As the regular readers here know, I’ve been out on the road for the past two weeks attending dog shows. First – let me thank my guest bloggers for filling in. They do it as a favour and without their posts the page would go blank after a few days. I owe you guys!
I’ve a few photos to share to provide a glimpse into the type of gypsy lifestyle we’ve been leading during this trek. To give our European readers an idea of what is entailed in driving from Saskatoon to Philadelphia, I’ve overlayed a map of England over Saskatchewan, to provide a sense of scale.
The black line represents the route which took us through Fargo, Minneapolis, La Crosse (Wisconsin), Chicago to Monroe, Michigan shows for Sept 29, 30 and Oct 1, before reloading and heading to New Jersey for Morris and Essex the next Thursday, followed by Hatboro, Devon and Montgomery County Shows in the Philadelphia area. The show sites change location each day, meaning that after showing, we have to repack all the equipment, the dogs and get the stuff to the next day’s site before the premium areas were gone. Most of the trip we functioned on around 4 hours of sleep a day, plus whatever naptime could be extracted when not taking one’s turn driving.
And of course, sometimes there are glitches. (Luckily, we had it back by the end of the day.)
We did enough winning to consider the trip an overall success. I’ve gathered up a few photos – which will have to do for now. The trip home was a 40 hour run, and as most of our days started at 5 am, it’s going to take a few days to regain my blogging coherence!
Grooming area at Hatboro. On the table is the puppy, Minuteman Stray Cat Strut who was winners dog that day for 5 points.
The shows are all outdoors – in the mud, as it turned out. In fact, with a reported 8 inches of rain falling on the site, the Saturday show at Devon was cancelled. The “main event” Montgomery County was touch and go, but as luck would have it, the rain moved on by Saturday night and the site dried sufficiently to go on with the event. The pictures do not do justice to the depth of the mud, especially in the aisles where dogs were carried back and forth between the grooming tents and the rings. Several of the rings were so wet that straw was brought in and laid down over the mud.
High style in the Scottie ring at Montgomery.
“Sparring” in the Bred by Exhibitor class at MCKC. That’s me at the left with Minuteman Halcyone, who won the class and went reserve. And below with my 10 year old Veteran, Am.Can.Ch.Benalta Batman ROM.
The last four dogs shown were from our “family” – behind Batman is Am.Can.Brz.PanAm.Ch.Beauideal Minuteman Smoooth, Am.Can.Ch.ToMar’s The Fix Is In who received an Award Of Merit, and his sire Am.Ch.ToMar’s Dream Fixer.
Finally, a couple of scenery shots from the drive home – the remnants of a huge snowstorm that hit North Dakota while we were away, and flocks snowgeese – millions of them – in the Outlook, SK area.
As many times as I’ve driven across the continent on these “suicide runs”, I never tire of it.
Many thanks for the nice pictures, K.
Your map reminds me of a saying about the difference between Europeans and North Americans:
An American thinks a hundred years is a long time.
A European thinks a hundred miles is a long distance.
English visitor: So if I take the 8:00am flight from Vancouver, when will I be Toronto.
Me:, hmmm its about 4 hrs, maybe more depending on the winds.
English visitor: What ! That’s impossible, I can fly from London to Moscow in just over 3 hrs.
Me: makes sense, London-Moscow is not nearly as far as Vancouver-Toronto.
English visitor: You are joking, right ?
Me: Nope . . . you should drive it sometime, gives a whole new meaning to “pain in the ass” 🙂
Welcome back Kate.
Kate:
Well, Miniature Schnauzers – what more needs to be said? Our own salt and pepper family member certainly approves. He’s a happy four-footed Canadian now cheerfully chasing s-q-u-i-r-r-e-l-s through the English countryside and assisting me with my extensive pub research.
Great pictures!
JM:
Yep, the distance thing hit home just the other day. We’re planning a trip to Australia next year so an Aussie friend has loaned me a road atlas.
I’ve been in the UK now long enough that I’m used to the big road atlases of Great Britain where one inch is often barely three miles.
Looking at distances between Adelaide and Canberra I idly did that thumb and forefinger rough measure (as you do) – 400 kilometres!
Yikes!
Hi, Kate!
It’s good that you’re back! Sean and Angry are great, but youdabest…
So, 5 points in one showing. Wow. Half the 10 points required for “Champion” status, for those not of the dog show world. It’s still 10 points, right? Or has it changed in the last 20 years?
Pictures gave me a serious deja-vu. I used to sit in the back of the ’70 Chev station wagon, with the dog crates, and read Heinlein when I did the show circuit with my parents. Sigh. (Now a ’70 Chev is a collectors item, and I’ll never again feel the anticipatory excitement of waiting for the next Heinlein book to come out…)
Is your “friend in Kandahar” a Saskatchewan native? When she/he rotates home, my mess chit will be open – for both of you.
Mad Mike
The point system in Canada requires 10, in the US it’s 15, with two wins of 3 points or more (maximum per day is 5). The points are determined by the numbers of dogs defeated – in the case of my puppy, he topped about 35 males that day.
And yes – the friend in Kandahar is Sask born and bred.
A dog show combined with a long ass road trip? I sense the sequel to Best In Show starring Chevy Chase.
P.S. Sorry you had to go to Philly.
If it comes down to a choice of keeping yourself clean or the dog clean in all that mud, I guess the dog wins. Congratulations on his victory.
Woof woof!
Jager,
Philly actually isn’t such a horrible place. Kate, let me know when you make the “suicide run” in this general direction again.
If those are miniature schnauzers, how big are “regular” ones?
& congrats!
Hmm we have a salt and pepper and a pure silver (same litter) any advice on the eye staining the silver experiences? Not show dogs (in fact never had the ears cropped) but they are great house pets (I just wish the wife treated me as well as she treats them :).
Ask your vet for the name of a vet ophtalmologist to rule out eyelid or tear duct defects first.
Are those snow geese edible?
Wow. You must love dogs. That’s a sickly long drive.
Minuteman Stray Cat Strut looks like a little doggie-dictator.
Didn’t know dog breeding and showing was such a hardcore lifestyle!
The wonders never cease…
the evil one
I didn’t know there were doggy ophtalmologists.
What next?
Hope it didn’t rain. I can’t imagine a road trip of that distance, hauling a load of wet dogs. yech!
The route taken by Kate in her recent trip looks quite like the one I and my family took when driving from Sask to NB when we relocated here. It was a bit more of a flat, more-to-the-north line, though.
Bummer I didn’t know you were going to be in Monroe – you’re only an hour from where I live. My wife is a groomer – her specialty is terriers and Schnauzers. I hope you had a good time in the Michigan though.
Welcome back Kate…I did miss your headlines though. The people who helped out with SDA when ya were gone did a fine job. A tip of the hat to all.
I can do you one better, marginally. I drove that exact route but from Edmonton, by myself, last May when I moved to Philly for a job. You can guess what I do.
The drive was nice, but almost killed me.
Great blog, by the way. My first post here.
Canuck Economist, are you a doctor or a nurse?
Well damn! Why do I have to find out Devon was cancelled from this blog and not from MB-F?
The landscape shot of North Dakota looks precisely like a scene one would see in NB. For example, just entering Sussex coming from Saint John.
And the Annapolis Valley in NS is so flat it makes one feel like one’s in Sask, except one can see the Atlantic on the horizon, rather than just land.