This was our fifty-ninth walk since the group started in October 2007. Amazing.

With an excellent turnout of 32 hounds - well 32½ really - a 17 week puppy was carried for a short distance - we were bound to have a great day in Savernake. Walk leader Dianne knows the extensive woods like her back garden - maybe it is - so we had no fear of getting lost. Unfortunately one Basset/Yorkie cross did do a runner at the end of our walk, but persistence by Guy, with his tribe of Alice, Maude and Jessica, retrieved the lost waif for Pat and Cheryl from Henley.

This walk was notable for some distant arrivals - Dave from Sheffield, Simon from Cambridge. Thank goodness the weather was blue skies and calm. How awful to come all that way and be disappointed.

Despite Dianne's warnings we had little mud but plenty of lovely colours on the trees, plus a look at some really ancient oaks in contorted postures. (Savernake has been in the same family since 1087: currently the Earl of Cardigan, yes the same as the infamous charge of the Light Brigade: death or glory and all that).

We had a few chases, nothing hectic but plenty of barking - and a fair amount of humping (hounds not humans, unless I missed something).

A really great, memorable day out.

Sam Morgan, on left, handing out invites to a new
Basset Welfare Group Fun Day. Details here.

Pat on left minus her Nahla, Basset/Yorkie cross:
but she did turn up at the end.

Nearing the end

Guy's Alice: home at last