Tuesday

The Dog Rambler E-diary

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September 2011
Walk Dogs on walk

Climbing Hartside and Clints Hills Archie, Finlay, Gina, Jerry, Solo, Tim

Length

6 miles

Into the windswept hills today the late show of unexpected summer sun not really revealing itself. It was chilly but nothing like the winds of last week. We had some sun to begin with but it faded away behind dark threatening clouds. They may have held rain but were skimming the sky so fast that it did not have time to fall. They gathered more bleakly as we climbed and I was sure it would rain now. Was this the very late arrival of the early morning rain which was supposed to give way to afternoon sun? Did the dogs care? No. In a tight group they padded down the path toward the gate leading onto Hartside Hills path wrapping around its side. Last week I saw triple. Today quadruple, with four Retrievers in the group. I did well not to mix them up. And I do not think they mixed each other up either. Although Tim did once lunge at Solo mistaking him for Archie. Or was he just being mean. They were all a little quiet today. Maybe the mixed up identities making them wary of who

to chase. Stringing out once through the gate and onto the climb. Finlay making for the front and pushing well ahead. Too far. I called him back many times but he seemed unwilling to mix with the others. Gina, normally dashing off here and there was stuck by my side. Tail wagging, tongue out and looking right up at me. Solo and Archie walked near to me. Only Jerry was leaving the track to nuzzle through the heather separating the track from the denseness of the hills forest. Dark and dim in the trees. Tim trotted about behind the rest of us. Occasionally catching up to see what was happening. He managed to stir up a couple of small scale chases but they soon petered out. The path swung around the hill as it climbed. The trees on the right falling down the slope and opening up some views to the further hills. Pillars of opaque greyness suggesting rainfall further away. Were we to get wet? We climbed all the way to the tall mast on Hartside Hill and the concrete trig point on its summit. Finlay still determined to be ahead had to double back as he set off on the wrong routes. The others looking to me knowing that we change our route on the top sometimes. Today we did, leaving the electric buzz of the mast we headed off across the wide ridge to Clints Hill. Its heath land top of grasses turning with the start of the autumnal term. The low sun catching in the deep hues of orange, brown, red and green. So many shades of brown it was a colour palette all of its own. The dogs loving its open top ran wild with Archie, Gina, Jerry and Tim racing through the stiffened stalks. By now Finlay was falling back into the group and looking less the figure of the lonesome soul he had presented before. Tim too was springing to life trying to galvanise more life into the others. He was not particularly successful. Even as we dropped down the turning track, its gradient giving them a hurry up, he could not raise much from them. Instead Solo lead us down with Archie and Finlay for company. Jerry still poked about in the heather but missed, along with the rest, a squirrel running over the track. Gina had resorted to looking up to me as though I had a pocket full of treats. A show of empty hands did little to dissuade her of the idea. We trundled back up the path to the car with the dogs trying to disrupt my seating plan. I gave up and let them make up their own minds.

Nick

Photo slideshow from the walk

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Nick Fletcher The Dog Rambler 9 Links Street Musselburgh East Lothian EH21 6JL

www.thedogrambler.com nick@thedogrambler.com t. 0131 665 8843 or 0781 551 6765

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