74. Stratford upon Avon (The Sequel) - House and Pet Sitting - Episode 16

Having Penny makes life so much easier as we go from sit to sit. We are really looking forward to seeing the town of Stratford-upon-Avon. Our next charges are Betsy and Daisy, a mother and daughter. 

We didn't meet the owners as they were on an early flight and we went in blind to meet the noisiest yapping dogs that ever there were.
Betsy, the black one, calmed down fairly quickly and Daisy?  Well, she's a basket case. She won't come near me and every time I move, she barks and takes off. Having said that, Max won them both over very quickly so I think it's a male energy thing. This may be a looooong week.

It didn't help that they are the fussiest eaters and the cheap food the owner left us to feed them wasn't popular.  After many attempts, Max gave them some of her roast lamb.  That worked! 

Pet owners sometimes withhold information about their pets' idiosyncrasies. These owners neglected to tell us that Betsy and Daisy start howling in the middle of the night for no apparent reason. Any noise set them off, including rolling over in bed. The dogs would bark until one of us came downstairs and threatened to feed them to the foxes outside.  Cute, but mad!


We're staying in a well fitted-out semi-detached house just out of town with views of a farm from the backyard. 


 Chickens! What a bonus!  Fresh eggs every morning for breakfast.


We were told they would eat from our hands so I had to try it.  


As winter creeps closer, the weather started to deteriorate and, with the clocks going back an hour, night was suddenly upon us at around 5pm. The house had a wood heater which worked brilliantly and gave us more than enough heat.



We had the dogs stay with us on the couch in the evenings. We could relax and they both looked like angels.  Little psychopaths!  They were sweet, just bonkers.



The next post will be showing pics of the beautiful Stratford-upon-Avon.

Another sit complete and now to South East England to Daniel's and Ellen's new place in Sevenoaks for a few days before another sit in Wadhurst.

Comments

  1. GabiNovember 7, 2023 at 7:30 PM

    You’ll be glad to get a good night’s sleep after that one!

    ReplyDelete
  2. KayeNovember 7, 2023 at 8:52 PM

    Well done feeding the chickens Paul 🤣😂 I know I shouldn't laugh, bit it did make me titter. No wonder the owners took an early flight, they didn't want to tell you face to face about the howlers.

    ReplyDelete
  3. AnonymousNovember 7, 2023 at 9:09 PM

    Those chickens were violent. I kept chickens for years and mine never behaved like that. They must have been fed up of listening to those howling dogs and they were bad tempered. Glen

    ReplyDelete
  4. Mary Lawrence November 7, 2023 at 9:41 PM

    Oh dear, funny little critters. All of them! I'll bet you're looking forward to moving on to more peaceful nights. 😉

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Max and Paul's Excellent AdventureNovember 7, 2023 at 10:03 PM

      Short answer Mary? YES! But half the fun is not knowing what you're walking into!

      Delete
  5. AnonymousNovember 7, 2023 at 9:42 PM

    Loving reading your posts Paul. What a wonderful way to see more of England...despite the odd idiosyncratic dog or two.
    Wonderful soaking rain here in Maleny after a long,long dry. Deb Lovegrove.🤗❤️❤️

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Max and Paul's Excellent AdventureNovember 7, 2023 at 10:04 PM

      Hi Deb. Good to know you got a soaking rain! You guys certainly needed it!

      Delete
  6. AnonymousNovember 8, 2023 at 4:57 AM

    Presume dinner was Roast Chicken...? :)

    ReplyDelete
  7. NataliaNovember 15, 2023 at 11:29 PM

    😆🤣😂🐔🐶🐔🐶

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

131- Lakes District - Edinburgh - Yorkshire - UK

Image
It's always good to see Daniel and Ellen. We'd last seen them in Majorca a few weeks before, and we were grateful to be able to stay with them again inbetween jaunts and pet sits. That weekend, there was a 'Lambing Day' at a local farm and Ellen and Daniel had taken a gig selling Jersey milk ice creams for a local farmer who couldn't make it that day. The queues were like this all day! Sheep dog demonstrations. Some of these border collies fetch more than 50k AUD at auctions. And... what the day was named after. This one looked blissed out!  Welcome to the world, little one. ❤️ Pics around Sevenoaks. Since we had no pet sits booked, we took advantage of the longer days and improving weather and planned a 'loop' to three destinations: the Lakes District, Edinburgh and the Yorkshire Dales.      The whole trip was just over 1500 km, which we covered in about 9 days. The first stop was Windermere in the Lakes District. We did fall in love with this place as the ...
Read more

End of Chapter 1 - Goodbye England. Goodbye Daniel and Ellen... for now...

Image
August 23rd and we went to Number 8, a restaurant in Sevenoaks, for Paul's birthday, which was the following day.  It was actually very good and we had a lovely time.  Ellen had kindly made a blackberry upside down cake (given it was blackberry season) and we left the restaurant to go eat sugar, sing birthday wishes and blow out candles.  The following day, Daniel and Ellen were selling ice-cream at an agricultural show in Oxted, so Paul and I went to London on the train.  Our last blast in the big smoke.  After a delicious breakfast at Dishoom we walked around the city and Regents Park and eventually headed back to Sevenoaks for dinner with the crew.  I'd made borscht for the first time.  Earthy dish, that.   Monday was a bank holiday (a public holiday to us Aussies) and the three of us headed to Oxted for the agricultural show. Ellen was working at the ice-cream van again so we spent the day with Daniel wandering around sheep and cows, goat...
Read more

132. Milton Keynes - UK - House and Pet Sitting - Episode 44

Image
Well, it's been a while since posting a blog as I've been tied up with video work. I'm still waiting on the result of my UK passport application appeal, which is due to have a ruling this week, so fingers crossed on that.  After spending a few weeks in Sevenoaks looking after chez Daniel and Ellen's we booked a few more pet sits to fill in time whilst waiting for a government department to get back to me.😄 The highlight was Max's birthday which was celebrated at a Turkish restaurant and a gift of 5 hours of massages, which, I must say, was gratefully accepted! The Birthday Girl The books that can be found in charity shops - Sevenoaks. Notice the bottom line 🤣 (The poems weren't as good as the cover!) Since the bookings were last minute we didn't have too much in the way of choice. The sit in Milton Keynes was a short and an easy one as looking after Doogle was a breeze. The house owners made us feel very welcome before heading off for their weekend in Wale...
Read more