Was he ok on the narrowboat? We have a little narrowboat on the Grand Union and have taken Toby there who is fine, but not yet tried Rufus out. Rufus is a bit more nervous so we are going to try a weekend and see how he gets on.
I love watching all the hardy narrowboat dogs when we take Red Dwarf out - you can tell the old timers by the casual way they jump on and off! We are a bit more careful and Toby has a little life jacket, just in case!
We have been on a canal holiday 3 times now, and on our first one, yes, Louis fell in.
He was stood at the back of the boat, and my hubby was driving. Over the noise of the engine he didn't hear the splash, but when he glanced idly behind him a few seconds later he thought 'Oh, theres a seal in the canal, how odd'
It twigged VERY QUICKLY that it was actually puppy-lou, and he started taking his coat off to jump in! Louis was doggy paddling as hard as he could to try and catch the boat up!! I started calling out wildly to the boat behind and frantically waving my arms screaming 'DOG OVERBOARD!' I was terrified the boat behind would run him down.
Luckily the bloke behind was an experienced canaller, and he organised the traffic well. He passed on the message, and manoeuvered his boat so it was sideways accross the canal preventing any more boats coming through.
Anyway while all this was going on, Louis, who is a resourceful beast, had decided that catching the boat up was never going to happen, so decided to swim to the bank. The OPPOSITE bank i might add, to the one we could actually moor up at!! So he ran up and down the bank very distressed and very bedraggled, trying to work out how to reach us!! My husband moored up and the kind man behind us also stopped and we ran to a nearby footbridge and raced over to scoop him up. He was SO UPSET and shivering.
Anyway i carried him back to the boat, thanked the man behind who untied his boat and got back on his way. As it was easter sunday, the canals were busy, and we had no idea just how many boats had been held up while we were having our dog incident. Since Louis STANK - canals are full of pungent water - i had shoved him straight in the shower and given him a good wash, and we stayed moored for a while.
And for about an hour, every boat that went past asked if our dog was okay - i think around 14 in total!! One boat in particular passed us very slowly, and they had a lovely Tricolour and Blenheim who were boating with them - those guys in particular had heard through the boat grapevine that it was a fellow cavalier who had fallen in - and they had got out a spare dog towel for us!!! They gave it to us as they were passing, and we still have it now!!! They were fantastic. But us Cav people are
Anyway i have just realised what a long rambling post this is!! Sorry about that guys !
To get to the point finally, even after that experience, Louis doesn't mind being on a boat one bit, although now we are more careful. We didn't get him a lifejacket as he is now a proven strong swimmer (!) but we take his car harness, and generally fasten it to something on the boat so he can't fall in. But its not always necessary cos he is fine under supervision!! And he LOVES all the fresh air
