Friday evening we drove to Zurich, where a familiar and dog friendly hotel waited for us in Sihlcity. Sihlcity is Switzerland’s first urban entertainment center. Though the outdoor recreation area nearby is the captivate for us. There we meet local dogs running free. Swiss dogs differs from German ones; they say "Grüezi!" in a friendly way but keeps their distance at the same time. This is exactly how I behave with strange dogs (sniffing but not touching), but Ciara is more German: she wants to play!
On Saturday after some free running, we aimed to the Wildpark of Langenberg, where we met Ruben (Faraoland Xcuse Me Desmond) with his family. Ruben has moved from Finland to Switzerland, so we will meet him more often. Ciara liked him immediately. Poor Ciara believed that Ruben was an another familiar basenji dog called Matti! But I showed that I was not confused. I told him, who is the older one and the boss, because I had met Ruben earlier when he was just a junior dog. Ruben accepted my conditions, so I let him to walk with us and even sit by the same restaurant table. Ruben and Ciara flirted with each others and acted like they know something about game animals. We continued the trip to France.
On Sunday I had to get up very early – even if it was cold outside. We drove about a 50 km to achieve the oval track racing area in Chatillon la Palud. After Cami survived from the registration process, we were warming up by walking around the area. There were no veterinary control and the competition started one hour later than estimated. We showed to the French audience that basenjis are faster than they expected. Of course, my special number is the killing of the lure more than the running itself. Ciara won the race with two seconds. Then we had a three hours lunch pause, when we visited in a local restaurant. We didn’t get any breakfast that morning, so my belly shouted for food. I got only little tidbits from the table. The reason for this appeared very soon: we had to run a final round as well. In finals I almost draw ahead Ciara in the beginning, but she managed to increase her speed. So she won the race again with two seconds. We both did the second run faster than the first run, even if the sand track was worn-out during the finals. I got a new porcelain dish bowl as a prize, while Ciara got just a big trophy, which is useless from practical perspective. After award ceremony we drove back to Switzerland to Lausanne. The day was very long so we fell into sleep immediately in the hotel.
On Monday we had a two hours walking session in a big garden of Lausanne. There were signs that dogs are allowed to run free between October and February. Unfortunately it was already March, so we had to be tied and the big birds in the park by lake avoided basenji company. It was night when we finally arrived home.
