Camping mischief

Another fun adventure with mum, but this time its a road trip with the promise of camping and mud!

I must admit to being slightly apprehensive given all previous camping trips have involved an evil sailing boat that mum keeps trying to persuade me is fun. Let me state for the record - boats are not fun! Neither is jumping off a boat onto the bank only to fall into the river and be fished out by your mum! The result was a very wet, humiliated and traumatised puppy!

Since that eventful day I am proud to say I have not set paw on or near a boat.

Anyway, that aside, I gave her the benefit of the doubt and late Tuesday evening we set off for Wales to see mums biological dad and drop off a rat cage. I know its bizarre but stay with me. We drove well into the night with mum taking regular stops so that I could experience the weird concoction of smells that is a service station - namely greasy food, sweat and lorry fumes. All rather delightful. It was exspecially kind of mum to bring a MacDonald's into the car for me to salivate over for the rest of the journey. One pointer though, if mum had applied common sense and not had joint water stops we likely wouldn’t have had to stop every hour for joint wee wee stops! We finally arrived at 12:30, long after my bedtime and I quickly made myself at home. Having been rudely insulted by the host who called me lazy, I was soon zonked out with my mum on the floor. Selfishly nobody had thought to bring me a sleeping bag.

We woke with the excitement of breakfast (croissants for them, and biscuits with no fresh mince for me) and then after a potter about the town, set off to source rats. Given mum had previously mentioned I had especially soft and sexy jowls perfectly designed for retrieving critters I was quite excited to pursue my first rat hunt. The reality was very different, I was cooped up in the car for another 15 minutes, they went to some housing estate and 5 minutes later back they come with a box and two tiny 5 week old morsels. Not being allowed out at the time, I missed Mark (Maria’s biological dad) dropping his newly bought rat, and having to catch it by its tail, with the result it bit him just seconds into their relationship – not the best start. While the others went to some craft centre I had a nice chat with the rats, newly named Fang and Banksy and I would like to say we are now firm friends. I do feel slightly guilty for thinking they were food. 

We had a little home warming for them and then ventured out to the park for a picnic where I met Bruno the chocolate lab. We hit it off from the start and had great fun playing in the pond, disrupting the fisherboy and generally getting up to mischief, making our mums run circles round us. Mum implied I wasn’t going to be the nicest person to share a tent with, but I have no idea why?

All this fun was then followed with more driving, I can see this is a major disadvantage to road trips. Mum kept telling me we were nearly there but on arriving at the campsite was told:

• You’re too late
• Don’t take dogs
• Don’t take tents
• The restaurant is closed

Wow that’s forward planning for you! So more driving, a random natter with a coach driver and we have two new plans:

1. Comfy guest house with four poster beds and full English breakfast 
2. Empty farmers field with no basic amenities

Yay for option 2! It cost just £3 and mum spent the saved money on treats for me. It was just super, we pitched the tent next to a river (well mum did) and it had this stick randomly caught in some rope tied to one the thick branches, Despite pulling and pulling I just couldn’t get it free, then mum made it even harder by sitting on it and swinging out over the river! It was great fun trying to catch her though.

Hey come here you!

Yay got her!

Of course I did get a little wet from all this river frolicking but since when has this bothered me? I rather like getting wet and was quite content to sit out in the rain, but oh no mum said I had to come to bed, despite it only being 8pm. Obviously sensing my disappointment at not having my own sleeping bag she wrapped me in the picnic blanket to keep me warm (and her dry no doubt). I slept wonderfully, and by morning had expanded my measly bottom of the tent territory to a more equal share with mum squashed at the top to give me sufficient ' leg spread' room. Stretched out I'm taller than her so it is only fair I have more of the tent.

Given it was still raining mum let me play while she packed up the tent and sorted breakfast. She then concluded it was a good idea to source coffee, so we drove to Ashbourne and found a  nice market to have a sniff about. I was made a right fuss over being the handsome chap I am, and mum looked like a right old farmers wife, I'm not even sure she had bothered to brush her hair - talk about letting me down!

It was probably a good idea then to hide from the public and embark on an 8 mile walk through Dovedale Valley which was just stunning. It drizzled the whole way which kept me cool and my ever organised mum hadn't bought a rain coat so got nice and wet too. They have odd quirks up there though, what with the boot plant pots and habit of lodging coins into tree stumps. It made for an interesting walk, and mum even did some climbing.

One of my favourite photos

Does it count as pocket money if I can the pennies out?

Ha ha wimpy scrambling on wet trees

Sitting pretty :)

Bless her, she was quite proud of how much we had achieved in two days, and we celebrated with more treats, which was a good thing really given she had promised me a 2.5 hour drive back and it took 4!

Still I can't complain it was great fun, and no doubt she will have another daft adventure up her sleeve again soon.

Woof woof and much love,

Jasper xxx