MegaWalk 2nd Leg Day Five: Aldermaston to Theale

4 miles, 4 locks, 4 swingbridges

Quite a pleasant walk today. The hotball was in the sky. No leakieskies! Yay! No snacks either! Boo! A couple of doggy pals to meet and greet along the way! Yay! A long wait at the squirtysnake point! Boo! All in all though, much better than the last few days.

Mum says we've raised some more funds too and that is what this MegaWalk is all about.

When we moored up this afternoon, the homeless man came along again and Mum made him more hot brown drink and more yummies to take on his way. I like him. His bags smell fascinating too, but Dad told me to 'get that shnozzle out'! Huff!

MegaWalk 2nd Leg Day Four: Woolhampton to Aldermaston

2 miles, 2 locks, 1 swingbridge, 1 lift bridge

A very sedate walk today. No leaky skies thankfully, but lots of puddles to splosh through in order to guide Mum around them. Mum calls that gallantry....I call it lovely! The swingbridge and the lift bridge were both clicky-whirry-bleepy things, not the usual hefty pushy-pully ones. The lift bridge was a bit scary. Mum used her little shiny jagged stick to click round in the slot, then she pressed buttons. First there was a lot of bleeping and cages came down across the road, then a lot of loud whirring as the whole road lifted up on one side. I joined in with the whirring noise but Mum said I was being a wingebag! She said I sounded like I wanted to be a German Shepherd! Well! Please! I think Labradors are far superior! Why would I want to be ANYTHING else!
My singing did amuse the workymen nearby though!

I missed out on two snacks today because Mum was mean! They were both lying on the towpath and really needed to be tidied up. She said that dead rat and dead hedgehog are not good for me to eat. Well, I think I should be the judge of that! I didn't get the chance though. I wasn't quite deft enough to outwit Mum's anticipation of my ducking towards such morsels! Harrumph!

This afternoon was nice - we spent it in a human yummies place called The Kennet and Avon Canal Trust Tearoom in Aldermaston. Some lovely people came to fuss me. mum says they came to support us on our MegaWalk, but I know they came to fuss me really!

After that, I took Dad for a walk to explore the village area a bit. When we came back, there was a man sitting on a bench beside our boat. He was very sad and had some big bags and things with him. Mum says he was homeless. I just knew he needed a bit of my love so I gave him my waggiest greeting and then went aboard the boat and fetched a toy to share with him. Mum made him a cup of hot brown water and gave him some yummies too. Dad did some yacketying with him, while I wandered around a bit and had a little play with a couple of passing doggy pals. The man then left with all his bags and another cup of hot brown water in his own mug with a lid, plus the bag of yummies Mum had given him. He was nice! He gave me a lovely ear rub!

Yaaaaawn...... It has been another long day of work, admiration and a bit if play.....so.....sofa cuddles time with Mum methinks!

MegaWalk 2nd Leg Day Three: Thatcham to Woolhampton

3 miles, 3 locks, 2 swingbridges

Only a short walk today so I wanted to make it last. Mum called me Ploddypaws again! She also called me Daisy! That apparently had something to do with my grass munching! Well, it was tasty and I just couldn't resist those long luscious strands.

Just as we were coming to the last stretch of the walk, the blimmin' sky sprung another huge leak. We got soaked again! Huff! Then, once again, Mum and Dad showed their human strangeness; once back aboard the boat, they dealt with the sogginess by getting even more soggy - in the frothy warm rain box! I just don't get it! Me? I had a great towel-rub from Mum then settled down for a snooze leaving them to get on with their oddities!

This evening, we walked the little way to a human yummies place where there was a table set out with loads of delectable smelling stuff. I didn't get to sample much but a couple of dropped morsels helped a little to stop my mouth making the carpet soggy! However, I did get to meet and greet Rolo! He is the red Labrador that I met on yesterday's very soggy MegaWalk. We did try to have a bit of a play but it seems this was not allowed in there! Huff! Maybe one day we will meet up somewhere for a proper good play!

MegaWalk 2nd Leg Day Two: Newbury to Thatcham

3 miles, 5 locks, 2 swingbridges

Mum says that today's bit of MegaWalk was more of a soggy Megaplod! The sky leaked on us ALL the way! I don't like working when the sky is leaking! Apart from getting all soggy, it is lonely because nobody else is daft enough to be out! Today was no exception. We only met two other humans along the way. They each had a dog with them, but it was too yucky for anything more than a quick sniffygreeting.

Mum kept calling me 'Ploddypaws' and telling me to 'huppup' and 'letsgo' and 'come onnnnnn'. She muttered stuff about me being perfectly happy to get soggy when she doesn't want me to - like when on a freerun and the river lures me in.....she just doesn't understand! That is a completely different kind of wet! That is fun wet! Working wet is just NOT fun at all!

I did have an interesting little encounter along the way today. I got screamed at by a little squeaky toy! Mum said it was a waterbowl. I don't think I would have got much of a drink out of it though! It was little and furry-brown with a stubby tail and little round ears. It scurried across the towpath in front of me and then just stopped under a big leaf. I dived across Mum to investigate (oops! Sorry Mum for nearly tripping you over!). The little squeaker screamed at me with a really loud high-pitched screech and tried to bit my nose! I managed to duck backwards just in time so it didn't quite get me. Then it went plop into the canal and disappeared. I would have liked to have had a chance to play a bit more but I'm not too sure I want my nose pierced though!

When we moored up, Dad got his one-eyed-clickybox out and clicked it at us so we could show you how soggy we got!

First photo shows Mum and me. Mum's fursubstitute is all dark blue and her head-lid is dripping down her face. The other three photos are of a very soggy me!

An Evening Out

Well, it would seem that walking 5 miles is not enough fun for one day!
We went across town to a pub called The Bacon Arms. We met up with a few nice humans and, more importantly, a fellow Guide Dog! Yay! A pal to kanoodle with while all the human yackety-yacking was going on! Henry is a lot bigger than me - a big black, fluffy lab X retriever. I had hoovering competition!
Mum did a load of talkystuff, telling the others all about us and our life on a boat. Henry was much more interesting!
Some shiny disks and some flappy rectangles went into the dog-with-a-hole-in-it's-head-box. Apparently these are important contributions to something called funds. If it's not edible, I cannot begin to work out how it can possibly be at all important!

It was nice to spend the evening with a comrade!

MegaWalk 2nd Leg: Day One Kintbury to Newbury.

5 miles, 8 locks. 1 swingbridge

But we walked straight past all of the locks and straight over the swingbridge with no windy-uppy-windy-downy-pushy-pully stuff at all! And Dad walked with us.

We left the boat behind and went on the train to Kintbury, then walked all the way back. Mum says this is because the swingbridge is broken so we couldn't take the boat, so that's why we didn't have to work the locks! She says that we will do the rest of the walk as normal - with Dad driving the boat alongside us. She says it is really fortunate that the boat is this side of the broken swingbridge. Actually, I'm not so sure.... I quite like the extra walking to and from the stations - and the extra fusses I manage to gain while we wait for the train!

We meeted and greeted lots of humans and doggy pals along the way today. Mum and Dad gave out lots of pieces of flappy stuff with coloured squiggles all over them. Some people handed back some shiny disks which went into a special pouch Mum has attached to my harness handle. Two of those people were rather important looking: They were both wearing black fur-substitutes, with round black head-lids that had black and white little squares all around. They had squawky boxes and all sorts of other things dangling on them too. They were very nice and, when a couple of mini-humans came along on wheelie-wizzers, the black-and-white people told them to get off their wheelie-wizzers and walk along that bit of towpath. The mini-humans did exactly as they were told! Maybe these black-and-white people are some kind of human equivalent of Guide Dog Mobility Intructors and Dog Trainers - 'Obey Me Or Else' people!

A few paces further on there were several men sitting, a litle way apart, each with long sticks going out over the canal. They were all sittting staring at their long sticks! Most odd! Usually, I like these long-stick-starers because they usually have tubs and bags of yummies around them. Today though, I was on harness so I couldn't inspect or hoover! Huff!

I did get a bit of a telling off from Mum - twice today! It seems she didn't appreciate my attempts to protect her from threats! First, by Victoria Park, just after we set off, I had to shout at both a hissing furball on a boat AND the hissing featherballs right by it. Then, not long after we got off the train and started walking along the towpath, I stopped to shout at a huge snorting, hay-munching monster that was stood behind a gate with huge round, hard paws and big sticky-up ears. It had a huge collar on and was standing watching some humans attaching a very long lead to a boat. Mum really told me off for shouting at this monster. I was only trying to protect her! She said his name is Charlie and he pulls the boat along. She tells me off for pulling! Huff! That's not fair!

We made it back to the boat via quite a lot of 'go-ahead' guiding practice on narrow bits. It was a good walk. I am ready for a good snooze now, while Mum does that weird frothy warm-rain box thing.

Being Good - by Being Naughty!

Today's obedience involved being very naughty! I jumped up onto a table! Ummmmmmm! But Mum told me to! It was for a one-eyed-clickybox-man to do his flashy-clicky thing!
It was at the pub where we went for the relaunch of our MegaWalk. I had to jump up onto the table and then lie down to pose with Mum.

We didn't actually do any MegaWalk today. Mum says we will actually start that tomorrow. We went on a train and then walked to the pub. Mum says we can't take the boat there because a bridge is broken.

We did go for a rather superb walk and freerun though - along a lane with no pavement, then across some huge fields - and all with a couple of doggy pals to run and play with all the way! There was a little brown short-legged senior boy dog called Tecky and a mini Jack Russel called Widget! Tecky was a bit slow and a bit senior for playing, but Widget was great fun to play chase with!

Now I am rather pooped, so, if you don't mind, I'm going to bed. Mum and Dad's bed looks much more comfy than mine.......I think I shall go and try to hide in it so they don't notice......

Two photos - one of me and Mum standing outside the Blue Ball, Kintbury. The other of me lying down on the table. Mum is crouched beside me hugging me and the one-eyed-clickybox-man is pointing his one-eyed-clickybox at us, with a huge picture of Mum and Me projected onto the wall behind us.