. They both behaved as if it was a squirrel or a fox...

Sooo much excitement for such a little creature...

Now they are past out in the house. A little cooler inside. 24 degrees outside, but a light cooling breeze. They were still panting bit. From on I think we need to keep the day walks shorter and morning and evening longer.

It will interesting to see how they acclimatise to the warmer weather down here.

Hi Greg and Nicolai,
Loving your 'postings from abroad' and glad everyone is settling in apart from the odd 'accidents'. They are creatures of habit - even the recent clock change here in the UK resulted in a completely unnecessary puddle on my floor.
I'm not surprised lizards get B&T going, they're so quick it must be the ultimate trigger for the 'If it moves, chase it and grab it' reflex.
It will be interesting to see how they adapt to the climate. Mine will lie and sunbathe in the garden then come inside and cool off on the flagstone floor at regular intervals but, with the recent heatwave (yes, even here!), I'm already having to walk them later as they just don't cope well with exercise in warm weather - and of course the sea is still FAR too cold for paddling in to cool off !

Well....

Last week was the warmest we had so far and I would think the hottest Booker and Tula has ever experienced with a few days of 30 degrees. I must say they coped well. We have adjusted their walks so we do a longer walk in morning and at night after sunset and shorter walks during the day. A little sun lotion on their noses, which they don't like..., and we are out. Luckily there is a lot of green areas around that offers lots of shaded areas to walk in, so that helps as well.

I think that I need to start carrying a squirt bottle with me to cool them down on a hot day. That black fur does get hot. They know it is hot outside though and spend most of the time sleeping. After the walks they stay on the cool tiled floor.

For dogs that don't really shed, they are sure loosing a lot of hair this week...

I the morning before it gets too warm, there is lots of lizards out. Tula caught one the other day by stumping on it. Booker as well caught one more. He now knows where they are and his hunting mode kicks inn every time we walk past this area. He also almost caught a pidgin last week. It was bit too slow in moving as we walked by and suddenly he took off after it, his jaws about an inch away from it as it flew away. I am sure he would have caught it if I hadn't held him back on the lead. On another walk he picked up a newly dead rat... We were not to impressed by that one. Good thing he let it go as I did not want to touch it...

Here are two pics of Booker looking for lizards:







And after a long day of hunting, it is time for a well deserved rest on the couch...

We had to leave them in a kennel again today as we are away for a few days. We found a really nice kennel not far away from where we stay.The first thing Tula did was to pee in the water dispenser...

Believe it or not, but we are considering moving again. Just south of Barcelona this time, bordering a national park and with a bit of garden space with a fence...

Nothing decided yet, but we are viewing houses the next few days.

The walking is pretty good where we are. the beach is off limits for the summer.

Hee is yet another beach pic. I love this actually. The way they are walking after Greg. Makes a good one I think:



Tula likes a little pose:

Great pictures, and I'll bet the dogs love that sand.

They do love the sand. Every time we go there they get excited. I would love to let them free as we walk down to the beach, but we have get down ourselves and make sure there is no other dogs around and then we walk across to the other end before we let them loose. It is a little secluded corner with no exits that we use and so far it has been great.

Of course I have more beach pics:...


Booker running to me. He loves a treat...





Tula in a "cave"

Just spoke to the kennel. They settled in and are eating well.

But....

Tula has started to limp a little. They were out playing with one of the care takers (part of the service) and you all know how they like to run. After this she started to limp. She is better today they said. Their onsite vet called me a few minutes later after having checked her leg.

It is not the paws. She said it appeared to be light bruising inside on one of the small bones she referred to as one of her fingers... A little language barrier there...

She gave her some anti inflammatory for her pain and she will rest today.

Called the Kennel again this morning and they said that was back to normal again, except that Tula started to whimper when she thought they were going to touch her leg.... Thats what we thought anyway.

Later this afternoon the vet called and said she was limping a bit again. She examined Tula agin. it does not seem too sore. She walks normal, but she said you can tell that it is little discomfort.

The vet said it was small swelling on one of her toes (not fingers...) and that it should heal itself. However, if she is not better by Monday, bring her back and they will do an x-ray.

We get back and will pick them up from the kennels tomorrow afternoon. Can't wait to get back to them.

As you know we are in Sitges looking at houses and we found one so we will be moving again in 3 months time.

I am sure Booker and Tula will like it better here. We got a house (with pool) to ourselves and a little space for them as well move about outside. Not any running space, but there is good walking trails as well near by.

There is a vet across for our hotel balcony. For a few days now we have seen this lady come in and out with a Greyhound, or Galgo I guess. Today I run down to meet the dog (and her). She is one of the vets. It was lovely and it is good to know that I can now have a vet that knows this breed.

The dogs name is Marly and he is 8 months old with a big head and small body. The friendliest thing ever, like most of them I think, but Marly was extra cute.

Here is two pics that I took:





I wanted to take him home...

hello, I'm Ursula the owner of Marley, the vet!
first sorry for my English.
I really enjoyed meeting you and Marley comes very handsome in the picture.
I wanted to tell you that in the hospital, two colleagues who also have dogs. one is an irish woulfhound.
I hope to hear from you and meet your dogs

see you!

It is always great to come back and see them again. Tula's foot seems ok, but we kept her walk short and slow and will do so for a few days.

AFter a few days in the Kennel it is time for some grooming and another brush. In this heat (22-30 degrees) we make sure to brush them a couple of times a week as it helps to cool them down. We find a nice spot in the shade, or under a lamp if it is dark.

Here are some pics I took of Greg brushing them:





Tula loves a good brush, They both do!



Look at Tula stretching her neck out.

So these well-travelled hounds will have a nice friendly vet ready and waiting!

Hope you enjoy living in Sitges. I'm sure no-one here is jealous at all.

I am so angry with Tula.

Yesterday after we got home, and had a walk and feeding, she decided to pee in our bed...

I have no idea why and the strange thing is that after, she looked extremely happy with herself as if she had done a good thing... I couldn't punish her as I did not catch her in the act, but I was still angry.

No sleeping in our bed tonight!!!!

I am away for 4 days training in Farnborough. Greg says they have been good so far today. Took them out for a quick walk before I left at 05:30 this morning. As soon as we got in they were straight back to bed. Greg told me that they did not emerge before around 14:00

They are getting more and more lazy I think, or is it the heat?

Well, it's tough, but you're just the guys to do it!

Hi,

I have never met you or your dogs but I have read your posts and have to say your dogs look wonderful on the pictures. They look like twins; I would not know who is who. I can relate to your story I also have two dogs from Jimmy and Celia, one grey and one lurcher and we love them to bits. However sadly we don’t live in a nice sunny country but not to worry, they are not fussy, they like to go out in any weather. I would love the beach though.

Monika!
I think you and I should know "the hardships" of nice, hot and sunny weather as in the countries of our origin summers are usually quite good (30C at Krakow in Poland today), although we know "all the pleasures" of cold winters as well but I like eastern European winters due to my fondness of skiing.
However our summers bring more rain than these in Spain or even Portugal.
Anyway I remember I was really fed up with heat waves when the temperature was over 30C with "no drop of rain" for a couple of weeks...I remember one summer in Krakow when I was a student...No drop of rain for nearly 3 months, all the grass around was burnt by the sun. Fortunately it has not happened again since then...

Greg and Nicolai,
I think you will end up having a Galgo soon. How to live in Spain without a Galgo??? I am sure both Tula and Booker would enjoy having a new companion
PS. I love the Galgo puppy in the pictures, especially its beautiful big head! There must be a big brain in it!

Absolutely Stan I remember well that’s why I never go for visit in summer but always at Easter and even then our son usually cannot sleep because it’s so warm. However back to Booker and Tula’s story I don’t envy the sun but the beach near our house would be nice.

Portugal is actually pretty good. So far it has been between 22 and 15 degrees. Today it was 30. But the cool atlantic breeze made it much more tolerable. Booker and Tula were fine on their walks, but of course we kept it nice and slow and not too long.

I am also used to proper winters and like to ski, being from Norway and all, just don't get much of it these days.

I suspect Barcelona area will be hotter in the summer.

Tula started to limp again the other day so took her back to the vet. Same foot, different injury. She had a large bruising on one of her paws. We tracked it down to the evening before, when Booker stepped on her foot with his full weight. We have given her some anti inflamatories and she is much better already.

Her is two pics of the vet examining her, If you look closely, you can see the bruising on the side of one of her paws. She was not happy being examined and was wining constantly. Especially when she though we would touch the sore spot...

Never seen a dog anticipate pain like that.

See the bruise?

The Kennel that we found for them here in Cascais is really good. It is a pretty large institution. As you know, they have their own on site vet. They have a pool play area and another pool for submerged physiotherapy and various other treatments on offer.

We felt pretty safe leaving them there and by the looks of it, they had some fun before Tula damaged her foot. They were there for 4 days.

Here are the pics (9) that they sent to us. Tula loves her Tennis ball. She gets very exited when she see's one. Booker can't be bothered most of the time. You can see on one of the pics that Tula I chasing the Ball and the trainer is trying to get Booker to chase as well. The result you can see on the next pic...

I think I might put them there while we execute the move to Spain in September as they got a bit stressed the last time when the apartment got emptied. It will probably be more relaxing for them. Then we can just pick them up, do a final walk and head off. Its only 850 miles...

For those of you that are curious, here is the link showing the house, and don't get any ideas, it is already taken... http://www.easysitges.com/show_rental.php?code=MMS-30t

It is nowhere near as big as they say unless maybe if you include the garage, all the balconies and the pool area... But still nice. Lots of space for Booker and Tula.

Finally, here are the pics from the kennel:










Tula: "GIVE ME THAT BALL!!!"



She's after the ball.






Good catch.



And here he sat down...


He will just run with anyone...

Great set of pictures, and the dogs look like they're having a great time

Hi Greg & Nicolai, I have never posted in this thread but have had the occasional peek at your posts. So you are moving to Sitges! I grew up very close to Sitges, in a place called Castelldefels (it translates to Castle of Faithfuls). It is a very nice area,ill be there for a wedding this Summer,but Ill be leaving my greyhound in Scotland :)