Not so bad, then!

I didn't like to say it - I was embarrassed for her.

But Cookie, despite making great strides recently off-leash, learning to come when called and learning to stay focussed on us, was VERY, VERY naughty.  Twice.

The first time was when I went for a walk in the woods above Reillanne - a familiar spot, one of my favourites.  I kept her on the leash until we got to the top and started to walk along the top of the ridge, then I let her loose and started throwing the ball.  She was good.  She was focussed on the ball and the treats that I gave her in exchange for the ball every time.  Then I got a text from the LSH.  Not an ordinary text, a Viber text, so it meant I had to go through a couple of extra steps to read it on my iPhone.  I took my mind off the dog while I pulled up the text, and WHAM! she was gone.  Not completely disappeared, never to be seen again sort of gone.  No, it was more a WHEE I'm free and I'm going to rampage through the woods, keeping an eye on you all the time but you're not going to catch me sort of gone.

I tried hiding from her, which used to work a treat with our Beardies years ago.  When she eventually found me, crouching behind a bush, she cocked an ear my way Oh there you are and galumphed merrily past me.

I tried feeding Cinnamon treats - jealousy has worked in the past, but not that day.

I tried throwing the ball, literally under her nose.  She couldn't have cared less, didn't even look at it.

I tried sitting down, hoping that she would come close and start sniffing at stuff nearby.  She seemed to feel that my staying still gave her license to roam further afield and completely disappeared into the woods, so deep that I could no longer hear her bell jingling.

At that stage, I thought the best thing to do was turn around and make my way back to the jeep, calling from time to time.  Eventually, she burst out of the trees far, far behind me on the trail and headed off IN THE WRONG DIRECTION.  I called, and she did a 180° turn and tore down the trail towards me, side-stepping neatly as she neared me and running past the proffered treat in my hand.

Eventually, by making a huge fuss of Cinny and stuffing her with treats, I managed to persuade Cookie to come close enough to grab her.  I made a fuss of her, although I wanted to throttle her, and she went back on the leash again.

A couple of days later, the LSH took her to the Watermeadows for a run.  I warned him. He said he'd leave her off anyway.

He unclipped the leash and she was gone like a snot from a sneeze.  The good thing about the Watermeadows, though, is that you can see where she is, most of the time.  She ran enormous loops, keeping the LSH roughly in the middle of her loops, but refused to come anywhere near him, not interested in the ball, not interested in treats.

Being better at throwing than me, he managed to throw a few treats right under her nose and got her attention that way.  He caught her in the end, but the two incidents gave us a fright and is making us rethink whether we'll ever be able to trust her 100%.

I went for a walk in the Watermeadows this morning with Gilla and Poppie.  This time, I reverted to our original policy of tying a long, light cord onto Cookie's harness.

I threw the ball, she tore after it, snatched it from under Poppie's nose and came galumphing past me, with her naughty can't catch me expression on her face.  I could, though.  I grabbed the trailing end of the cord and pulled her up short, and she came straight back to me, all happy and tail-waggy.

And that was the end of it.  We had a lovely walk.  Poppie and Cookie chased the ball and brought it back every time and got loads of treats.  Cinnamon chased moles (unsuccessfully).  They explored by the river and in the woods.  And Cookie kept coming back.

Maybe there's hope for her after all if we give it enough time.

Finally, good news on the Cinnamon front.  The vet rang this morning to say that her lumps are a benign kind of sebaceous gland tumour and are nothing to worry about.  Phew.

And REALLY finally, thanks everyone who voted for me in the ESMA awards - I didn't come anywhere (sniff!) but it was a huge honour just to be nominated.

Maybe I might share the Gobsmacked Face with you if I have enough glasses of wine some night.

Believe!

Believe in those who love you

Believe you can fly

Anything is possible

Even freedom.

Thanks to the LSH for capturing these beautiful photos of Cookie enjoying life.  
For anyone new to the blog, Cookie is a rescue dog.
We thought we would never be able to her allow off-leash.

Days of Whine and Horses

Since last weekend, Cookie has had another three off-leash walks - yes! Three!

The first one was with my friend J and her dogs, we went to the Watermeadows, which is a wide expanse of marshy fields, very open and safely tucked away from the main road.  We started off with four balls between us, and spent the first ten minutes throwing them enthusiastically.  Then one of mine got burst (it was a really cheap one), Cookie went off at a tangent to dig at some molehills and I had to follow her and bring her back.  Shortly after that, we realised that another ball was missing, presumably dropped by either Cookie or Tattie as they galumphed around.  At that stage, my nerve failed me and I put Cookie back on the leash, but she had a good twenty minutes running around with the other dogs, which was lovely to see.

Cookie and Poppie in the Watermeadows

On Saturday, the LSH and I went back to the Watermeadows, with our two dogs and our guest dog Poppie.  As soon as the ball was produced, Cookie was leaping up and down enthusiastically, whining and whimpering with excitement.  The LSH is better at throwing than me, and this time it went much better, with Cookie and Poppie galumphing around the fields merrily for a whole hour.  Cookie got distracted with interesting scents a couple of times, but we were delighted to see that when we moved on, she followed us.  She seems to be getting the idea that she needs to keep an eye on us!

The next day, we went for a walk along a ridge at the eastern end of the Luberon.  Once again, we had a couple of balls with us, and once again, Cookie was in a frenzy of excited concentration, whining and whimpering until the ball was thrown, vying with Poppie to be the one to retrieve it and and dashing back to us as fast as she could afterwards, with or without the ball, to receive her reward.

The only little glitch happened when we were homeward bound.  We met a large group of walkers, accompanied by a golden retriever.  Poppy was on point duty, and she froze when she saw them and then bolted up to the top of the ridge, from where she watched proceedings (she is very nervous of strangers).  Cookie rolled up her sleeves and went into attack mode, making a beeline for the retriever, barking hysterically as she ran.  She almost heeded our calls to return to our side, but a certain Small Brown Dog decided that Cookie needed reinforcements, and belatedly entered the fray, with her piercing yap echoing around the hills.  At the last minute, she went into "Oh hello, you look nice, let's play" mode with the retriever (who was very tolerant, bless him), which confused Cookie long enough for us to grab her.

Fortunately the walking group didn't seem to be offended by the Hyper-Terrier attack and Poppy quickly came down from the ridge once they disappeared, so it all ended well.  We do realise, though, that we are a long way from Cookie being reliable off-leash, our fingers are firmly crossed that we do eventually get there...

Rugby got in the way of any horse-riding on Saturday (Go Ireland! Only four more matches until we're Grand Slam Champions!) so on Sunday, straight after walking the dogs, we went up to the horses and headed out for a Long One.

Sleepy Aero ears heading out!

We went along the top of the ridge, Reclapous, for a while, then descended into the valley behind it, travelled the whole length of the ridge in the valley and then climbed up again at the Reillanne end, eventually rejoining the ridge-top walk where I've been with the dogs many times.  It was three hours in total, with a very long descent followed by a slightly less long, steeper ascent, through forest and scrubland the whole way.  Click on the link below to see a couple of extra photos.
Circuit de Reclapous at EveryTrail

My new size 2WW Renegades arrived during the week.  I put them on Aero's front feet, and Flurry got to wear the old, fairly worn size 2WWs on his hinds (they were originally his front boots for all of Le Big Trek).  He was noticeably more comfortable with them on, and I think I will continue to use them for any long rides we do for the foreseeable future, although I intend to experiment with leaving him fully barefoot for short rides.  Meanwhile his front feet continue to spread, which is a good thing I suppose, except it is now a struggle to get his right front Cavallo SportBoot on.  ARGH!  I don't want to have to buy more boots!!!

For the first time ever, one of the straps on a Renegade boot opened mid-ride - on one of Flurry's hinds, the oldest pair of boots we are using - and was so badly coated with mud that there was no way it was going to close again.  Fortunately we had our emergency kit with us and just swapped the old strap for a nice clean new one - Piece of Cake!  One of the reasons I like the Renegades!

How was Aero for this trek - the longest he has done so far?  Well, he was dead lazy going out along the first section of the ridge, but as soon as we turned to begin the descent from Reclapous, a new section which neither horse had seen before, he became much more alert.  He didn't put a foot wrong, but I could feel him "watching" behind with his ears the whole time, and at one stage he almost felt like he was scurrying along with his tail clamped down, anticipating that a mountain lion or a pack of wolves was about to spring out and attack him.  Fortunately, nothing awful happened, and at the far end of the ridge, he met his very first long, steep, rocky climb.  He tried to rush it initially, which works with short, steep climbs, but when you've got a steep 350 metre ascent, you have to take it steady, and eventually he did, following Flurry's lead and picking his ground carefully as we climbed.

We tried out another new bit of kit as well, the cantle-mounted saddlebag which I bought at Cheval Passion - you can just barely make it out behind the LSH's bum in the photo above.  Flurry got to carry it with two bottles of water and our picnic in it.  It's a bit small, but it worked fine, except when he shook himself - one of the bottles of water fell out, but I don't think that will happen if we pull the drawstrings tight enough!  Aero got to carry the pommel mounted saddlebag for the first time, I deliberately didn't put much in it, just the first aid kit and hoof boot repair kit.  As expected, he took no notice of the new attachment at all.  Next time, I'll put a bit more in it!  And then after that, my new Tapis Sacoches will have arrived :

And we'll have fun loading that up!

Leap of Faith

Today we went for a hike to the Saut du Moine (the Monk's Leap).

Between 1385 and 1395 there was a bad guy, Raimond de Turrenne, who earned himself the nickname of The Scourge of Provence.  Basically he went around with his armies, generally trashing the place (he's responsible for the first vandalism of the Tour d'Aigues, when the original building, the central keep was seriously damaged) and trying to force the decent, law-abiding Provençal folk to pay homage to someone other than their rightful liege, the Comtesse de Provençe, Marie de Blois.

One day, his forces were attacking the abbey at Valsaintes, about 10km from here as the crow flies.  One of the monks fled in terror, with the attackers in hot pursuit.  Believing his God would protect him, the monk faced his horse at a waterfall on the Calavon river and jumped off the edge into the water below - a true leap of faith.  History does not record whether he survived or not - at least, I can't find out for sure if he did!  But the waterfall has been know as Le Saut du Moine ever since.

I've been looking at trekking routes, one of which would bring us past Le Saut de Moine, and I wanted to check how horse-friendly the terrain was.  We parked the jeep 2km away from Valsainte and set off on foot, Cinnamon running along off-leash, Cookie on the leash trotting beside the LSH.

Following on from the OOPS post, let me just clarify this - Cookie is never intentionally off-leash.  She is just too unpredictable, too disobedient and too easily distracted to trust.  So what on earth are we going to do when we start long-distance trekking?  Leave her in kennels every time?  Well, we don't want to do that.  Attach her to a lunge line and lead her along while we ride?  Somehow, I don't think that's a safe option, and I think Aero and Flurry would take a dim view of it.  We've been talking about trying her off-leash for a long time now, so that we can start to develop some trust in her, and so that she learns to follow us as we hike along.  Once we can trust her while we're on foot, then we start introducing the horses into the picture... that's the plan, anyway.

Anyway, we decided that today was the day.  Like the monk from Valsainte, we had to take a leap of faith and just give Cookie her freedom.  We unclipped the leash and kept her attention focussed on us by throwing the ball a couple of times.  I had two tennis-balls with me, every time she came back with one, I would give her a little treat and throw the other while I picked up the first one.  It was going great - and then, BAM, a scent distracted her, she spat the ball out as she ran along and disappeared into the bushes, oblivious to our calls and oblivious to her abandoned toy.

What should we do? we wondered.  Let's just keep walking, she'll either follow or she won't, we have to trust her sometime, we said...

And she followed!  She spent the whole three hour walk off-leash apart from two occasions - once when we were passing through Valsaintes and once when we met some other dogs - Jack Russell Terriers, as it happened!  Our walk was about 12km, but between all the back & forth and side to side exploring she did I reckon she covered the best part of 18km, most of it at a run.  We called her back every so often and gave her a little treat each time.  By the time we were nearly back at the jeep, it was just like walking with a normal dog - she was pretty tired, and happily trotting along, just ahead of us.  She was exhausted afterwards, and actually lay down, asleep, under my chair when we stopped into a Café - unheard of behaviour, normally she stands on full alert the whole time!

Leaps of Faith aside, Le Saut du Moine is a stunningly beautiful spot.  There will be a mounted, picnic expedition there in the not too distant future...

And yes, the waterfall has a lot of ice in it.

Oops

It was nearly midnight.  The LSH was taking the dogs out for their final wee while I gathered bit and pieces from the living room and brought them into the kitchen.  I walked into the kitchen just as the LSH came in from outside, looking vaguely stunned.

"You won't believe what I've just done," he said.

I looked.  He didn't have to tell me.

Cinnamon, the quiet, well behaved, sensible and generally obedient dog was standing by his side - on the leash.  Cookie, the rambunctious, disobedient wannabe-cat, chicken and mole-killer was presumably running riot outside somewhere, free.

Yes, he'd clipped the leash onto the wrong dog.

I put on hat, coat and scarf (it was -3 outside) and picked up a torch, while he got the squeaker from an old dog toy, hoping it would attract Cookie.  We went outside and listened - nothing.  Of course, she wasn't wearing her harness with the bell attached.  How on earth were we going to find her in the dark?

Next thing I saw her eyes glowing in the light of the torch as she whizzed towards us... and past us, intent on following all the delectable scents left by chooks and cats.  She zipped backwards and forwards for a few minutes, ignoring the squeaker and the treats we were waving at her (and feeding to Cinnamon).

Then, a miracle, and a big mistake on her part - she headed into the garage.  We legged it after her and pulled the double doors shut.  She still didn't want to be caught, though, and ran around investigating all the smells in the garage, until she disappeared into the back left corner and stayed there.  I followed her, wondering what was keeping her occupied.

Ugh.  Our neighbourhood cats have made that corner of the garage into a toilet and she was busy stuffing her face.  Yeuk.

I caught her easily while she was distracted.  No, Cookie, you're not kissing my face again for a while!

Note to Self : There's a very good reason for keeping the garage doors shut.

Dear Cookie

Dear Cookie,


I am writing to let you know that I have decided to keep your human.  You have done a good job training him (he gives the most excellent belly rubs) but now it is time for him to be re-homed with a dog who is will truly appreciate his finer qualities, a handsome Anglo-Hispanic dog like me.

I have already decided which photo we will use for next year's Christmas card, this one is rather fetching, no?

You can keep the female human, but this one will be moving to Southern California with me shortly.

I cannot keep the smug grin off my face.

Sincerely,
Joaquin (Jack)

Sunday Stills - Pets

Cookie is the ultimate hunter.  She spends her day gazing out the window, watching the chickens, cats and pigeons and trying to figure out how to catch them.  On walks, she is constantly on the alert for prey.  We daren't allow her off-leash - her recall is non-existent and her hunting drive is so strong that once she gets a scent, the killer instinct takes over her brain, leaving no room for trivia such as family members calling her or trying to distract her with treats.

She does have some down-time though.  Preferably on the couch beside me, or even on my knee occasionally.

She even likes to "help" while I do this Blogging stuff.

I'm currently feeling very, very guilty about her.  By the time this is posted, I will be in a plane somewhere over the Atlantic, and poor Cookie will be sitting in kennels, wondering why we have deserted her.  She will be in kennels for a little over two weeks.  Since we took her in as a stray eighteen months ago, she has never been with anyone other than family for more than a couple of days.

Because she can't be trusted with cats or children and because of her overly strong hunting drive, we couldn't find anyone to look after her while we are away.  Cinnamon is a different story, she is very personable and low maintenance, but Cookie, despite being very devoted and loving, is a risk.  She's safest in kennels.

Sorry, Cookie, it's for your own good.

Visit Sunday Stills for more pets photos - it's their fourth anniversary, too!

Dude, where's my Horse?

Flurry and Aero are delayed.  The transport company I'm using, George Mullins, offers the best rate I could find, but unfortunately this means that they wait until they have a full load, in order to keep prices low.  Their departure date has gone from being "the 6th or 7th" to being "maybe at the end of next week."  I'm...well, "annoyed" is too strong, "irritated" is not strong enough.  Disappointed?  Gutted?  Not happy?  Desolée?  Some combination of those, anyway, with a little frustration thrown in for good measure.

So Aero & Flurry will continue to munch grass in my good neighbour's paddock, and I will continue to wait.  The LSH will be back to "business travel as usual" from next week, so I may very well have to collect them from Macon on my own, which I'm not entirely happy with - I always feel it's better to have two people travelling when there is more than one horse, in case something goes wrong.

Flurry & Aero checking out their new digs.  They have a great view of Cork Airport, the runway is on top of the hill in the background - I waved at the Queen's plane from this field in May 2011!  (There was an anti-aircraft battery stationed two fields away, gulp!)

Other than the acute lack of equines, we've made good progress this week.  The LSH missed a day's work with the move, but barely broke his stride and is now back to full-steam-ahead mode.

Our house has been rented - a great relief, and the tenants are happy to look after the cats and chickens, too.

We've unpacked pretty much everything except the horse gear, and fitted our own stuff around the house here in Les Granons.  We've taken down a few of the landlord's pictures and mirrors and hung our own favourites instead, which makes it feel more like home!

Giles Norman prints, Tony O'Connor original "Blue" (prized possession, and doesn't he look like Flurry?) and Judge the dog.  No, that's NOT a man-bag on the floor, it's eh... an iPad carrier.  Really.

I've made an attempt to sort through the tack I brought.  When we were leaving, I essentially loaded the entire contents of the tack room into the trailer.  Now, I'm trying to sort it into boxes :

Stuff I'm never going to use, but want to keep "just-in-case."  A bit like the jodhs I'm keeping, just-in-case I lose 5kg.

Stuff I will need when we start some serious trekking - seat-savers, breast-plates, saddlebags, that sort of thing

Stuff I might need if other stuff gets broken - spare bridles, reins, stirrup leathers, bits and pieces from old grooming kits to replace anything which goes missing 

Stuff I will need straight away, which will be hung up in a tack-room sort of arrangement (when I get a few more shelves)

The "horse" plan for the next few days is to continue sorting my gear and to clean and oil all of the leather bits & pieces - bridles, reins, stirrup leathers, breast-plates.  It's incredibly dry here, and a good oiling will stop the leather from drying out and cracking (this is never an issue at home, usually it's damp and mouldy).

Finally, the dogs... they're both a bit out of sorts, especially Cookie.  She's not poorly enough to bring to a vet, but she's uncharacteristically mopey.

Mopey Cookie.  I don't know that I've ever seen her eyes closed before

Our best guess is dehydration, caused by char-grilling herself in every available ray of sunshine which hits the floor.  We're trying to enforce some coolness for a few days, by closing the curtains and by locking Cookie in her crate in a shadey part of the house whenever we go out.  We're also soaking her (dry) feed, to try to keep her water intake up.  We'll see how she is for the next day or two, hopefully she'll be back to her normal irritating self before long.  Cinnamon just seems a little tired, she is quite content in the new house but is sleeping a lot.  I suppose we have to remember she's getting older, and she has the heart murmur, too.

Fingers crossed that both dogs will improve and I will hear good news about the horses next week, meanwhile, the Boyz are enjoying their time in Frank's paddock.

Dude, where's our Mum?

Nous Sommes Ici! (We're Here!)

As I write, Cinnamon is stretched out on the couch beside me

Zzzzzzinnamon

Cookie is curled up in what she deems to be an ideal dog bed (it's a pouffe!)

Cookie on the pouffe - this reminds me of 101 Dalmations (the book by Dodie Smith) where, after escaping from Cruella DeVille, the puppies all slept on hassocks in a church over night and in the morning, the verger thought there was something wrong with the church boile, because on each hassock, there was a perfectly round (puppy-sized) patch of soot

In the corner of the room, the LSH is working.  It's just like home!

Our journey was completely painless, thanks to Irish Ferries' ability to seamlessly absorb a load of extra vehicles, passengers and animals.  I've never seen their kennels so full - up to now, Cookie & Cinny have had a double sized large kennel to share, but this time they were in a single.  No matter, they were remarkably content.  Cookie was even relaxed enough to "use the facilities" each time we took them out for a leg stretch, and Cinnamon eventually condescended to have a wee, too, about four hours before we docked.

Driving off the Oscar Wilde in Cherbourg - note the Brittany Ferries ship tied up on the right

The only minor issue that we had was with the sailing time.  The last two times we sailed with Irish Ferries, we left mid-afternoon and arrived the following morning, but, this time, the Oscar Wilde left Rosslare at 9.30pm and arrived in Cherbourg at 4.30pm.  We had 500km to cover before we reached our hotel in Vierzon.  Dinner was a sandwich picked up along the way - a far cry from the luxury of pulling into a hotel at 6pm with plenty of time to relax and freshen up before a delicious dinner.

We arrived at the hotel at 10.40pm and fell into bed.  We still had another 650km to go, so we were up at 7am and on the road before 8.

It was a beautiful morning, crisp and fresh,

Near Vierzon

The mountains of the Auvergne, with Puy-de-Dome shrouded in cloud just to left of centre

starting a long descent

although apparently the weather was not so good in Provence!

What lay ahead of us, according to my brother

Jeepy was struggling with the heavy load, particularly in the mountains after Clermont-Ferrand, so we went easy on the throttle and let her find her own speed up the hills.  We slowed down a lot and burned a lot of fuel, but eventually we left the hills behind us and descended towards St Etienne, thankfully, with a still-functioning old Landcruiser.

Joining the Autoroute du Soleil at Lyon felt like we were nearly "home", but there was still a long way to go.  We ran into some of that rain-belt just before Lyon and the skies remained very overcast for the rest of the journey, but temperatures were a toasty 18C - I think that's as warm as it got in Cork all summer!

Our old friend Mont Ventoux, who watched over the first 200km of Le Big Trek, peered over the horizon just after we passed Orange - now it really felt like we were close!

At last, we arrived in a rain-washed and deserted Apt - half an hour to go!  The landscape became ever more familiar, this Cabanon selling fruit and veg was just being built while we were here last winter.

Then we could see La Gardette in the distance, with a cloud shrouded Grand Luberon to the right

La Gardette, which overlooks Céreste, on the left, with Le Grand Luberon on the right

and before we knew it, we were at the roundabout in Céreste.

La Belle Cour, our home for three months last winter!

This time, though, we still had a bit further to go, so we continued out the East side of Céreste, through this wonderful tree-lined section of the D900

until FINALLY, after 52 hours of travelling, we arrived at Les Granons and our home for the next year.

...just as a mighty thunderstorm descended and the heavens opened!  Plans for unloading were deferred to the following morning and we just unpacked the basics needed for ourselves and the dogs.

The house is lovely, here's a quick tour.  This is the kitchen, looking towards the door pictured in the exterior shot.

It's all open plan, there's a dining area beside the kitchen

 and a little sitting room with a big wood-burning stove off that.

There's a bedroom downstairs

and an "under the stairs" cubby which is a great dog bedroom!

 This corridor leads to a back door, loo and utility room

and on the other side of the utility room is this enormous storage area.  This is where I'll keep most of my horse gear.

Upstairs, then, there's another bedroom, which we have appropriated.

It has a lovely terrace off it, which was very wet, with a very cloudy view of Le Grand Luberon on the day we arrived.

Then there's this sort of landing area

with really cool stairs leading nowhere.

And finally, there's the TV room/office area.

Well, actually, not finally.  There's also the Bergerie underneath the house itself, which used to contain animals but now contains the landlords cars and motorbikes.  There's also a little garden and a summer house, which is like a teeny-weeny little chalet, and could probably house any visiting young people who want to feel like they're camping.

The packed up horsebox

Today was our first full day here. We unloaded the jeep and horsebox first thing this morning, and I've spent most of the day unpacking.  It's about 70% done now, I'll get a lot more done tomorrow, though I'll leave the horse gear for a while - I need to figure out just how and where I will keep it. I'm thinking I'll keep the smelly rugs in the Bergerie and everything else in the big storeroom.

The other thing I really need to do is a big shopping, so tomorrow I'm off to Manosque.

And so, a new normality evolves!

Canine Pilates

Cookie latest fixation is Pilates :

After five minutes of a workout, she's exhausted and fit only for her bed.

Have we finally figured out how to get to the bottom of her?

Hello, Emergency Services? My Dog is Stuck up a Tree...

Well, no, thankfully it didn't go that far, rescue was accomplished by means of a 15ft ladder and a 6ft LSH.

But I'll start at the beginning... Granny had been press-ganged into helping us this weekend, and was just leaving when Cookie spotted the open door and darted out.  After a brief search of the back garden, she tracked down Skinny Cat and followed him straight up the tree.  Barking coming from about ten feet above my head made it easy to triangulate her position, and the yowling and hissing noises from about three feet above her made it obvious where Skinny was, too. Eventually, he made a leap for freedom, launched himself to the ground, and a few seconds later Cookie followed suit, with a crash and a thump and a few broken branches.  She raced off in the direction the cat had gone, I reassured Granny that she was fine and we said our goodbyes.

I decided to leave Cookie run off some steam before I tried to catch her, so about twenty minutes later I went outside again to find her.  Normally, you just stand still and she whizzes past you after a few minutes, or at least you hear her tags jingling as she runs around.

Nothing.

I called.

She whimpered.

From somewhere above me.  Sigh.

I peered into the tree top and called again.  Branches rustled, the top of the tree waved backwards and forwards, and a little face peered out at me for a moment.  From about as high up as she could possibly be, short of perching on the tree-top like a blackbird.

The white patch is her hind leg

I tried to entice her down, calling her, feeding Cinnamon treats and pretending to find a cat under the car.

No joy.  Apparently, a hyper-terrier will only launch itself from a tree if it's aimed directly at the tail of a retreating cat.

The LSH was on a conference call.  I sent him a text  "YOUR dog is definitely stuck up a tree.  At least she's not killing hedgehogs."

Somehow, he excused himself from the call and appeared on the scene.  The ladder was leaned up against the tree and I held it while he climbed.  Well, I held it until I took this photo, anyway.

Reaching for Cookie

(I was still holding it steady with my foot, though.)

I think Cookie was very happy to be rescued.  He caught her easily and tucked her under his arm while he climbed back down.

Yes! I can see her bum under his arm

Safe on the ground

I'm not sure how I'd describe Cookie's expression.  Relieved? Chastened? Embarrassed? It's not her normal look, anyway.

For perspective :

She was just above the highest point of the ladder

Fingers crossed I never have to dial 999 and try to explain that my dog is stuck up a tree.  

Or, worse still, try to explain it to the Reillanne Pompiers in French.  They'd think I was barking mad altogether.