We've Arrived!

but have limitied internet and my computer refuses to work with the hotels connection. I have heaps of pics of the trip up and will post as soon as I can - Pepper was an angel.
We don't move into our house (in Westmere) for 2 more weeks so the poor girl is staying at a kennel (albiet a lovely one - Pets in the City)
I miss her so much :( Its even harder because I don't start work for another week so have nothing to occupy myself with.

1st Rally-O link

Rally in NZ is a really new dog sport, there are only a handleful of clubs that actually offer it.
Lucky us that we found one (and sad that we're leaving)
Therefore in order to allow for more competition there is a "Link" course set every month. Basically every month participating clubs are sent a new rally course, they can pick the time/day to set up and do it. A member from the club judges and the scores from all over the country are sent in and compared against each other. We had a go for the first time last night.
Pepper had had a terrible week at club last week - she had another UTI and she spent the whole time with her tail between her legs & kept wanting to hid under the bench. Poor wee girl. So I wasn't sure how we would go this week
But she was almost back to her normal self, happy and full of fun!
I was really proud of her - a bit slow to down in the moving down, we had quite a lapse of concentration during the 1, 2, 3 steps and she hardly even increased her speed for the fast pace but aside from those wee things her attention was on me most of the time, her left turns were ok and we had heaps of fun! I'm hoping one of the Auckland clubs will get with the program and start to offer rally so we can keep going.

Oh and the club had their lights fixed (after vandels smashed them) only to have them all smashed again two days later. Unbelievable.

Time to start saying goodbye

Our time in Wellington is nearly up. We're off to Auckland in two days, we're driving up and staying the night in Taupo on the way. Although all our furniture is going tomorow so its time to say goodbye to our two furry neighbours.

Louie

And Amber, my rough playing buddie

Check out those ears!

We went to watch Ben play his last game of rugby in the weekend. Pepper hates sitting around and often gets frustrated & barks but she did really well and was pretty much quiet the entire game. It helped that for the last 20mins she had a group of wee girls playing with her, wish I'd taken some pictures cause they were so cute but I was too busy trying to make sure she didn't jump on them or lick them to death

I got one, the little girl was sitting there telling Pepper about how her dog could fly a spaceship. It was very funny.

Tonight we're going to have a go at doing a rally-o course at club, it will be part of a national link competition. We'll just go just non-comp with treats but hopefully we have fun. I'm making my sister come to take pictures and video so will post when able.

Tag Game

Thanks Bodie & Mrs Magoo for tagging me into the game!
So because Peppers only a puppy and I've used many of her puppy photos on the blog already I thought I'd just choose the first album on my computer and post the 10th photo from that.

And its horsey (of course)

This is me & my old horse Molly in all her muddy finery. It was taken in July 2006 (winter for us down here) It was freezing, and had been raining for weeks. It was too wet to ride in the paddocks but I wanted to use my new camera and take a few quick pics. And I know, no helmet, I'm naughty.
Here's a couple of "after" shots to show that we weren't always covered in mud! She was potentially the most over photographed horse in NZ for about 2 years.

In my hand is a Pukeko that came to a show with us one day. Our friend Jenny is a crazy bird rescuing lady and so all the wee rescue birds that she has have to come along so they don't miss out on their feeds. Lilly-Jane was her name and she was hilarious. We also had 1 or 2 magpies along for the ride that day. Here's Lilly-Jane up close.

Not to leave Pepper out though, here's some beachy pictures from yesterday.

Firstly a rather serious looking Pepper checking for seagulls before we set off to walk there (Seagull checking is a very important job, apparently)

Happy and tired on the way home.

We want to tag Elbow and Hauwii to play the game too! (10th photo from your first album and tell us all about it!)

Trip down South

Wow, what a lot of traveling we've done over the past 4 days!

The wedding we went to was incredible, such a gorgeous setting.

Groomsmen.

Our good friends Rach, Ollie and Andrea

And Te Anau turned on 3 cracker days of perfect sunshine

We stopped off at my home town on the way back and stayed with my parents.

Of course Moby was there, he looks very old all of a sudden.

And this is Mobys friends Marley who was staying at our house.

I managed to squeeze in time to ride to pony club with my good friends nieces

And of course say hi to Jess & Cocoa (lab attack)


And give cuddles to all the horses.

This is Max, the "Wild" stallion.



And two rather large foals that really need to be weaned (according to their long suffering mothers!)

Pepper was so happy to see us when we picked her up last night, she was absolutly filthy (so had obviously had a great time) and totally tired

Wordless Wednesday

We're off to a place called Te Anau (down the bottom sort of on the west coast of NZ) for a wedding tomorow and Peppers off to spend her first time in a boarding kennel (well, its not really her first time, she was at the SPCA for 3months)

So we'll be away until Sunday, hopefully Pepper has a good post-easter break!