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Saturday, July 30, 2011

Missing My Furs

I am very much an animal person. Courts is too, but being without them definitely affects me more. I’ve been away from Toby for a month before, when I went through the States, but it’s been 7 weeks now and I miss his fur. We saw a Border Collie the other day and even though it looked more like my old dog Holly than it did Toby, it made me wish he was here.

A lot of people travel with their dogs here too. At home there are no dogs allowed at campsites, ever. Either finding a place that will allow dogs or, easier, finding someone to look after him while we’re away, is a strong factor in any holiday we take. I’d much rather have him with us because he loves being on holiday with us, and here it’s so possible. I thought it was a novelty to see a blog before we left about people travelling long term with their dogs but if we stayed in Europe we could do it easily.

Of course that would entail spending thousands of dollars getting Toby onto the continent but for those that are already here, all you need is roughly 2 Euro extra a night and a way of securing the dog to your pitch or on a lead.

I’m yet to see a travelling cat but I’ve known of them at home. At our last house Izzy taught himself to open the bathroom window and escaped within 2 days of us moving there. But he was there, waiting outside when we got home and we didn’t have a problem afterwards. It would probably be different at Monty and Nurse B’s house where he has Jimmy to keep an eye out for but I’d like to think he could be a travelling cat.

Alas, with 8 more weeks (of Summer!) to go, at least our furs are safe with wonderful people who treat them very well and post lots of photos of them being ridiculously cute on Facebook. I do have two extremely cute furs if I do say so myself, very photogenic.

In the meantime, every animal anywhere near us gets fussed over. Whether we are riding past cattle or horses, or if we spot fish or turtles in rivers, if we’re at the zoo or the aquarium, if the next door tent has a puppy (even one that looks like a grizzly and barks like it wants to attack) or the campsite has a stray cat, we have animal radars imprinted in our brains that immediately go “LOOK! CUTE!” when we pass. We’ve even become nerdy avid bird watchers and feeders and if a squirrel were to find it’s way near us again it would probably find itself becoming a travelling squirrel.

None of these animals make up for fur cuddles though. I love the way my boys smell, their fur and their wet noses, Izzy’s whiskers and Toby’s annoyingly never-still tail. I miss a proper cuddle with one of them on my knee, or Izzy under the covers with me.

What part do animals play in your life? Would you miss them if you travelled long term?


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