Dunure Castle

We’ve noticed that in our part of the world early morning weather can be really nice even when the rest of the day stinks. Ordinarily we let those brief fair weather opportunities go to waste, but on Wednesday of this week all that changed.

From Beanie & Biggles’ perspective the first sign that things were different came when – at 4am!! –  I got up and opened their crates to let them have a snuggle with Susan while I went for my shower. The beaglets never normally get snuggle time this early on a morning. Occasionally they’ve attempted it of course. For example, it’s not unknown for either or both of them to announce an urgent need for the loo, then on their return from the garden conveniently forget that they’re supposed to go back into their crates. But to be officially allowed in bed at such an early hour? That was an agreeable development!

It was even OK a little later when they were be punted out of our bed and relocated into their baskets in the lounge, although Beanie had to explicitly request a blanky to cover her (a princess should never have to ask for such things). What was NOT acceptable, by any stretch of the imagination, was the further upheaval of being told it was time for walkies then being bundled into the car while it was still dark.

Walkies? At this hour of the morning? No, not acceptable at all!

We made the surprisingly short drive to Dunure along almost deserted roads (save for a milk delivery van being piloted by a lunatic) and arrived with 20 minutes or so to go until dawn. Unaccustomed as I am to being up and about so early, I was amazed how much light there was. I’d come armed with a torch but there was absolutely no need for it. While Susan prepared the Beaglets for a jog on their bungee lines, I headed down to the beach with my camera to get some shots of the castle in the dawn light.

About 15 minutes to sunrise…

Here it comes…

The castle in dawn light, which lasted barely 5 minutes!

Once the magical dawn colors had faded I headed back up and caught some shots of Susan and our pups doing laps of the undulating terrain around the castle.  As it turned out Beanie and Biggles were thoroughly enjoying their super-early outing, but this new territory was far too sniffy to fully appreciate at a running pace. As a result Susan had a lot of stop-start Beagle behavior to deal with.

Sniffing Beagles underfoot – hit the brakes!

The classic split. Beanie pulls to the side, while Biggles tanks downhill.

That’s more like it!

As a cool-down we all had a walk together, exploring more nooks and crannies around the castle.

Walking the maze. While humans can find navigating to the center of a maze quite difficult, Beagles do it with ease.

See? You just clamber over the walls. What could be easier?

Just as the first local dog walkers were turning out, we were packing up and heading back home. About half way through the return journey heavy clouds flew in, then came the rain, and it never really let up for the rest of the day. That didn’t bother us though; we’d had our dose of sun, and it was time for a catch-up nap anyway.