A weekend on Brean Sands with Bob the dog - Off lead experience

Last month I decided to take Bob away for a weekend to visit the beach before winter kicks in. We stayed at a Travelodge in Burnham on Sea and spent our days on the Brean Sands.

It was quite a difference experience paddling in the Bristol Channel than Bob's first beach trip which was in St Lucia, north of Durban in South Africa, where he paddled in the Indian Ocean and chased monkeys over the sand dunes.

His next beach experience was in Dubai, in the Arabian Gulf, but sadly it wasn't long before dogs were banned from the beaches there.

Bob has had a wonderful life after we adopted him in 2013 and has clocked up some air miles along the way.

His latest beach trip was a world away from South Africa and Dubai, this time it was late September and in the Bristol Channel. He had a wonderful time with miles of empty sand to run off lead and I didn't have to worry about him taking off after a monkey over the dunes in Durban like he did before or have to keep an eye out for crocodiles and hippos.

Now I've discovered we can stay in a Travelodge, it means there will be more beach trips ahead for us. Our tent is on its way over from Dubai in the shipping container so there will be camping next spring also to add to our UK adventures.

Bob's recall has diminished since moving to Dubai as outdoor spaces we have used have been shut down to dog users and the only place he's been able to run off lead for the past 3 years has been at indoor dog parks.

I started off with the short lead to get to open space.

Moved onto the longer lead to let him explore further

Let go of the lead to work on his recall, which he mastered, straight away.

Then let him off lead, knowing I had all day to get him back if necessary.

I always carry a ball and some treats as an incentive to get him to come back.

There were plenty of rest stops.

And food opportunities.

Being a dog owner in the UK is a new experience for us both. Bob hasn't been used to visiting beaches, parks, coffee shops and the sights and the sounds and the smells have taken quite a bit of adjusting to.

Settling in a dog and a cat from South Africa to the UK, via Dubai.

Bob the Dog aged 10 and Pushkins aged around 11, started their journey to the UK from South Africa, via Dubai. The cat just moved in with us one day in 2012 and the dog was adopted from the SPCA in 2013.

They had 5 years in Dubai where they adapted well to the heat and for the last 2 years Pushkins has been an indoor cat, due to health issues.

They arrived in the UK on February 1st 2020 and so far, despite the cold and the rain, they've settled in well.

It has been helped by child 5 travelling with me, child 4 and 4a visiting and Peter arriving a week later.

They've established a routine of walks, food, sleep and toileting.

Bob is used to extreme weather from living in Dubai and adopted the same approach to the cold, rain and wind in the UK, he needs the toilet, it's a quick dash outside and straight back in.

The cat is still trying to find her spot and we're playing a lot of hide and seek as she has done on previous moves.

Bob is exploring new territory, new smells, sounds (sirens) more cars, pedestrians and a variety of other dogs. It takes us forever to get anywhere as he's constantly being petted. In between he's straining on the leash to explore further. We're not sure if he even speaks the new language of dogs here yet and has been very calm as one appears around a corner wither on an expandable lead and even off leash. The post being delivered is a puzzle to them both.

Bob has never been in shops before. We taught him to lie down by saying bed, so I'm carrying a towel with me to the coffee shops to wipe his paws on and for him to lie down on, so I can drink my coffee without him wanting to explore.

He's so far behaved himself in shops and banks.

making friends at the dog park

This morning a group of women met for coffee and a chat, sitting outside enjoying the winter sun in Dubai. We meet every Tuesday and the groups is getting bigger, we don't socialise outside of these hours and we're not all connected on social media. We have one thing in common and that is our pet dog(s).

Mums meet for coffee, colleagues meet for coffee, dog owners meet for coffee also.

Whilst our dogs play, swim and run around, we sit and discuss the recent rains, kids, day to day life and upcoming trips and visitors and our plans for the weekend.

We have to deal with the occasional petty squabble between the dogs, but we're not constantly distracted with requests for the toilet, something to eat or drink and endless questions.

It's taken me a long time to settle into life in Dubai. In the UK I had the kids at home, met people through playgroups, activities and in the school playground. I also worked and studied and could always find someone to have a coffee with at any opportunity. In South Africa I started to feel isolated, no more school runs, after school activities or a job in which to meet people so I focused on volunteer work and within 18 months, I'd built up a network of friends.

We've been in Dubai for 4 years now, I was teaching for a year. I joined all sorts of groups and activities but never felt I fitted in. I have a couple of friends who Peter and I meet with regularly as a couple and one friend I meet up with for coffee and shopping, but my network in Dubai is much smaller than it's ever been and when these friends are travelling, I've feel isolated. It also hasn't helped that the last two summers have been spent in the UK and I've not been around much.

How do you make new friends?

Holiday gifts for the cat and dog

I've been off on my travels to the UK for a month, leaving Bob and Pushkins in Dubai.

Peter joined me for the last week and he put them both into boarding.

Needless to say on our return they were very excited to us both. 

Since our return, Peter has returned to work and the cat and dog are never more than a few meters from my side.

There are a few things that Peter and I can't get in Dubai 'our taste of home' so the suitcase always contains our favourite food items. It also always contains something for the cat and dog, usually novelty items.

On this trip I found:

Dog Beer

Pawsecco Wine

Chocolate Easter Eggs 

The usual cat milk treat.

It's all designed for cats and dogs, contains no alcohol or actual chocolate, of which are dangerous to dogs. They're just novelty items and why not?

Visiting Santa without the kids. Christmas with Pets in Dubai.

When in Dubai.........

And why not? I say.

Since leaving school I've made friends via the work place and through having kids. But when you relocate from one country to another and your kids are all grown up and you don't work, then how do you make friends?

Well you join clubs/groups/attend coffee mornings. But that's not my style. In South Africa I did volunteer work and met the most amazing people and made life long friends. In Dubai, I took my dog out and about and met people. I even spent a year teaching in FS1 in an Arabic school after meeting a woman out walking her dog in the desert.

As my husband works away a lot and spends the days in the office talking to people he likes to come home in the evenings and switch off, me? I like to quite literally chew his ear off out of boredom, so Bob and I go out and join Dog groups, meet people, explore new places and generally have fun.

This is our 4th Christmas in Dubai and they do Christmas here big in all the malls and shops and as well as catering for all nationalities they also cater for our 4 legged friends. Bob and I attend Valentines lunches and Halloween parties and we love nothing better than a visit to Father Christmas.

We have 2 events this year. A secret Santa and swimming session at Dog Walk this coming weekend and last weekend we visited Santa at Paw Parking.

Oh and on Thursday Bob and I are going for a spa day. I'm off to have a manicure and pedicure ready to see John Bishop in the evening and brunch on Friday, while Bob is off for a grooming session at Paw Parking for the day.

And don't forget the cat. Pushkins joins in with Christmas also.

I'm pleased to say she doesn't mess around with the tree or the presents, but she did attack and eat half the contents of her advent calendar when left unsupervised.

Bobs Pre School Assessment.

As a mother of 5 kids ranging in ages between 18 and 29 it came as a bit of a surprise when Bob came into our lives.

We opted to do things differently this time and chose to home school Bob, but he is now 7 and we've come to realise that he needs to spend more time with others, despite him having good social and communication skills. He is a little clingy towards me and with me having to spend so much time away, he has been having anxiety issues that my husband has found difficult to deal with on his own. So my hand has been forced and I've had to go through the process of selecting a school for him to attend.

I had already visited several schools and done my research carefully over the past 3 years, knowing this day would come and we have of course used some of the holiday facilities in the past, but I'd never left him on his own. So last week, I made the decision to book him into a school near where we are relocating to at the end of the month for his pre school assessment.

I must confess I hadn't done much preparation in regards to discussing this with Bob, I really didn't want to put my anxieties and worries onto him. So the night before we packed his day bag, with a drink and snacks and a familiar toy and made sure we had an early night.

In the car on the way there in the morning I told Bob about where we were going and what was going to happen, how they were going to assess him and that I would be back after lunch time to collect him. I filled in all the paper work on arrival and then Bob was led off into the school, without glancing back once. I then asked what I was to do and they said I could go home and return at 1pm.

I didn't want to go home, what if there was a problem? It was a 30 minute drive each way, so having not done this for a good few years, I turned to Social Media for advice and was told to go find a coffee shop near by, buy a magazine and keep an eye on the phone, this is after all a very stressful situation for any parent and was a natural response to be worried and concerned.

I couldn't wait for 4 hours, so I arrived back an hour early and was told Bob had been fine, he'd passed the assessment with flying colours and had been accepted into their day care facility and I was welcome to go and see him at play and view the facilities.

Bob was extremely happy to see me and show me around and introduce me to his new friends. He seems happy there and the staff were welcoming and friendly and I'll be more than happy for Bob to attend regular sessions from now on. Bob was shattered when we got home so it was Macdonald's for tea all round and another early night as we had Halloween to prepare for the following day.

Oh just one thing........Did I mention Bob is a dog?

One Daily Positive - Week 44

I may also have been a little curt and not my usual cheerful happy self this week, but sod it. I'm fed up of smiling and saying I don't mind when inside I'm sobbing and wondering why I tolerate things so much, it's certainly not for an easy life. We're all sorted now with our current tenancy contract so we'll hopefully be signing for a new place before I return to the UK next week, which takes a lot of pressure off me.

No clock change here, but that means we're now 4 hours ahead of the UK which makes communicating back home more difficult.

I'm feeling a lot better, I don't know if you've ever had pneumonia? I had it in 2007 and was hospitalised with it for over 2 weeks. It took me several months to recover. I have been diagnosed with 'walking' pneumonia, which means I don't realise how ill I actually am. I get my blood tests back this week that will show the strain, but the doctor suspects it's where I'm run down from the summer in the UK, a chest infection that I was probably unaware of, that has been left untreated since June when my white blood cells were sky high but any infection I had, had been masked by a 9 day migraine and the identification of a lesion on my brain as well as tests to rule out leukaemia. Yes, I ignored the cough, especially after my dad died in July.

Anyway on with the week.

302 Sunday Warm. Seeing as I'm not sleeping past 3am, I made the most of the night time weather and cleared out the sheds ready for moving, caught up with a ton of paperwork, realised if anything happened to me, hubby would have no clue how to access our online accounts so made a secret, password protected file stored online. He chose the password. Walked to the local shops for coffee to stop myself sleeping during the day and dropped hubby at the airport for an overnight trip to Saudi. I was exhausted by 6pm.

303 Monday Scare. Took Bob for an assessment at a play park, it lasted 4 hours, I stayed for a bit then went off to look around the area to see if it's somewhere we'd consider living. Got my car sorted in the afternoon, needed a new battery. Driving is challenging in Dubai, if you want to turn left you have to do a you turn, unless you're at a major intersection. Today's route involved 2 x 16 lane highways, I entered from the left slowly, everyone was trying to exit right at speed. I visited a Halloween store in the evening and bought inflatable balloons and spoke with the neighbour for the 5th time in 3 years, didn't know she'd had another child.

304 Tuesday Halloween. Hubby arrived home in the early hours. Food shopped, carved a melon, it was cheaper than a pumpkin, baked some cakes for the neighbourhood kids and decorated the outside of the house. I then took Bob to a Howl O Ween party, it's at the place where he boards and he loves it there, came away with a goodie bag full of treats. Got back to hand out treats to the neighbourhood kids and ran out in an hour, tidied up and went to bed early. I may have over done it today.

305 Wednesday First. The whole day was spent house hunting, considering we have to move out at the end of the month, you'd think we'd have something sorted by now, but no, that's not how Dubai works. There are loads of places we like it's just all about location.

306 Thursday Must. Doctors appointment first thing. White Blood Cells still high, in fact they've gone up again so more bloods taken and a bit B injection in my bum. Hubby dropped me off, we had coffee and afterwards I tried to catch the bus home, but my travel card was empty so I walked to the shops and got a taxi. 2 companies came to quote for packing and moving us. Such a wonderful view from the bus stop outside the Doctors.

307 Friday Self Portrait. More house viewing, everything looks the same, everything is the same. Took Bob to a new play place in the afternoon Paw Parking, he chewed through all their tennis balls and took home a goodie bag full of treats.

308 Saturday Fireworks. Can't find any bonfire events anywhere. Found a house to rent, deposit paid and contract signed, just trying to get something in writing to confirm dogs are allowed. The front looks exactly like Day 305 but in a different location as in that location there is no shade at all.

On the blog this week:

My Sunday Photo - Z is for Zoo.

Triumphant Tales - I get really frustrated that companies assume everyone has access to the internet and knows how to use it. How to get things done without the internet?

PoCoLo - It iratates me when people tell me what I can and can't do in Dubai, especially when they don't live here and only go by what they read in the media. This week we did Halloween.

TweenTeensBeyond - Parents, Teens and Alcohol. Did you allow your kids to drink? 

They don’t do Halloween in Dubai.

The word on the street is quite literally ‘get in your car and drive round to where we live’ as apparently our street gives out the best treats in the neighbourhood. Despite half the street being knocked down this week, this evening we’ve been inundated with trick or treaters of all ages and nationalities. Dressed as witches, vampires, superhero’s and unicorns.

Dubai is full of Halloween, from the stores selling over priced, imported Pumpkins (I carved a melon) to shops dedicated to Halloween costumes and displays in shops selling cards.

There are themed parties at some of the top hotels for children and adults alike and we’ve even been a long to a HowloWeen party especially for the 4 legged variety kids.

Whether you like Halloween or not, it really does happen here in Dubai. It’s friendly, safe and nearly everyone joins in, whether it’s understood or not.

It’s the same as Christmas, Easter, Diwali, Ramadan and Eid. And all the other festivals regardless of  religion or origin. Everyone is encouraged to participate and learn about the different cultures. Even the cat has joined in.

I personally love this the most about living in Dubai. In that respect it’s the best city in the world to live in, if you ask me.