Tag Archives: puppy

August Getaway: La Rochelle

Posted in France, Married Life, Travel by

Since Matt’s new job doesn’t start until next month, we’ve had a lot of free time this summer to travel and visit many different things. Besides going to St. Sorlin, another annual summer trip Matt’s family makes is to La Rochelle, a touristic beach city eight hours away on the Atlantic. The last time that either one of us was there was in August 2010, the first time I visited France. This time we went there for Matt’s aunt’s wedding, which was especially nice because Matt’s family from Canada came as well and I was finally able to meet them. Matt’s grandmother owns a little piece of land right on the beach in an adjacent town to La Rochelle called Angoulins. For about two weeks we “roughed it” while French camping, although technically we were camping since we stayed in a tent while everyone else had a camper. This was very luxurious camping: showers, electricity, a kitchen, a covered place to eat and hang out, a washing machine, etc. But after two weeks staying there we were quite ready to come back home to our cozy little apartment. Solo, on the other hand, did not want to leave!

We did enjoy our time there, though. The first time I visited La Rochelle and Angoulins we saw a lot! This time we did more relaxing things, but we still took a day to do my favorite activity there: go on a bike ride around Ile d’Aix! I love bike rides and I really miss having a bike. After Matt starts working again I hope we’ll be able to buy a bike for me, but until then I’ll just keep hinting at wanting one! For those of you who read my last post, remember when I said we bring Solo everywhere? Well this was the day Solo went on his first boat ride and his first bike ride. He’s still a puppy and isn’t supposed to run too much, and he’s a mountain dog, not a beach dog, so he’s also not supposed to be outside in the hot sun all day (and he knows it too, that’s why whenever he’s in the sun he immediately finds the closet spot of shade and plops himself down!). So to make things easier for all of us, we rented one of those little children’s bike trailers and buckled Solo in behind us while we rode around the island. At first I was pretty nervous about it, because Solo clearly did not want to be in there. But after a few trials he finally stayed put and seemed to relax a lot. I already feel that we treat Solo as our own baby, but that day proved it! My brother- and sister-in-law rented a trailer for Timéa and Matt’s cousins from Canada also rented one for their two-year old, making it even funnier that we put Solo in a trailer of his own!

Also during our trip we visited the old city of La Rochelle, which is beautiful and is Matt’s favorite place in France (I still haven’t asked him if he prefers it over Disney World so I can’t say if it’s his favorite place ever!). The main landmark in the city is the old fort that’s surrounded by dozens of street merchants and so many delicious restaurants, one of which served the most delicious duck leg I’ve ever had…just thinking about it makes me hungry! Next time we visit I would really like to spend more time in the old city, because it is simply gorgeous and there are so many shops and things to visit.

The hardest parts about visiting La Rochelle and Angoulins, however, are the eight-hour car rides and the lack of the amazing foods from this side of France. Unsurprisingly they eat a lot of seafood over there, but where we live most meals are made with cheese and potatoes! Mmm! Overall, though, it was a very fun trip and we can’t wait to go camping again…and this time I mean real camping!

Some snapshots from our trip to La Rochelle in August. The “mountains” in the middle of the bottom row are actually extinct volcanoes in Clermont-Ferrand!

July Getaway: St. Sorlin

Posted in France, Travel by

During the summer, French people take a lot of vacations! Going on 2-4 week family vacations once or twice a summer is a big part of the culture here. Unfortunately, most Americans don’t have the time or money to do the same, probably because vacations mean unpaid leave from work. But here you get paid to take five weeks of vacation time a year! That’s rather nice!

One of the vacations we took this summer was to St. Sorlin D’Arves, about an hour and a half away in the Alps. Matt’s parents own a cute little cabin there in the mountains, and they usually go a couple of weeks every summer and during Christmas. This year we also spent Easter weekend there to get one last trip at the ski slopes!

During the summer it is gorgeous (well, it’s gorgeous all the time!). The weather is sunny and cool, there are flowers everywhere, and there are plenty of fun outdoor activities to keep us busy. Solo loved it there especially. One of the best things about having an active, adventurous companion dog is that you can literally bring him anywhere, and we really do! In the three months that we’ve had him he’s been to the mountains (his favorite place), the beach, rivers, on a bike ride in one of those little kiddy trailers, on a ski lift, on hours worth of train, tram, boat and car rides, on lots of big and little hikes…and he’s done a lot of other things too that I’m forgetting. While we were in St. Sorlin we went on a four-hour hike up one of the mountains near the cabin. It was a little chilly and there was still snow in a couple of places which Solo played in (pictures at the end of this post). We stopped for lunch near the top at a lake. Overall it was a wonderful day!

Two other things we did during our week in the mountains was have a family picnic dinner around some nearby lakes during sunset, and we took a ski lift up to the same area one morning where there was a small “festival” in honor of the annual sheep pilgrimage that happens in St. Sorlin. Three shepherds migrate with their herd of around 1500 sheep from their winter pasture by the sea to their summer pasture in the mountains. We left Shepherd Solo back at the cabin, just in case he got any ideas to herd/chase the sheep!

A collage of some of our St. Sorlin experiences!

Adventures in Puppy-hood

Posted in France, Married Life by

We’ve had our Australian Shepherd puppy Solo for three months now and we’ve been wanting to sign him up for some puppy classes. We train him on our own but there are a few things, such as light biting, jumping on strangers, pulling on a leash, and not always obeying us, that we want help in improving.

In Grenoble they offer free lessons with a trainer who we went to see two weeks ago. The only thing they ask in return is for dog owners to help keep the city clean by picking up dog poop; easy enough since we already do that. From the moment we met the trainer I was already getting a weird vibe from him, and then I found out why. He’s an older man who believes in negative reinforcement when it comes to dog training. That’s not how we’ve been training Solo and I haven’t read anything encouraging owners to train that way. The only lesson we had was leash training, and his method was to walk with the dog and when he strays too far from you you yank the leash back until the dog is at your side. One time he did this too harshly with Solo and he yelped. I don’t see how that is good for the dog’s neck or how that’s supposed to encourage the dog to trust you or obey you when he’s not on the leash. Needless to say, we decided right when we left that we were not returning.

So this past week we contacted another trainer, who owns an Australian Shepherd herself and who uses clicker training coupled with positive reinforcement. She came over to our apartment to meet us and Solo and she gave us a lot of helpful information. Solo, like with every other living thing he encounters, liked the trainer right away, especially after she gave him lots of treats! We’ll be meeting with her once a week now and hopefully Solo will be able to do everything that the trainer’s own dogs do (the trainer’s website had demonstration videos with her Aussie walking at her side all over town, crossing the street when told instead of darting across, and even waiting outside by herself while the trainer was in the bank)!

She was impressed with Solo–mainly his size!–when she met him, since he already knows quite a few commands. He’s a smart dog and Aussies are a smart breed so we know he’ll benefit from puppy training a lot. One thing is for sure: owning a puppy requires a lot of patience! Having Solo is definitely helping us prepare for parenthood one day.

Our 5 month old Australian Shepherd puppy, Han Solo. We call him Solo for short.