I went to Sandy Beach. Its on Lake Murray. Ive been here before. The good thing about this place, was there wasnt anyone there. The bad thing is that the only way to get there is by boat or someone has to drop you off because you cant park anywhere, or the cops come. Anyway, my husband dropped me off and I took Miley, Java and Zoey to the beach. You have to walk through the wooded path for about 10 minutes, to get to the beach. Along the path was a small deer leg. Ugh!! It still had hair on it. Must be coyotes. Yikes.
We get to the water and the puppy it very happy. Running back and forth along the water's edge. Then all of a sudden, she takes off running into the water.
Ok, no biggie.
Ok, we are still ok.
Now Im worried.
She comes up and keeps swimming away from shore. "Oh Crap". I throw my camera on the sand and run into the water. By the time I get to her, she has turned around and started swimming to shore. Crazy dog, scared the crap out of me. LOL
Doesn't it look like Miley is laughing at poor Zoey.
So after that she had a harness and long line put on her. I should have put it on when we first got there.
This side of the island was mostly shaded.
Then we walked to the other side of the island, to anther beach area. Usually boats are anchored here but there werent any.
Miley and Java didnt really play with the puppy. She wanted to run and play chase but for some reason they didnt.
I kept trying to get a picture with all 3 of them but the puppy kept moving. lol
We only stayed an hour, I was feeling guilty that my husband was just trying to hang out and find something to do, while he waited for me.
Yup, I bought a new RV. I know you all think Im crazy after all the work Ive been putting into the old RV. Ive been looking for a while now. I came across this one and it was located in South Carolina and in my price range. I called but they had just sold it (they had a deposit on it). But then that evening they called me back and said the sale fell through, was I still interested. So the next day I drove down to Charleston to see it. I really liked it. So I gave them a deposit. I drove home and told them I would be back Monday.
Its a 2004 Newmar Kountry Star diesel pusher. Its really nice. So Monday I drove my old RV down to Charleston. It was a horrible drive down. Traffic accident after traffic accident. One of them was 1 1/2 hour delay. Ugh!! So I get off the highway and take some back roads but there was lots on construction going on. So stressful to drive though small roads with big orange barrels every where. I finally get there. I think the guys could tell I was spent. They had the RV all ready to go. They helped me transfer everything from my old RV to the new RV. And then I followed them , in the new RV to a RV park down the road.
I bought it from TJ Auto Sales but their website comes up at Coastalrvcenter.com They only sell RV's.
They put you up for 2 nights at an RV park so you get to know the RV and can make sure everything works. You also get driving lessons but I didnt really think I needed that. I mean they did go over the difference in shifting and the breaking and parking break in the diesel. It is very different. It has air breaks. The break actually looks like a gas pedal to me. The guy must have realize I was having trouble taking off from a stop, like from a stop light. Because when we got to the RV park he explained to me, that I need to slowly press the gas all the way down to the floor when starting from a stop. Its different then driving a gas RV or car. That made a big difference. I was just trying to give it a little bit of gas at a time. LOL, didnt work very well.
The RV park was very nice. Oak Plantation Campground. This is the first campground that Ive been to that had a cable TV connection. The RV guy went though the entire coach with me explaining everything.
(They had replaced the carpet and put wood floors in too.) I had to bring the puppy with me because my son works 11 hour shifts and I didnt think she should be alone that long. So she was in that little crate starting at 9am and I finally got her out for the night at 5:30pm. She did have a couple of bathroom breaks. But she never cried the whole time. Wow!! What a good puppy.
They offer you 2 nights at the RV park but I only had time for one night. I had to teach a class from our club Tuesday night and then had to work on Wednesday. Then I was going to a dog trial on Thursday. So I got up the next morning. The guy came back and fixed a couple of little things that I found and then I was on my way. I was so nervous driving it. Thank goodness the drive home was easy and no traffic.
Driving it up to the dog trial on Thursday was soooo nice. Its quiet and I can hear the radio. Its much easier to drive. I dont feel stressed out when I get out of the thing. I think the dogs like it better too. They hated getting in that other RV. Not when it was parked but when they knew we were going for a ride. It was noisy and loud. This is 10 times better and I think they were surprised it wasnt like before.
Get a puppy!! LOL, Yes I did. I got another dog. Miley is struggling in agility. She just takes off way to early, with jumping, so I figured I better get started training another dog. And now Im feeling really tired and thinking this maybe my last puppy. Because boy am I tried!!
Here she is at 10 weeks. She is from Blackmyst Shelties in Minnesota .
Her litter name is Blur. Im still trying to pick a name.
She has lots of energy , happy and fun. Some names Im throwing around are Pip, Busy and Zora.
She was flown in last Friday to Atlanta. My friend was picking her up for me because she was suppose to come in at 6:30pm and I couldnt get there in time. We'll the flight never took off due to mechanical problems. The plane finally took off at 6pm and she landed at 9:10pm. Then it took about 1 hour to get them off the plane and over to the cargo area. So my very nice friend went back to the airport and got her. The crate was soaked with urine but besides that she seemed ok.
So far none of the dogs like her or will play with her. I hope that changes. Over the last week, everyone has started to adjust except Java. Which I figured would happen.
The weekend before last we went to Huntington State park Beach. The weather was great. We had some rain on Friday night but that's it. It was kind of windy but we needed the wind because it was so hot.
It was nice an quiet in the mornings on the beach. Even though the park was full.
Stephanie also came for the weekend. She lives in Conway, which takes about 40 minutes for her to get to the park. So this time, she just stayed with us. She brought her tent, just to practice setting it up. It was the first time and she wanted to make sure she could do it.
Last time we were here, we didn't see any alligators. This time we saw lots. There is this bridge from the front of the park, to the beach part of the park. There is a lagoon there. In the lagoon were all the alligators. There are bike paths that go across the bridge on both sides. Its go to take pictures. There are 5 alligators sitting on the low lying sand bank.
We cooked over the open fire a lot. Only because Stephanie wanted to. That's to much work for me. Cleaning that cast iron skillet is not my idea of fun. LOL But the food was good.
The birds were all on the causeway (lagoon) area too.
Miley is really slowing down, as she has gotten older. They didnt play chase as much as they usually do.
We are pretty sure this bird just like to play with the fish before eating them. Because he just kept throwing them in the air, multiple times, before swallowing them.
Last week was Spring Break. The first few days I worked hard to get the new carpet in the RV. So I finished that Tuesday evening. Then Wednesday drove up the Concord NC.
This was a big trial because it wasnt only agility but also confirmation and obedience. I put my RV reservation in early because I knew there would be lots of RV's with confirmation being there. So I get there and they cant find my name on the list. But as he looks again, Im on the first page. (Its not in ABC order. It must be how they received your registration) On his paper is says "grass" . I wanted to be in the back area where the grass was. There is a front part for RV and its all on pavement. I dont want to walk forever for my dogs to have to go the bathroom. (lots of confirmation people put ex-pens outside their RV and just let there dogs go to the bathroom right there and then hose the area down. I have ex-pens but my dogs dont go to the bathroom there. I always walk them) So anyway, the guy in the golf cart brings me to my spot. He wanted me to pull into the grass and then back between 2 RV's that were already there. (People had started setting up their RV's on Monday of that week. The trial started on Thursday. I dont get that) I told the guy I didnt want that spot. He said I had to take it because I had a small RV and could fit in the spot.
Here it dosent look to bad. But here is another view.
The buildings are behind my RV. I have to go that way to get to the agility building. I have a wagon to carry my bag, cooler, tripod and other things. I cant get the wagon over all that stuff. So I have to go around. Everyone has ex-pens on the sides of there RV's. But I wasnt walking all the way around just to get back to where I started. So I cut through someone's spot and of course their dogs went crazy. Sorry, there wasnt anything else I could do.
Here was the circle of RV. There was that one spot open across the field. Thank goodness they left that spot open, so I could leave Saturday.
Another weird thing, quiet hours didnt start until 11pm. Poeple's dogs would be barking like crazy right up until 11pm. What is wrong with people these days.
I will never RV here again when they have confirmation. Besides all that, it smells horrible. Because they dont walk their dogs and just let them pee all over the mats they put down. And then they just hose it down. Ugh. I dont know how they stand that smell all the time.
The first day I came back to my rv and someone had moved my stuff. They had pulled the black material that I have on the bottom side of my RV, to prevent the dogs from getting out under the RV, they had pulled if off and moved that and the ex-pens all forward, to the front of my RV. I have no idea why. At first I thought the wind did it but there is no way. The ex-pens would have blown over , if it was from wind. And I had a tarp on top of the ex-pens drying, it would have blown away. And it didnt. Just a weird RV weekend.
Im not even sure I remember all my runs. I know that there was a problem with FAST. The judges microphone kept causing static noise on the speakers in the ring. Dogs were having issues with it. There was a lady with a border collie, who went and talked to the judge because it was freaking her dog out. Then it was Java's turn. Right after we started the send bonus, the static started and Java came to a dead stop. She refused to run. Java has never refused to run. I just tried to keep her happy and get out of the ring as fast as we could. But that run was blown. After that happened, the judge stopped using the microphone. But the next day they were using them again!! WTH?? So I went up to the scribe and timer and said that i needed the speaker turned off during Java's run. I told them that she freaked out yesterday and I dont want her thinking that noise it part of the ring. They said they couldnt do it because they couldnt hear the judge. I told them that I didnt care if I NQ'ed because they couldnt hear the judge call the points, I just dont want the noise going on when my dog is in the ring. They got all upset. Im sorry, its my dog and Im not running during a negative experience. It was hard keeping her away from the ring and trying to stay close enough to know when it was my turn. After that I decided unless they fix the speakers and microphones, Im not running my dog again there during FAST. I asked the person doing leashes , why wasnt anyone else complaining. She didnt know. She said she saw other dogs being effected. She said one dog was cowering in the corner before its run because all the static on the speakers. You could hear the static across the whole rings and up at the top, where our seating was. Anyway, Java did Q this run.
Sorry, I stopped writing and now had our trial. So not sure I can even remember what happened. I remember the standard courses where hard. Well, not hard but harder then they usually are in AKC. I thought, wow, if this is regular standard, I wonder what premier will be like.
This was standard on Thursday.
This was standard on Friday.
I cant find the video of this run.
Here is Saturdays standard run. Ugh, so close. Why wasnt I talking to my dog, saying "go, go on"??? She has that command.
Here was premier standard. It wasnt that bad but I messed it up anyway.
Miley really struggled this weekend. Lots of stress circling. Finally I figured out that the medication I was giving her for having to urinate all the time, could be causing this behavior. So I stopped giving it. She had two wonderful runs. It was her last time at 12inch jump height.
And she took 2nd place.
Then jumpers, she had a bad crash. Which is why Im putting her down to 8 inches. I was going to stop running but she just got up and took off, so I just kept going.
I did manage to keep Java on course once. LOL
In other news, by RV door came off the hinge. I didnt really know anyone who had tools to help me fix it. The door was rotted earlier in the year and my husband and I took the door apart. Put new wood in the fame and put it back together. I guess we didnt do a good job. LOL
Now what? It was night time. My husband was going to come up the next day to help me fix it but what to do until then? Well, I put a bunch of levelers , that you use to level your RV, and I put them under the door to hold it up. Then I cut this water hose that I had. It was flat like a fire hose. And I tied the door together. At least I was able to shut the door that night.
My husband came up on Friday and we couldn't really get the door back together the correct way. (At least I got to see my husband. LOL) So we took some of the screws out of the hinge, so the door would shut and then tied it shut. My husband drove it home, in case the door flew off. It didnt. So we hope if fixed now.
