Have you ever wondered what your humans got up to before they had you to take for fun adventures and walks?!

We did and this is what we found while rummaging through all their old photo’s…

Hmmm why are they all dressed up funny with strange sticks?

They're in a boat, we guess that's pretty cool!

Ok, so Marc's head is in a big gush of water...

So what, Laura's soaking wet and submerged in water...not our cup of tea, but who are we to judge!

*shock horror* ummm...?

O my gosh, o my gosh!!! *Panic*

O god, where did they go?! Under all that water?!

We cannot understand why any human would want to do something this horrific, who would want to throw themself off a waterfall in a BLOW UP boat??!   We think getting us was the safest thing they ever did – a walk through Waiatarua Wetlands is definitely not that life threatening.

You don’t think our humans will want to do something like that again would they?!  We are NOT going to participate in that adventure with them if they do!!

Apparently New Zealand in known for it’s many extreme sports.  This one is called White Water Rafting and is one of the tamer ones…ummm what is tame about throwing yourself off a 7m waterfall!!  You can also throw yourself off giant buildings, cliff faces, and bridges!!!   As well as going swimming through super dark waters in the middle of a cave, this is called black water rafting. We also probably missed out the craziest of them all, jumping out of an airplane!! *EEk* Skydiving it’s called.

We prefer to keep our feet firmly on the ground and on dry land :p  Hopefully we don’t find anymore Life before us photos!

During this time we got to go on lots of diffferent walks and meet up with lots of different friends.  Our humans and us love making new friends and catching up with old ones!

Today we caught up with some old friends, we hadn’t seen them since July 2011.  Which is a long time, especially in the dog world.  We met up with our friends Cinnamon and Mint, some of you guys will know them from their blog, Beagle Diary.

Waiting nicely in the gardens!

We went to a place that we have been to a few other times with another one of our friends.  It’s called Auckland Botanical Gardens and it is beautiful there; it has lots pretty paths to walk around, with all different kinds of flowers to look at – Nope not to sniff or pee on   Our humans don’t let us sniff and pee when ever we want while we are on the lead.  They like to use sniffing as a reward when we have been behaving well.  They like to use all different types of rewards.  Not just the standard treatie or pat on the head!

We met Cinnamon, Mint and their human outside the front building, where there is an information center and a cafe.  What we also like about the gardens is that it has on and off-leash area’s.  You have to walk through the beautiful gardens on-leash to get to the off-leash section.  Laura thinks this is great because we have to be calm and settled while walking on the leash through the gardens, then we get rewarded at the end of it with a big run off the leash.  Having to walk on-leash also makes us use our brain a bit more, by making us be aware of where we are walking and making sure we are respectful with good manners.

When we finally got to the park we did a lot of this at first…

Sniffing!

Then Cinammon and Mint’s human pulled out a toy, and then it was game on.  Though Mint was the only one that really wanted to play the game.  All Lexi wanted to do was take it off him and then not give it back…

"Please can we play with the toy"

"No! That's my toy"

We continued to walk around the whole off-leash area.  It’s a pretty large space with different paths and lots of trees.  There is also a little pond in the middle and a river type thing to the side.  Since none of us are real water dogs we didn’t hang round in the area very long.  We went over to a large space of grass off the main path, where we could run around and play…

Cinnamon wasn’t really that interested in playing with us, but Mint was.  He loved to chase us   Which is great, because that is one of our favouite games to play.

Lexi also found herself a boyfriend, she went all silly and submissive (which is very unusual for her) and started jumping, squiggling and play bowing all over the place…

Jasper also found himself a *Ahem* …a boyfriend.  His name was Dudley and he was a 14month old Long Hair Rottweiler…

Man love moment!

As you can probably guess we were very hot at the end of our outing.  All that running, playing and “man love” makes us giant doggies super hot.

Our humans were also quite warm, the weather is very humid at the moment.  Too much rain mixed with sunshine makes horrid humidity!!   They got themsleves a cool drink after giving us one of course and we all went and sat in the shade.

*Ahhh* What a great end to a great play date!

Our human also thinks it’s import to keep us fit and healthy because it could help with our longevity. Lots of Giant breed doggies have a reputation for not living very long (Obviously sickies that we have no control over don’t count).  We wonder whether it might have something to do with what other reputation giant breed doggies have…being very big and lazy. We have seen lots of humans keep their giant breed doggies over weight because they are big dogs and are “supposed” to big and heavy.  They also don’t give them much exercise because they are lazy and don’t “need” it.   Exercise and weight is very important, just like in humans!:)

Anyway, getting back to us having the opportunity to behave like real wild dogs,well not real wild dogs, we didn’t go hunting or anything. We could have had the chance but we were too busy sniffing a log…

As you guys probably don’t know (we haven’t posted about it yet), we are now fed on a raw diet.  Our human Laura buys food from the Raw Essentials Store once a week and made friends with one of the ladies (her name is Haylee) who works there.  They get on really well! Haylee is also a dog trainer and works in a very similar way to our human.  Haylee has a dog called Reid and we all get on like a house on fire.  Haylee and Laura have plenty of things to talk about and laugh at, because Reid is a little bit of a weirdo just like Jasper is a bit of a weirdo and they do the same stupid things and pull the same special faces.  Have we ever shown you a picture of Jaspers “special” face?

Here is a sneak preview, you see his one eye?!  We will show you a full frontal “special” face another day.

As the title of this post states this was a pack walk and since our human is used to having 4 dogs with her she would use the term “pack walk” for a common number.

This pack walk had 7 dogs and 2 humans

From left to right: Flo & Sam (Hungarian Visla's), Red or Redford when he is naughty (Staffy), Reid (Pointer x), us (Great Danes) & Bailey (Chihuahua)

We were all very well behaved on our pack adventure through the forest.  We all took off chasing a rabbit, but as soon as our humans whistled we turned around and came straight back.  Whenever we hear Laura whistle we turn around and come running straight away, she taught us from a very young age that a whistle means “I am leaving and if you don’t come right now you will be left behind”.  We learnt it very quickly as well, do you know how?!  When we were just 12 weeks old she never waited for u, she left us behind and we learnt very quickly what the whistle meant!  She makes sure she is very consistant with its meaning as well – she can’t whistle and then stay in the same spot, because then we would realise that she isn’t moving off and wouldn’t come as quickly.  Everytime she whistles she must move off like she is going somewhere else.  It all comes back to her liking to use ways of communicating that are natural to us.  If we had another dog as a pack leader then they wouldn’t stand around waiting for us if they wanted to leave, they would give one signal that they were moving off (sometimes no signal) and then they would go and because the rest of the pack didn’t want to be left behind they would quickly follow.

One moves off, they all move off

The forest we went to was Woodhill Forest, Rimmer Road Access.  We have been here many times, it is so great when you want to have lots of space to run and investigate and do natural doggie activities; like disguising your smell so prey can’t tell your there, marking your territory by peeing on everything and making scuff marks at the base of trees!

Here’s what we got up to…

Lot's of exploring and playing with both dog and human - how can you resist a pine cone being hurled through the air?!

We found a large puddle to drink out of and splash around in!

We also participated in simple obedience for a tasty treat! Yes we know that is not natural, but hey, we are domesticated :p

Our pack walk was a total of 2 1/2hours long and it even ended with us having to walk nicely behind our humans for the last 15min.  Most of us were really good at that, the one exception was Redford.  He came along with Haylee (her sister is his owner), he’s a pretty good little boy except he has shocking leash manners.  But luckily teaching dogs their leash manners is one of Laura’s favourite things and within about a minute Red was trotting along nicely behind with the rest of us!

As you can probably guess we were very tired after our adventure into the wilderness to unleash our inner wolf *Hee Hee*.  We came home, ate our dinner and then crashed for the rest of the day :p

We hope you guys get to experience these sort of walks, they are great!!

]]> http://doggyadventures.wordpress.com/2012/01/14/out-in-the-wilderness-with-a-pack/feed/ 9 Lexi the Great Dane Muriwai Beach 2011 014 26-12-2011 090 Jaspers crazy face WoodHill 107 black-wolf-pack1 2012-01-02 WoodHill2 2012-01-02 WoodHill1 2012-01-02 WoodHill http://doggyadventures.wordpress.com/2012/01/13/flashback-friday-the-crazy-faced-one/ http://doggyadventures.wordpress.com/2012/01/13/flashback-friday-the-crazy-faced-one/#comments Fri, 13 Jan 2012 05:16:29 +0000 Lexi and Jasper the Danes http://doggyadventures.wordpress.com/?p=1277 Continue reading »

Now I, Jasper, have always been a little weird or as my humans call me a bit “special”

Do you think this face has anything to do with it?

O and I can’t use the excuse of this just being a “puppy phase” face, these faces still come out now that I’m 2 years old! :p

But don’t worry even with my crazy face I still get people saying how very handsome I am

We just don’t tell them about all my crazy behaviours that match that crazy face

]]>

Something horrible happened to me...

As you may or may not know I’ve been very lucky and have not had my nads removed like many other males.  This means I have not had to experience that horrible thing called anaesthetic!

See I'm very well endowed

Sadly that all ended today   If only I could have put two and two together and realise this is why everyone at our Great Dane meet up was saying
“Aaawww poor Jasper”.

Monday morning my huMAN took me to the vet. I love the vet, it always smells like dogs and I love dogs!!   Also the vet that Lexi and I go and see is very nice and he has a beautiful sunny waiting room for us to chill out in.  We go to Rothesay Bay Vet Clinic.

But this vet visit was different, my human brought my blanket along and then left me there…    My vet came and gave me an injection, and the next minute I’m waking up from a deep sleep feeling very yucky   I couldn’t even stand up!

While I was drifting in and out of consciousness, hoping this horrible feeling would go away, I hear a familiar voice. My huMAN!! My vet comes to get me, I stand up to go and see my huMAN…  but goodness the floor was moving and I felt so very high up (these long legs are good for running, but not when you don’t feel so good).  I wobbled out to see my huMAN.

We get home and I was still feeling so yucky I went straight back to sleep.  When Laura came home all I could do was sit up rest my head on the window and watch her come in.  I felt so horrible and I was still very wobbly on my legs!  A regal creäture such as myself should not have to be in this state!   I was feeling so sorry for myself, that I just sat with Laura, staring up at her looking as pathetic as I could!  Can you believe it though, she was giggling at me!! She said my face looked so funny, and she couldn’t help it! *Humph* It wasn’t my fault I felt horrible, it was their fault for taking me to the vet!

*Dum dum dummm* Then I clicked…

I had lost my nads!!

Don’t worry, I’m not really that upset about losing them.  It’s better for me in the long run, now I won’t be pumped full of hormones that make me want to put my nads to good use   Plus I have less chance of getting bad sickies that are often associated with having them! This is the why my humans decided to get my nads chopped off, it just wasn’t fair for me to have them and not be able to use them!

Most people get their male dogs neutered because the hormones are causing them to be not so friendly with other male dogs and a little bit to friendly with female ones :p You see I’ve always been a very reliable boy when it comes to dominant male confrontations, I never feed into their behaviour, will always try and avoid a dog that will have a problem with me and have never started a dominant male confrontation. When another dog wants to start a confrontation I’m very good, I stand there very VERY still (but nice and tall, I don’t submit :p), I don’t make eye contact with the dog because I don’t want to accept his challenge.  I’ll stand there like that until either the human has collected the dog or it momentarily forgets about me and then I run away.  I display this behaviour even if the dog is being aggressive. For a while though my humans thought I was trying to start dominant confrontations, but it was actually me being insecure. It’s only Danes that I don’t interact with properly and losing my nads won’t make a difference in that situation!  *Pffft* and they say dogs love playing with other dogs that are the same breed as them…*Hmmm* maybe I’m a terrier?!

Another benefit to me loosing my nads, fingers crossed, is that the number of insecure dogs going crazy at me will reduce.  Obviously it won’t completely stop, after all I am a Giant Breed and we always bring out the crazy in dogs   But hopefully the ones that go crazy because of my nads will stop :p

I’m sure my human will keep you posted on any behavioural changes she sees in me!  I bet I’ll be exactally the same

Note from Laura:  Yes, we finally got him booked in for his neutering. A while back I talked about getting it done because we were having some minor issues with him when we were meeting up with other danes,  after taking him around them more and more I realised it was an insecurity with a fight or flight response attached to it, which is why we were getting a mix of nervous and grouchy behaviour when around the other danes (it was only danes he behaved like this around, other giant breeds didn’t bother him).  He is slowly getting used to them, tends to keep to himself and avoid them if he can, he has even dabbled in a bit of play.   The reason we decided to get him neuterd is that he wasn’t going to be used for breeding (he’s too small, 52kg when his brothers weigh in at 75kg) and I just felt bad leaving them on when he would never be able to use them.  I can only imagine the frustration for him, having all his hormones telling him to do one thing and then not being able to.  I’m sure our male readers can relate

Anyway, he seems to be recovering nicely and fingers crossed we don’t end up with too much excess skin!

Now obviously the award doesn’t just end with us, because we aren’t the center of the world!  This award has some formalities that we must abide by…

(1) Thank the blogger that gave you the award and then add a link to their blog. – Check
(2) Reveal your top five picks (with less than 200 readers) and let them know by leaving a comment on their blog. - See below
(3) Copy and Paste the Award to Your Blog. – Check
(4) Hope that the people you’ve sent the award to send it to their five favorite up-and-coming bloggers, and keep it going! - Come on guys keep it going

Ok, we are also not really sure what the 200 means; so our top 5 to send this award are…

Sammy the Cavalier King Charles Spaniel – Sammy is just so gorgeous with his Tri-colours, and we absolutely love little dogs and can’t resist this little guy!

Angus and Milo’s Adventures – These loveable lab always have a great story to tell! Angus has recently passed over the rainbow bridge, but he will always be remembered!

Bodie and Mrs. Magoo, a tale of two terriers – These two are always up to something, there’s nothing like reading about these tenacious terriers!

Teal’c, Dogs Life Down Under – If the surfs up he’ll be there, he’s a real Aussie beach dog

Jasper and Nellie the Maremma’s, their doggy world – The two also live in New Zealand as well!  They are beautiful with their long white coats!

We really enjoy following these blogs, you may already have come across them   If you haven’t, pop in and say “Hi”.

Thanks again Digby, Delta and Lincoln

Now: Bastion Point, windy and photo being taken with scenery in the background

Then: Bastion Point, windy and photo being taken with scenery in the background.

]]> http://doggyadventures.wordpress.com/2012/01/06/flashback-friday-now-and-then/feed/ 9 Lexi the Great Dane Dance and Bastin Point 022 Puppy Bastion Point http://doggyadventures.wordpress.com/2012/01/05/how-not-to-end-a-day/ http://doggyadventures.wordpress.com/2012/01/05/how-not-to-end-a-day/#comments Thu, 05 Jan 2012 01:15:00 +0000 Lexi and Jasper the Danes http://doggyadventures.wordpress.com/?p=1133 Continue reading »

Before all the Christmas celebrations started the weather up in Auckland was beautiful and sunny.  For the past 4-5 days, we’ve had the tail end of a tropical cyclone so it has been windy and very wet.  We haven’t minded though as we really enjoy playing in grass ponds, which only form when there has been lots of rain.

Anyway the weather is not what we wanted to tell you about today…

Christmas Eve was a beautiful day and there was lots of excitement because Santa would be visiting that night.  Our humans decided we should go for a nice long walk at one of our favourite parks, Waiatarua Wetland Reserve.  Even though our humans take us for an hour walk everyday, they wanted us to be extra tired because that evening we were going to Marc’s parents house for a Christmas Eve Party! Woo Hoo! They wanted to make sure we would be very well-behaved and not have lots of pent-up energy.  There was going to be lots of people and 3 other dogs there.  Two of the other dogs were Cassie and Trixie, their humans are Marc’s parents and sister.  Since it would also be beneficial for them to be tired and well-behaved they came along to the park too!! Yay, the more the merrier!!

So off we go to the Park, we all had a fabulous time!

We had fun running around together

We enjoyed stretching our long legs

Some of us really enjoyed the water

While others prefered to pose for the camera

We had a great time at Waiatarua and we were there for probably about 2hrs; playing with balls, sticks and other dogs! We also did lots of exploring in all the trees and bushes; Jasper especially had to see what other dogs had been to his favourite park since he was last there!  When it was time to go home, we all happily got in the car and looked forward to being able to curl up and go to sleep on our beds…

BUT sadly that is not how this story ends …

Because it was a nice hot sunny day and we were going to a party tonight with lots of people, Laura and Marc decided we needed a bath *Humph*  And not a bath with nice warm water, which would have been bad enough. A bath with horrid cold hose water!!!

It was NOT a good way to end our fun day at the park!!  But don’t worry we made sure Laura and Marc knew we were not happy about this…

Don't you feel sorry for me?!

Please feel sorry for me!

We got our pay back though, if they are going to give us a bath with a hose and say it was because it would cool us down then they also needed to be cooled down! *Hah!*

Pay Back!

There is one good thing though about having a bath and that is we get dried afterwards!   We absolutely love getting dried with a towel; whenever one gets picked up we run towards it and dive our head in and push and rub up against what ever poor human is holding it.  Once we are dry we get to play zoomies in the garden   As long as we don’t roll in the dirt *hehe*  Zoomies is one of our favourite games!!

Hmmm…Now that we think about it horrible hose water wasn’t the last thing that happened, being dried and playing zoomies in the garden was, and that’s actually a pretty good way to end the day…

]]>

We are very sorry we have been absent for a while.  The past few months have been very crazy for us and our humans.   We are going to quickly catch you up on everything that’s been going on.  As of tomorrow, we should be able to get back to blogging as usual.

Well we sort of disappeared from blogging in November.  And it all started here….

Laura went jet setting across the country for a week.  Visiting Christchurch and Queenstown for work.  At the beginning of this travel she became unwell with a head cold   this turned into a sinus infection…

Now Laura should have taken time off work.  But she could not, she was given an opportunity that she wouldn’t miss no matter how sick she was!

After returning from her jet setting, she had one day off and then traveled to Hamilton.  To meet and work with this man…

So, drugged up with nasal spray and Flu medication, she got up on stage with Cesar Millan and demonstrated what a calm submissive dog and a calm assertive handler looks like.   We really like Cesar Millan, Laura was so glad she got to meet him and see him work in person. (Yes we know many people don’t like him, but Laura does and seeing him work with the dogs and how they react to him was amazing).  What Laura really likes about him is that what he talks about can apply to everyone no matter what trainer and techniques they like and use.

Anyway, after making an appearance in Hamilton with Cesar, Laura returned to Auckland the same night.  To return to work the next day…

Going to work the next day didn’t work out so well.  Her sinus infection had gotten much worse.  Her whole face was now aching :S  Off to the doctors she rushes, she couldn’t be really sick for her appearance with Cesar Millan in Auckland!!!

Medication prescribed, feeling a little better the morning of Cesar.  Day off work to recover.  Laura is getting ready to go out to Cesar waiting for Marc to get home from work. 5min before Marc and Laura are due to leave, Laura’s cell phone rings…

Marc: “Laura I’ve been hit by a car” !!!

Marc rides a motor bike and 2min away from home a car pulled out from a driveway and T-Boned him.  His leg had been squashed between the car and the motor bike, luckily there was nothing else injured. So off we go to the hospital following the ambulance.  We’d never been to the hospital before… well the car park anyway.

Luckily, Laura didn’t have to miss Cesar Millan, Marc’s parents came to sit with him.  And he was home that evening.  But wait that’s not the end.  All of this happened in the period of 1 1/2 weeks.  We’ve been gone for longer than that…

So Marc is seriously injured and has to have his leg up for the next week, but Laura and her mum had made plans months ago to go on a holiday to Wanaka, two days after Marcs accident!!  Who was going to look after us?  Laura was VERY stressed.  luckily her sister Sally came to the rescue and said she would exercise us!

Laura had a lovely time in Wanaka, it’s in the South Island of New Zealand and very beautiful, Laura’s Aunt and Uncle live down there.

So Laura flies back from Wanaka, to turn her cell phone on and find a message from Marc saying…”I’ve gone to A&E, the graze on my leg has turned into a massive infection.

It had, for the next 4 days we had to visit the local doctors so Marc could have his wound dressing changed.  On the 4th day how ever, the doctor thought that he might have cellulitis on the top of his foot.  Off we go to the hospital we go again…

Marc has now been admitted into hospital for the next 4 days, poor Laura is back at work and rushed off her feet!  Don’t worry we did lots of travelling and went for plenty of walks in the dark.  We were even a hit with the hospital nurses who always came and spoke to us while we were waiting patiently in the car at the hospital!

Marc is then back home, still unable to do anything, still off work and waiting for his leg to mend. Here are some photo’s of his injury, if you have a weak stomach don’t look, but don’t worry there is no blood!

So as you can see Laura and us have been very busy up till now.  Laura and Marc have two weeks off over the Christmas and New Years break and are enjoying relaxing after the past couple of months!  We are enjoying it as well, going for new and exciting walks, meeting up with our friends, going to Christmas and new years parties!  Woo Hoo!

We think we have had a pretty great year, we have done so much it’s hard to remember everything!  We will leave you with this video of our adventures in 2011.  And hopefully 2012 will be just as fun!