Water Rescue Course - Nurhan's take:

Nurhan's take:

Last week was spent at a water rescue course in Bergen. Bergen has an environment for this which isn't just Newfies. Above picture is taken ten minutes walk from cabin that my mother and I were staying at, and sadly Kin wasn't allowed in...

This was as far as the scope of his lead let him get. He was fine outside but I'm used to having him about and was a bit worried having him sleeping outside in a new place, that said he was fine the two evenings that he slept outside, although on returning home he didn't want to go in the back garden if the door wasn't going to be open.

He was a bit skeptical on the ferry, which is a surprise as we've been on plenty. On the way back to Stavanger the little chap wouldn't get out of the car, but think this was more to do with the fact that he was tired. Lots of new experiences for him.

Sadly I don't have very many pics of him on the actual course, mainly owing to the fact that I was in the water training with him. Here I'm in the water trying to convince him to join me directly off the pontoon. Diving is something that he's never done before. Karma (my old Newfie) 'managed' it once, he was about four months at the time and was on a jetty and he was leaning out to inspect ducks (Karma inspected everything, he even once swallowed a stinging jelly fish...) and being only four months old he was a bit clumsy and over balanced and managed to land on his back in the water with all four legs in the air!

Shortly after the above picture was taken, Kin decided to join me:

If you look carefully you can see some black fur just above the water's surface, this was Kin's first ever dive!

Then I had to sprint, as Kin doesn't believe that I should be in the water and his response verges on panic until I am out of the water. Try to distract him as much as you like, but it makes no difference, he's totally focused on me and swims straight to me, claws and all, when he arrives he doesn't know what to do, so keeps pawing me, which as his paws are bigger than my hands and his nails are considerably longer, isn't the most pleasant of experiences.

What he should do is this:

This is another Newfie, Odin, towing Unni in.

Not sure which dog the above is.

 Above is a Newfie.

 This and the next three pics are the same Leon Berger

 The above and the below pictures are a Spanish Water Dog, had a Portuguese WD as well on the course.

 Never seen a German Shepherd, doing this but he was good.

 Next three are a Newfie.

 Below is another Leon Berger.

Amazingly enough did manage to get Kin to pass his SoR (Swimming and Rescue Test), amazing because part of the test is to rescue the owner; some creative thinking from the instructors, Inger-Anne, and Hanne actually managed to get Kin (reluctantly) to tow me in. Kin & I now have some things to work on.

Now despite the sun, it wasn't hugely hot, which can amply be seen by the choice of summer garment Unni is wearing:

My wardrobe is definitely missing one of these fine garments! Says he typing this up in the evening when it's a sweltering 6 deg C outside (not including windchill...).

Now all Newfies are cute, but I really wanted to bring this little lady home:

Nina, I think is four months old - this colour of Newfie is known as a Landseer, after a British painter of the same name who had this coloured Newfie's and was good at getting them in his paintings (as opposed to most Newfies who are good at being painted - wooden houses in Norway need regular painting on the outside, and  Newfies being naturally curious isn't always the best combination!

I'd like to say a big 'thank-you' to the instructors and the participants (two & four legged) who made this so much fun.

This is Kin relaxing after a hard day of trying to keep me out of the water!

Skiing to Kjerag, grating, everyone has an opinion, carry bags, Nurhan's take:

Nurhan's take:

We had a week of sweltering weather, that ended on the 28th of May. This picture is taken by Espen, of me on the 27th of May where the temperatures down on the fjord (1000 m lower) is in the region of 26 deg C. Sun burnt calf muscles!

At this point Kin was excavating new holes in the garden, await Jan to come and take him out for his third walk of the day. Above trip was 15 km ski trip:

with David, May, & Espen (from foreground to background). We skied from the road, 

Over three lakes.

still plenty of snow. 

And right up to Kjerag:

Boulder is just in the crack by my left arm. Man on right is taking the 'classic photo' of someone standing on the boulder. Man is on rotten snow, which gets worse as the season goes on, and in my opinion is approaching the same level of danger as standing on the boulder.

Which is an easy step. Thanks to Espen for the above three pictures.


And no write up of a trip to Kjerag is complete without mentioning Pluto. Pluto was a Spaniel who had been taken to Kjerag with his Mistress. Pluto managed to fall down a crack, and could be heard, but not seen. Attempts to reach her failed. Her distraught owner could do nothing, and had to return to Egersund. There was speculation in the paper that folk would hear the dog barking for many years and in all likelihood the dog was dead...  She wasn't. After 13 days two folk reached her and rescued her; she was checked by a vet and found to be well (water running down the crack, and people who had heard the barks had thrown food down). That evening they knocked on the lady's door and you can imagine that scene! This link is by one of the persons involved in the rescue and has links to Norwegian sites for more details, great story, with a great outcome:


http://marek.vokac.org/Pluto/Pluto_Story.htm

Shorts have gone back in the cupboard, which Kin doesn't like as it means no naked flesh to lick, but he does like as it means that the temperature is colder, six degrees C on taking him out this morning, add in wind chill and that makes it not at all warm.

Now Kin has passed 18 months, I'm trying him with this rucksack for easy trips. Plan on taking a small walking tour with him and camping out somewhere. This trial has so far not been so effective as you put these on and he then runs into things to try and get them off, lots of rolling around on his back, will have to have a think as to how to get him happy about wearing these.

This pic does not capture the place were we are, there is a 1/2 moon above his head which you completely miss, and the great thing about this is it was a short drive after work with some folk from work to go climbing. Today I was about as good at climbing as Kin was, I managed to make it up the access path and that was about it! Kin is very agile, but I regretted taking him up the access path as there were lots of sections with scree, and he could get injured trying to negotiate these sections. Still he was very happy to try, unlike:

This grating bridge, he could see through the bridge and he completely freaked. We didn't manage to cross it, and the next bridge we came to (that wasn't a grating bridge), he freaked on principal! 

Years ago we took Karma, and Xo on a trip of Norway, and on the way back on the first ferry from Bergen, both dogs were quite happy to go up the grating steps (because they weren't looking down), on the way back Karma was quite happy... but NOT Xo who got to a mezzanine level and then refused to go up or down. By this time we were almost at Stord, and didn't have much time before we had to get off the ferry. Tied Karma up a the bottom of the steps. Xo was barking which set Karma off. I went back up and picked all 70 kgs of Xo up and then staggered down the steps, much to the amusement of a group of motorcyclists (who have the only photographic evidence of the event!). Because both dogs had been stressed, I gave them both treats and the motorcyclists pointed out that it should be me having the treats not them! Kin like Karma hates being lifted, Xo was quite happy, pick him up and he'd just go to sleep, which is the reason why I could carry him down the stairs. This coming weekend Kin, & I are heading to Bergen for a water rescue course, I don't think I'll be taking him up the steps on the ferry!

I like bringing Kin to as many places with me as possible. Brought him down to the boat as I had to do some work on her, and here he is 'supervising' the work - and being quite opinionated, didn't manage to get a picture of him when he had all four paws on the cat's (catamaran) trampoline.

Search for a cabin, four paw drive, rabies, Norsk Information Gene, Nurhan's take:

Nurhan's take:

Our hunt for a cabin continues... this has the positive side that we end up in some locations where we've never been before. Kin's four paw drive is finally coming into it's own, as on this occasion at this altitude the skis stayed in the car's roof box, and he's faster than me. The orange lead in the picture is a plastic lead that's 16 m in length and in this kind of terrain you just let it run behind him, then if you need to grab him it's possible, but otherwise he's free to roam, as there's still snow up here there are no sheep yet. Picture is taken at about 690 m, had to go up to about 750 m for skiable snow... oh and this is (according to the cabin prospectus) one hour's drive from my house (it was 1 hr 15 mins, which was fairly close).


The week before Kin and I had taken a walk from the house down into town and back, on the way back some kids wanted to meet him. He was fairly warm and had some slobber around his muzzle. Now Kin has become somewhat reserved when meeting kids, if they 'charge' him. If the kids stand still and he goes to them, all well and good, but he's not happy when they swarm him. They tried to swarm him, and he backed away. They then decided that as he had 'foam at the mouth' he obviously had rabies, which is why he didn't want to meet them!

Now back to four paw drive. Kin is no better when I am on paws than when I am on skis, he still tries to go in front and seems to enjoy 'T-boning', and generally getting in the way.  For a Newfie, he's wonderfully agile, but still need to be very careful about picking routes. Was trying to steer him down a safe gully, across a stream bed, when I slipped and did a wonderful glassade, on my arse, into the aforementioned stream bed... as Kin gave me a surprised look and saunted by - after this I became somewhat less focused on steering him!


We were having a wonder around the area where there is a cabin plot available. We bush wacked on one side, from the car at 500 m up to 740 m, then spoke to some locals who pointed out that the road to the secret  military installation (at least that's what the sign says), unlike on the map, it actually goes on for another five km, up to 906 m, on the other side of the hills, so up Kin & I went to explore.

We got up to ~ 869 m before the snow became too heavy going and we turned back.

Great area to visit; place is a little gem, but because of geometry, would run out of ski areas to explore quite quickly. 


Area is the south side of Ørsdalsvatnet, in Bjerkreim, road that goes into Lauperak. Incidentally for those who are in the Stavanger area, the hill that we wondered up is the one with the large radio mast on the summit (Gaupelemfjellet), that can be seen covered in snow when you drive on the E39 towards Vikeså.


On driving out we had to follow the three dead end roads to their ends. One of which goes through a farm and then you wonder if you are on the farm's private road as it goes to a gravel road, through fields... This brings you here:

With a stunning view along Ørsdalsvatnet, and this vessel:

Which at first inspection appears to be a shelter deck trawler (on a completely land locked lake, with no access to the sea), but on closer inspection is a tourist boat:

Which leads me to the Norsk Information Gene, as proposed by Pete McAulay, this is a gene that Norwegian's are born with so for instance they know that down this unlikely looking road there will be a boat that travels the length of the lake once a week between these times, this is why no advertising of this service is required!


Meantime the search for a cabin continues...

Bullying, injuries, great day, big dogs - Nurhan's take

Nurhan's take:

Late season skiing is normally really good. Snow is a good consistency, weather is more stable, sun doesn't go down until after 22:00 hrs, and as you can see from Mel in the above picture, it's generally warmer. Here Kin is trying to hypnotize her so she gives him, her food. It wasn't a great success... in fact, despite the fact that he has quite a number of kilos on her, she does have a tendency to bully him:

Not that he really seems to mind.


This was a short trip from the car and had him tied to a tree whilst we ripped up the surrounding slopes.

This pic is Kin, & I on the way back to the car (Pics from Mel). 


Kin still runs under the skis, so you have to be really careful, which does limit where we can take him. He was clipped with the metal edges of the skis on a paw back at the end of March, this then caused him some problems which necessitated a trip to the vet, lotions and potions.

And meant that I either had to put a cone on his head (cone is so big that he can't fit through doors! Or

He didn't like the 'anti lick' wool sock and despite the addition of duct tape, it didn't take him long to remove it!


Now on last Saturday, Mel, & I had gliders, and skis in the car (and of course, Kin). There is a paragliding course ongoing at the moment and I normally can tie Kin up at the hill that they are training on. Sadly this time there were cows in the field. Cows and dogs don't tend to mix well. When I noticed the cows (on the other side of the fence), Kin & I turned back to the car. The cows came as a herd to the rather insubstantial fence. Cows have a tendency to trample dogs (and their owners, if they are in the same place - and are best avoided). We took a trip up to the main take off, but it was too windy, so we decided to head up the road and go skiing instead. We did ask/taunt May if she wanted to come, and we were kind enough to send her pictures of us, in the sun, in the snow.


Next day Kin stayed at home, in the garden, and May, Mel, David, and I went on a longer ski trip.

And my jaw is still hurting from the grinning. Perfect snow, found some steep downhills to carve turns on, great weather, and not least good company. Kin was in the garden for almost eight hours (on the Friday before he'd been in the house for almost ten hours alone - neither time did it seem to be a problem for the little chap).


Felt knackerd when I came home but had to take him out. At one point he managed to disappear, and when he came back, you generally make a fuss, so he associate's coming back as a good thing, sadly it was only after I started to pet him and he'd rubbed himself up on me that I realised he'd found something worse than shit to roll in (I have no idea what/where he rolled but it was seriously unpleasant). Got him to swim in a lake, didn't do much to change the smell, did think about taking a dip to get smell out of my trousers, but decided against it on the grounds that the shoes would take too long to dry out (oh and it was only +6 deg C). Got back to the house and then had to wash him, which generally takes an hour, then had to have a shower. So very late dinner! - This kind of thing could be made hilarious in a comedy serious, less funny when you are tired & hungry!


Lastly Øyvind, & I have been trying to get a play date for our dogs. He has a two year old Great Dane, who currently weighs in over 80 kgs. They have met once before, but that was when Per was looking after Kin. Øyvind and I were talking dogs last week and he showed me the below picture of one of his friend's dog:

And people think Kin is big! Then we had a look at 'George', the world's largest dog, another Dane, who really isn't far off the size of a horse!

Screwed, strange sense of foreboding, made for the purpose: Kin's take:

Kin's take:

Trip into the small hills, no snow in sight, pity as I like rolling in it, and grabbing my human's legs when he has these strange plank things on his legs, that seem to make him fall over a lot - especially when I try to grab his legs...

Well that's it, now we're screwed... sometimes I wonder why I follow my human as a lot of the time he really goes to strange places.

 

Still on the plus side it means that we get to find another route.

I don't understand why my human insists on only using two legs... I keep having to stop and wait for him, or go back and try to find him.

I'm  little bit skeptical as to what my human is doing in my garden.

Can't see what my human is trying to achieve, but I have a strange sense of foreboding... still I'll go dig another hole in my garden as this helps me to think...

And then I can go inside and work on my wall mural, before having a relaxing snooze. Talking of which, I've taken to sleeping outside, and I've found this really great place to sleep when it's windy and raining:

 I could almost believe it was made for the purpose!