I bet you thought Kentucky was in the South. So did I. Turns out it's in the East. Which means you get up REALLY early. Because 7am East Coast time is 4am Santa Cruz time. And a neat fact, the 3 most popular restaurants in Kentucky, based on my whirlwind tour of Louisville are Hooters, Steak n Shake, and Waffle House. And horribly, some, but not all of the highlights of this whirlwind tour were eaten by my camera.
For this I weep, because you will not see these things:
The view of the haunted sanitarium from the sneaky walking path I found in a fancy neighborhood that is built on it's outskirts.
A security guard may have been involved. Let it suffice to say that me and Otterpop are very fast runners, my little blue rent-a-car is nice and fast and that I am not in jail!
Otterpop visits Churchill Downs, and barks at the beautiful memorial statue of Barbaro out front. We will try to go reconstruct the scene of this crime. This statue will make you cry. Churchill Downs is beautiful! We just walked around the sides of it.
Many pictures of many of you that come running up and you know me! But I don't know you until you introduce yourselves then I do! I have SO MANY new friends! Sorry the camera ate your photos! You all look exactly how I imagined you! Hello Canadians!
The whirlwind tour also took us to Iroquois Park, a beautiful orangey red fall color hiking park. A coffee place. The hipster street of Louisville. More coffee. We drove by Louisville Zoo for Francesca. Sorry about that photo! Thank god for the much coffee due to our new status as East Coaster of Time. Louisville has much coffee. And donuts.
After our whirlwind tour, we met some of our friends to go practice.
In another state! We drove to Indiana. Although we could have just a easily gone to Ohio! Massively impressive to just drive across the river to a whole other state.
I am lucky to have Terry and Ashley as friends because they give me tips on being a champion. Although most of their tips for me are more kindergarten level of champion such as You Should Know When Your Walkthru Is. Luckily I have my other Group B super champ friends like Susan and my babysitter Kelly and my awesome teammate Beth to help me with this so I can busy myself taking pictures that will hopefully not get eaten by my camera tomorrow. Bad reporter. Bad reporter.
I don't know if you can see, but Ashley is wearing the newest thing in dog agility footwear called Flipper Feet shoes. They are good for wearing in Indiana dirt as well as Kentucky dirt. Which is dusty. We had European Standard today in the dusty dirt ring.
Wait. I get ahead of myself. The place! Which I can't show you due to the eaten photos. Here. Look at my agility pals posing in front of the dog agility pond of Indiana. Kentucky agility is in a HUGE, massive, Costco-esque with no Costco items, just dirt surrounded by little fence and miles of dog crates! Like 2 Costcos! Like 10 Costcos! Good luck watching your friends if they're in the far away arenas. Walk, walk, walk for a long time to see everything. Go shopping! Many vendors selling things with pawprints on them! Deep friend pork based foods! Then you walk, walk, walk to see when your ring runs. Walk, walk, walk back to your dog. We are meeting so many new friends! Sort of like camp in a cement Costco, but where you can sneak back to your super luxury hotel and have a beer and some yogurt whenever you like.
We had one run, European Standard, at around 7pm or so. Otterpop ran clean, but was very slow and stressy off the startline and into the weaves at the beginning of the run. She picked up after that, and was lovely and speedy after that, but was slow enough from her start that she landed squarely in the middle. Hopefully she gets comfortable running indoors with all the commotion and shows her true Otterpop self.
She sure is being a good dog. She is actually super easy to travel with on her own, and we are having a great time on our dog agility vacation of champs even though we miss everyone at home. Right on Otterpop, who knew you were the travel dog! Here's to a super speedy week, tomorrow we have Grand Prix round 1 and Gamblers. Can't wait!
6 comments:
Glad you are not alone in the big wide Kentucky! Sorry about the camera malfunction, but hopefully you will get many more fantabulous pictures.
Good luck tomorrow. Otterpop will find her speedy feet and there will be no stopping her.
Oh, what a great report!! I am watching/reading the whole thing on the internet!! Glued to your blog, facebook, cynosport tv. If you see a very tall girl running a fast red border collie named Kelso, that's my friend Dee! She is the future! 17 years old. I know - over 300 people and 600 dogs, you'll see her. Rightio....
Very cool to get any photos at all! When I was at nationals, all that walking and keeping track of things often left me with no time to take photos at all and certainly no time for touristing, so you're doing great so far. Thanks!
Loving the coverage! Thanks so much for taking the time to post updates. Best of luck to you and Otterpop, the worldly traveller.
Say Hi to the Canadians for us. Especially Tiffany and Rio. That is Jeepers' grandma. Good luck and keep the updates coming!
Thanks for the updates!! Go Team Otterpop!!
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