Aggie, Arth and Zoe have an adventure!

I took Zoe to  the Acomb woods this morning. I was keen to try out my new ball thrower (see image) which means I don't have to bend over and pick up a disgusting ball every few seconds.

We were on the top path and all was going well. I'm a bit new fangled with the thrower and not totally accurate, so the ball went off the edge of the path and down into the woods. Zoe had not seen it go. I encouraged her to go down the woodland slope to find it. I could see the ball.

After a lot of sniffing and digging and chasing leaves..........she found the ball. Hooray. She picked it up and then dropped it, so it rolled further downhill. I'm doing all the encouraging stuff. After many attempts she brought it almost to the top and............let it go again.

My assessment was that climbing down myself was not particularly safe. We could walk along the top path and double back along the lower path and find it.

A man with a boxer (on a lead) had talked to me at the top and knew what had happened.

We had a pleasant walk through the woods. When we came to the bottom of the hill, I started searching. Zoe tried to help.  The other dog walker shouted to tell me that Zoe had left the ball at the top  of the hill earlier.  Smiling through gritted teeth I started to climb, but then decided against it.

The walking festival committee will be very unhappy if I have an injury.

When we finished the walk we started it again, to look for the ball at the top.  Zoe went charging down the hillside - she knew the spot. She appeared with the ball in her mouth - and let it go at the top. She did it a few times more.

By this time I was determined to take this new ball home. Aggie and Arth were not impressed and were not prepared to go down,  so I went down the hill - on my bottom. The leaf mould was thick and there were saplings to hang on to. At the bottom I found the ball and then I scrambled back up.

Are you still with me? It gets better.

I threw the ball along the path for Zoe. She picked it up, went to the edge of the hill and let it fall all the way down again. Good game this!!

Time was pressing on and I'd had enough of this so I headed for the car, by myself. Zoe was lagging behind.

Then she appeared with the ball in her mouth. Zoe 1: Marj 0.

In other news, I took Mum to have an echocardiogram at Hexham General. We were back home in 65 minutes from leaving. Very efficient. No results yet.

Now I'm going to try to tidy my study ready for Mr hazelh's visit tomorrow. Hazelh is obsessionally very tidy, so I must at least make space for him to get into the study.