Road Trips & Goodbyes

Monty and I set off for Bristol early, about 5:30 a.m., to get past the M25/M4 junction before any traffic started to build up. Even on a Saturday, the London orbital can get pretty annoying. Despite Highways England's best efforts to reduce the speed limit of the motorway network to 50 mph, section by excruciating section, we made pretty good time and arrived just after 9 a.m. It took a couple of hours to clear out Monty’s room and load up the car and another couple to dispose of his old bed; in the end, we resorted to breaking it into kindling in the back yard so it would fit into refuse sacks. We were on the road again by 1 p.m., car stuffed to the brim and a gravel bike on the roof, and made our way back to Whitfield.

The journey home was long and slow, and we were both tired. We arrived back to some sad news… our lovely seven-year-old cavapoo, Ted, had suddenly taken ill that morning, becoming extremely breathless. Vanessa took him to the vet only to find he had suffered a catastrophic failure of a heart valve - common in his breed and very similar to the condition that had taken his mum only two weeks earlier. The problem was far too severe to be fixed, so we had to say another goodbye, all too soon. Run with your mum, little fellow.