Goodwoof

Today we joined friends at Goodwoof. Goodwood estate in West Sussex is well known for its motor car racing festival every summer, but this is the first time they have hosted a dog festival aptly named Goodwoof. I have never seen so many dogs in one place before, big, small, old, young and so many breeds - Whippets, Spaniels, Doodle dogs, Labradors, Great Danes, even an Irish Wolfhound .They had various activities for the dogs to participate in, and the one I wanted Xena to  enter was 'how fast is my dog' - but the queue for that was over an hour long, not worth I thought. We wandered around a while looking at the stalls and then we found some chairs near the Taittinger tent, ordered a bottle of bubbly and sat in the sun watching the dogs and their owners go by while we sipped champagne in the sun (it only amounted to one glass each!)

We saw a few TV personalities too, there was Kevin McCloud from Grand Designs being interviewed about a stylish range of dog kennels, helped by Bill Bailey! In the extra you can see Julia Bradbury from Countryfile being interviewed while she meets this large Great Dane.

It was a fun event, but being the first time they have done it I feel it could be improved - more dog stalls selling dog goodies - foods, dog beds, collars etc and also events like 'how fast is my dog' had hour long queues all day, there could have been at least three of these setups. 

As we were sitting there we were asked to move back as there was going to be a parcours display and next thing a group of men came bounding down off the building walls and somersaulted across the lawn in front of us, followed by this agile border collie who jumped over the benches - I was lucky to get the shot!

Xena came home exhausted - she usually likes to sleep after her morning walk but she has been on her feet paws all day. But she enjoyed meeting all the other Vizslas there.