We are off tomorrow to New Mexico. TBC is trying to scare me about Coyotes, and says I can't do any exploring on my own. I will tell you all about it when we get back. I think I will call the account "Hamish Magruder's Excellent Adventure". Ciao.



Nov. 24



WE'RE BACK!



We had a great trip. I am going to give you a day by day account, but it may take me awhile to get it all typed in.



I couldn't believe it when we finally arrived home yesterday. I started getting excited when we reached the hill down into Orchard Beach, and then here we were back home. The first thing I did was run around the house at top speed 4 or 5 times. Yeah! Good to exercise the old legs, not that traveling isn't great too.



So let me start at the beginning.



Saturday, Nov. 6



We're off! On a bright mild sunny Saturday. TBC and Margi say that the purpose of this trip is to escape the usual gloomy November weather in Port Stanley, but today is a beautiful day.

We stopped for lunch at an Arbys near Flint, Michigan, and I got my first opportunity to get out of the back seat and sniff around a nice grassy area near the parking lot. Margi had smuggled my sheep into the car, so I had spent most of the morning lying on the back seat of the car beside it. Margi gave me a biscuit at one point during the morning. I was trying to bury it so that the sheep wouldn't get it, but dropped the biscuit under the front seat. Five minutes of whining and whimpering eventually persuaded Margi to climb into the back seat and fish it out for me.

We drove most of the afternoon and then stopped at a Comfort Inn in Muncie, Indiana. After carrying my crate and the suitcases into the hotel room we went for a long walk on the campus of Ball State University. I have never seen so many squirrels in one place. What Ball State needs is an army of Cairn Terriers to clean up their campus for them. I did what I could, but there is only so much you can do on the end of a lead.



Then TBC and Margi went out for dinner, leaving me in the car. After dinner I got to roll around on the bed with TBC (it was a huge bed). This is always fun. Later, TBC and Margi were lying on the bed watching TV, so I unpacked TBC's suitcase for him, arranging all his clean socks under the dresser. He didn't seem to appreciate my help, and just stuffed everything back in his suitcase.



Sunday, Nov. 7 St. Robert, Missouri



Oh oh!. You have all heard about the puppy mills in Missouri. What are we doing here?



It was a long day's drive, and the weather is downright hot. Despite having the air conditioning on in the car, I was panting in the back window. It is nice of Margi to keep giving me biscuits, but I do have problems dropping them in the back seat. If TBC didn't have so much other junk in here, I wouldn't have this problem with losing them. So between looking for lost biscuits and hassling the sheep and watching the scenery, the time went by fairly quickly. TBC and Margi went for dinner at "Aussie Jack's Steak House" (don't ask). I sat on top of my crate while they were in the restaurant, sort of hoping that I would be dognapped to act as a sex slave in a Missouri puppy mill, but no one came near the car. I guess I should learn to control these sexual fantasies. Speaking of sexual fantasies, there was a doberman staying in the adjoining room. At least I think it was the same doberman that we had seen playing outside earlier. TBC put a bedspread down in front of the door, probably so I would have something soft to lie on while I was snuffling at the door.



Monday, Nov. 8 Elk City, Oklahoma

When we went out for my morning walk, we saw a chow and a sheltie coming out of the adjoining room, so I guess it wasn't the doberman after all. I didn't get to say Hello to them. The dogs here don't seem very friendly. We drove for awhile and then stopped for TBC and Margi to visit a barrel making factory. The parking lot was next door to a place that had a dog run in the back yard containing a cairn and four dachsunds. Now we know where that dog that beat me at the dog show in Sarnia came from!



When we got to Elk City, where we are staying tonight, we found a big park with an outdoor museum and a railroad caboose and a bunch of old buildings. We went for a long walk, and sniffed around all the buildings. The grass here is really funny. It is all stiff and sort of wiry. TBC says that we are in High Mesa country.



Our hotel room ( a Holiday Inn) was nice, but some other dog had peed on the corner of the bed. I almost forgot myself and did the same, but TBC yelled at me just in time. I am glad he did, because that would have been really bad. Not at all the sort of thing a good traveling dog like me does.



Tuesday, Nov. 9 Las Vegas, New Mexico



An eventful day! Margi was awake early and took me out for a walk in the big patch of grass beside the motel while the sun was rising . TBC took most of the pictures on the trip, and these won't be ready for another week or so, but here is a picture that Margi took to prove that both she and I were awake in time to see the sunrise.

 While sniffing around, I found an old soccer ball under one of the bushes. I pulled it out and Margi and I spent twenty minutes or so playing soccer. TBC didn't want us to keep it when we came back to the motel room and woke him up to tell him about it, but Margi persuaded him it wouldn't hurt to put it in a garbage bag in the trunk because I had found it all myself. So here I am playing with the ball, and I think it will be really great to have at home.

Eventually everybody was up and loaded in the car, and we went on to Texas and then before we knew it we arrived at the New Mexico visitor information centre. TBC went in to collect tourist information, and I had my first encounter with a thorn ball. These are really vicious little balls, about 1/4 inch in diameter, that fall off the trees and have very very sharp thorns sticking out in all directions. Sort of like New Mexican caltrops for cairn terriers. Margi thought I had stepped on a piece of glass and cut my paw, but it was just one of these nasty little thorns. And this was not to be my last encounter.



After Margi got the thorn out of my paw, and TBC persuaded us both that I would probably survive, we got off the interstate and on a little road which cut across country. TBC had not realized that not only did the road cut across the high desert country which we were in, but also climbed about 4000 feet. The countryside was totally deserted, with only the occasional ranch in the distance. We had just climbed a long long hill when suddenly the car cut out. It wouldn't start, and our cell phone wouldn't work, so TBC started to walk back up the road to talk to a road crew which we had passed. We had climbed to about 6000 feet at this point, and TBC gets shaky at high altitude. I would have gone for help, intrepidly, but there were holes beside the road which Margi figured might be rattlesnake holes. I didn't think they were, but I peed on them anyway. TBC eventually got back and said that the road crew had radioed for a wrecker to come out from the nearest town which was 30 miles away. While we were waiting for the wrecker, TBC took me out to pee on some more rattlesnake holes. I decided to pee on a cactus instead, which was a mistake. Live and learn, I guess.



A bit later a Sherif's car passed us at high speed, braked to a stop and raced back. TBC said, "It's O.K. we have called a tow truck" The Sherif waved, did a 360 degree turn around us in the ditch and disappeared down the road with all his lights flashing. After about an hour when the tow truck still hadn't arrived, TBC tried to start our car again and it started right away. So we continued on slowly in the direction we were going. After a few minutes we met the tow truck which stopped and tested our fuel pump which seemed to be O.K. They offered to tow us to Las Vegas, N.M., the nearest town, but TBC said we could drive ourselves if they would follow us and show us how to get to the garage when we arrived in town. When we got to the town they led us to a really crummy part of the town with dirt roads and little shacks and a pretty disreputable looking garage with a couple of mangy looking dogs lying in the dust. A Mexican looking guy came out and told TBC that he would take us for a test drive. He was sitting in the front seat where TBC should have been, and I was in the back seat with TBC. The garage guy drove us out into the countryside for about 10 miles. TBC was looking pretty worried, and the Mexican guy didn't seem to know exactly what might have been wrong with the car, which seemed fine now. Eventually he and TBC decided it would be a good idea to change the fuel filter, which he did, back at the garage. I wasn't allowed out to play with the mangy looking dogs, which frankly was O.K. with me.



By this time it was too late to get on to Santa Fe, so we stopped at a motel called the Motel on the Santa Fe Trail, which wasn't as bad as it sounds, except that TBC couldn't get the room hot enough, but I think it was just the altitude.
 

Wednesday, Nov.10 Santa Fe, New Mexico



On to Santa Fe. The drive only took a couple of hours, and we are staying at a nice brand new Holiday Inn which costs $39.95 a night with a discount coupon that TBC got at the Visitor Information Centre. It has a glass walled elevator, which is pretty neat and a bunch of German tourists who were all really anxious to make friends with me. I really liked riding up and down in the elevator. After a bite of lunch we drove into the centre of Santa Fe and found a parking garage where I could wait in the car in the shade while Craig and Margi went for a two and a half hour conducted historical walk



I had no sooner settled down for a long wait when TBC came rushing back and said that if we hurried I could come on the walk because the lady who was conducting it had a dog herself and said it would be alright. So I did, and it was a really good walking tour. We walked all over the old historical part of Santa Fe, and people kept stopping to pat me, and we met a bunch of other dogs and some other kids. Lynn, that was the guide's name, even got permission for me to be carried into a church which had some sort of miraculous staircase. The explanation about the staircase pretty well went over my head, but I can probably now be called The Blessed Hamish Magruder of the Holy Chapel of Loretta of Santa Fe, or something like that.



Dinner (I always have to wait in the car) and then early to bed. TBC tried to take a picture of me flaked out in my crate, but I opened my eyes just as he took the picture, which he says destroys the whole effect, so he is not going to put it on the web.
 

Thursday, Nov. 11 Santa Fe
 

Boring Day. I spent most of it in the car in the parking garage where I had almost been left yesterday. Except today there was no friendly travel guide to invite me along while TBC and Margi went to museums and galleries and gift shops and such. They would seem to have spent a good part of the day whoring around with a couple of West Highland Terriers who lived in one of the galleries.

Eventually they thought better of their wayward behaviour, and came back to take me for a walk along Canyon Road, where another bunch of art galleries and restaurants were located. They had some neat statues in front of the galleries. There was one of a horse that I started to bark at, much to the amusement of the other tourists. Things were going well until a Giant Schnauzer, who apparently owned the horse, poked his head over a high wall beside the gallery and told me to shut up. So I did, pretty fast. There is an old sailor's adage, "Give way to tonnage" which just once in a while even Cairn Terriers should remember.
 

Friday, Nov. 12 Taos



This is more like it! This morning we drove up to Taos, and are staying in a ski condo which TBC found that takes pets. It is at an elevation of 8400 feet in the Sangre de Christos mountains, and is really neat with 3 rooms for running around in, and a big fireplace for sleeping in front of, and wide window sills for sitting on and looking out the window. Margi has a head cold so she went to bed as soon as we arrived, but TBC and I went out for a good walk in the mountains. We had seen a sign in a ranger station on the way to the condo saying, "WARNING! EVIDENCE OF HUMAN PLAGUE HAS BEEN FOUND IN THIS AREA! PROTECT YOUR PETS FROM FLEAS!" TBC, overconfident as ever, probably figures a case of the old Black Death would be really interesting to treat, so we went out for a great walk and found a beaver dam, and I snuffled every tuft of grass we passed. There was a bit of ice on the path. The temperature down in Taos is near 70 degrees, but up here it is below freezing, at least at night. We are the only people staying at the Condo, other than the owners, and it is in the middle of a National Forest, so it feels as if we are really isolated.



TBC made dinner, and then we went out to look at the stars. There are about ten times as many stars here as there are at Port Stanley. About 9:30 there was a power failure and all the lights went off, so TBC and I went out to look at the stars again. Margi had gone back to bed. We saw a satellite going over. At least, TBC assumed it was a satellite, but it moved in a very jerky fashion, and it certainly wasn't a plane because there was one of those in the sky as well. At one point the light seemed to stand still and then reverse direction for a minute. For once, I stayed within 12 inches of where TBC was standing. TBC thinks the light might have been a flying saucer. Of course, he had had a bottle of wine to drink.
 

Saturday, November 13. Taos



Went for a couple of good walks today.

First thing in the morning we walked down the canyon to show Margi the beaver dam. The long dried grass is great for sniffing in, and I have almost perfect protective colouration. I bet if they would let me I could sneak up on the beavers and scare heck out of them.



Next we went down into Taos, and I was left in the car while TBC and Margi went shopping, but a c.t. does need his rest from time to time. We came back to the condo, and started up a long trail which started at 8500 feet elevation and ended at 12000 feet. The trail was covered with horse poop, and it didn't take TBC and Margi long to decide that it made better sense to head in the opposite direction. So we went down past the beaver dam and along a very snowy bit on the trail. The mountain stream that we were walking beside was frozen in places. I tried walking on the ice, but it broke through and I got my paws wet. But Hey, that's not the sort of thing that bothers a tough Canadian Cairn Terrier.
 

Sunday, November 14 Taos



Exciting day! I woke up about &:00 and got Margi up. She has been waking up early anyway. It has to do with crossing a couple of time zones, which I could explain to you, but it's really complicated so I'm not going to bother. Anyway, Margi and I went out and explored a path up behind the condo. TBC was still in bed when we got back, so we went back to bed for awhile (I'm not going to get into that). About 8:30 the lady who owns the condo called to warn me that there was a brown bear up behind the condo. So of course TBC and I went out looking for it. Apparently it was on the front deck of a fellow who owns a cabin hidden in the trees behind the condo and he couldn't get it to leave. TBC and I didn't want to get too close. Eventually the guy called the Fish and Game people to come and scare it off. By the time he had persuaded them that he really was trapped in his cabin, the bear had ambled off up the canyon. YBC and the condo guy had a long discussion about whether brown bears or black bears are more likelt to maul you, but I forget which is which.



Then we went for a drive through the mountains crossing a pass that was 9820 feet high. TBC has been worrying a lot about the car, but it seems to be behaving pretty well. And he has figured out how to make the cell phone work. We stopped for lunch where a lady thought I was a Yorkie. Geez!



Got back to our condo about 3:00, and repacked the car for the second half of our trip. After supper, TBC took me out for a walk, singing (under his breath, thank goodness),

"We are off to look for Bears, un huh

We are off to look for BEARS".
 

Monday, November 15 Albuquerque



So I'm a sound sleeper!



When TBC went to pay the bill, the lady at the desk said, "Sorry for all the noise last night".

TBC looked at her blankly, and said, "What noise?"

"You mean you didn't hear it?", she asked.

""No", TBC said, "Hamish and Margi and I sleep pretty soundly".

Apparently the bear had come back during the night and crawled in the rear window of the truck parked beside the condo. It got wedged in the front seat, and was leaning on the horn. The folks who owned the condo were afraid to go out and open the truck door for fear the bear would attack them. Eventually the bear got out itself through the back window,. And I slept through it all.



Then on to Albuquerque where we went for a long walk in the desert to see some petroglyphs.

We are staying tonight at a new Hilton Garden Inn, which is really luxurious, except that when TBC took me out for my usual bedtime walk, I stepped on a couple of those thorn balls that I was telling you about. I couldn't walk at all, but good old TBC picked me up and carried me back to our room where Margi got them out of my paw. Forget the bears, it's the bloody thorns that you have to look out for.

 Tuesday, November 16 Albuquerque



Spent most of the day sleeping in the car while TBC and Margi did the historical museum in Albuquerque and took the aerial tram to the top of Sandia Peak. But I did get to walk around the Old Town for an hour or two, and met a lady from Germany and a man from Kansas.
 

Wednesday, November 17 Durango, Colorado



We are staying tonight at a great hotel in Durango. It is called a Doubletree Hotel, and we have a huge room for chasing balls in, and a balcony that you can walk out on and look down at a mountain river. There is a path beside the river where we go for walks and where people jog and ride bicycles. When we checked into the hotel they had hot chocolate chip cookies waiting for TBC and Margi and free dog biscuits waiting for me. I think that is great. I don't care how expensive it is.



We went for a walk in the town. Margi wanted to go in some of the shops, so TBC just picked me up and carried me in too, and nobody seemed to mind. After dinner, TBC went back to the desk and said that I had decided we had to stay an extra night.



Before going to bed TBC was reading the list of things that the hotel will provide if you forget to bring them..toothpaste, extra pillows, a razor...and they include dog biscuits at the end of the list.
 

Thursday, November 18 Durango



Drove to Mesa Verde National Park today. TBC and Margi kept stopping and getting out to go and look at things, but they had signs up saying, "No dogs on trails". I hate that sort of rampant speciesism, but what can you do? I just can't see myself marching in protest marches with a placard saying, "STOP DISCRIMINATION". Maybe I could try passing as a cat, but that would be playing into the hands of the ugly individuals who put up these signs. I think the only solution is to just keep acting as if I love every individual I meet, and hope for a brighter future. After all, there are always places like the Doubletree to give one hope.



Back at our hotel, we went for a long run along the bike path beside the river. I forgot to tell you yesterday that we had crossed the Continental Divide. TBC says that what that means is that every time I pee it drains into the Pacific Ocean. Isn't that neat? What would happen if everyone drank on the east side of the Continental Divide, and then walked across and peed on the west side. Before you knew it, the Pacific Ocean would fill up with water, and the people who put up the No Dogs signs in Mesa Verde National park would all drown. So there.

I have to stop being bitter, because our hotel is really neat with huge floor to ceiling windows on every stairwell, so that as you are walking up and down from your room you can stop and put your paws up on the windowsill and look out, which I always do.
 
 

Friday, November 19 Limon, Colorado



We have started back east. Spent a relatively boring day driving through the mountains, which are now behind us. We are staying tonight at a Holiday Inn which charges $15 extra for pets. I don't know whether to be insulted, or pleased that TBC paid the extra $15. Met a black and white spaniel in the next room called Oreo. Get it? Black and white - Oreo? Glad I have a name like Hamish Magruder.



I have looked for Devil and Halo in every motel we have been in. I always race down the corridor sniffing at every door I can in the expectation that we may find the one with Janine and Devil in it, but no luck so far.



TBC left my Buster Cube in my sleeping crate last night, and then wondered why there were rattling sounds coming from my crate this morning.
 

Saturday, November 20 Topeka, Kansas



Spent the day driving across Kansas. I hate to say this, but Kansas is B-O-R-I-N-G. Toto, you should have stayed in Oz. Good-Bye, Dorothy.



To be fair, when we finally got to Topeka, Margi found a great park, and TBC and Margi and I went for a long run. And we have another nice motel with a couple of other dogs in residence.
 

Sunday, November 21 Springfield, Illinois



A rather unsettling day. We drove most of the day to get to some dumb house designed by Frank Lloyd Wright. Then TBC and Margi went to see the house, leaving you know who sitting in the car. By the time they got back it was starting to get dark, and we always have found a motel before it gets dark. So we went to the downtown Hilton, and they said they didn't take pets. By this time it was really dark, and we still didn't have a place to stay. I started whimpering in the back seat. TBC and Margi didn't seem especially worried, and told me to stop being silly, but we always have a motel before it gets dark.



To make a long story short, we drove to the outskirts of town and checked into a nice Drury Lane Suites. You know how if there are two beds in a motel room there is always a table between the beds? I like to climb up on the table, which I did tonight, but it was sort of a high table and I couldn't get down. This was not good You would think that TBC or Margi would have helped me down, but they just laughed at me. The life of a traveling dog is not without travail.
 

Monday, November 22 Fort Wayne, Indiana



TBC says that we are going to be home tomorrow. I am sorry he has a cold. I sneezed a couple of times in the back seat, but I don't think dogs get colds.



It has been a great trip. Lots of new sights and smells and experiences, and new people and dogs to meet. TBC wants to add a postscript.



Just to say that it would be hard to imagine a better traveling companion than Hamish Magruder. His hotel manners were faultless throughout the trip. He has learned to ignore all distractions outside our room (even bears!) and to ignore all the previous occupants of the room who had probably done unmentionable things on the carpets. Five minutes of olfactory exploration and the room was his. He waits for us patiently in the car when we are having dinner or exploring on our own, but is always up for a walk or a chance to make new friends. While we are driving, he either watches the scenery out of the back window, naps, explores for buried bones (the next occupant of our back seat is forewarned) or beats up on his sheep. He may not accompany us on every trip in the future, but he has certainly earned his DD (driving dog) degree.