Bob And His New Best Friend Leo.

A friend that has a heart and soul of gold.

My family is huge and at the moment another few are in town and it is, oh so very nice. A concept that is rather foreign to South Africans is the fact that over here, dogs are not only there to guard your home, but they go with you on holiday too. Often the dogs get more attention than the children ever did...

Well, we have two dogs in our midst at the moment. One is a bit camera shy ( or rather I didn't have my camera around her ) and the other one, Leo, is a darling, gentle and patient. It was hot as blazes yesterday yet the dogs never complained, which is more than I can say for myself.

After we'd lost ourselves in greetings and catching up, my cousin noticed that Leo looked in need of doing his business. He is used to only doing his business while out on a walk. Actually, a walk is a bit overstated as Leo tends to stop, sniff, mark and start at three meter intervals.

It was my Aunt, cousin and I that took Leo for a walk and it didn't take long for him to be enticed by an attractive flower display. As the three of us were nattering away and Leo was on his line, we only realized what he was up to, when the line tightened and the aroma hit us.

The dog did nothing wrong except that among a sea of easy to clean up lawns he chose an intricate flower arrangement for his loo. Leo has style and his drop zone was outside the house of the most garden-mad lady in the village. Her lawns are a show piece. My aunt straight away went and picked up the offerings in a plastic bag to be disposed of later.

I didn't mention who lives there, but my cousin is a clever gal and without my saying anything, she took the scene in at a glance and joined me in flattening ourselves against the wall in the hope that we weren't spotted ( of course we forgot about the neighbours across the road, and I think I saw a curtain twitch...) Grown ups, aren't we? All this while my aunt searched in the flower display in order to pick up everything that needed to be picked up.

Yes, you do get dog owners who are responsible!

The walk around the block thereafter was rather uneventful except that Leo had to leave his calling card at every place other dogs had left theirs. Nothing would budge him to walk until he was satisfied at being the top dog for a while and I realized that for Leo that is part of being on holiday. A new place to explore and to put his I've been here! stamp of approval on it.

The rest of the evening we had a marvelous time and a special pot of Weisswurst together with Brezen brought along from a butcher in Traunstein, lubricated with ice cold beers. What more could one want...life is great and hanging out with family is extra special.

Bob and his new best friend Leo...look at how Leo has sandwiched Bob's hand between both his paws. Oh so cute.

I think you'll guess what Bob whispered to me?

" Aah, don't you think we should get a beautiful dog like Leo? "

Our darling Leo...

Biggi