Picture Postcards from Rolo the Airedale Terrier Dog in France

France with Rolo the Airedale Terrier

Rolo and I are over half way through our two-month sabbatical in France. Here I shared a blog about a day in my life as a jeweller and I thought fellow dog-lovers might enjoy seeing what he's been up while we've been away. Let me hand over to Rolo...

I start my day by going out into the garden to check everything is as it should be and say good morning to the deflated football I rescued from a local park.

I have breakfast in the garden. My normal food isn't available here so Catherine has been experimenting with some different options - I enjoy them all but my tummy has been less keen on a couple of the options.

Next it's up we head out for a walk. Most mornings we go to the to the local park, Parc Rimbaud, where I love to play football. There's a dedicated dog area in the park where I've made some friends however sometimes there are some scary looking dogs so I prefer to keep my distance. I love to watch the women in the park doing their daily exercises on a special platform and Catherine loves the Plane trees.

Sometimes we walk into town over the river Lez. I love spotting the mother duck wither her ten chicks but she's less keen on me.

If I'm lucky, on some mornings, we go on a nature walk with Catherine's friend Françoise and her collie's Lulu and Moa.

When we walk with our friends we often visit this park which is a bit further away but very beautiful.

My mornings aren't always so idyllic, one day instead of going for a walk I had to go to the vet as I got an ear of barley stuck in my eye. It took a team of four to hold me still as I was very cross to be missing my walk. They put a green-coloured cream in my eye and it came down my nose but thankfully my eye is better now.

When we get home Catherine works so I keep watch to make sure everything is ok. When I say keep watch it may involve having a bit of a nap.

Catherine's working on the quilt she started at a workshop at Pincushion in the Pantiles a while back. You can read about it here. She's sewn the 24 star pieces while we've been here in France so now has 24 dog squares to make.

Some days Catherine does a weight-lifting class on Zoom, so I quickly get ready to help her out. 

Jake gets home from school at lunchtime and I wonder if he'd like to share his lunch with me. He sometimes seems more interested in his phone so I see that as an invitation to tuck in.

We've been on a few train trips from Montpellier station. Travelling can be very tiring.

Here I am in Marsaille with Jake. Catherine loved it here as there are lots of street art murals and a wonderful tribal mask dealer.

This was taken at the port of Sète-Frontignan with Jake - he seems to be just sitting around so I take the initiative and have a hunt for snacks.

On our trips I enjoy modelling for Catherine's blog. She seems overly obsessed with doorways. Jakes says: 'oh no, I think we have more crusty door inspiration', but I just stop and in every doorway now hoping to get a treat.

Later in the day we often head to the beach. We travel by tram and I have to wear a muzzle which is annoying and hot.

We've arrived and Jake keeps throwing a ball so I have to keep rescuing it for him before it goes in the sea.

On other days we head into Montpellier Old Town for a stroll. Here I am with my two bitches, Lulu and Moa, again.

Seeing the sites in Montpellier old town involves a lot of walking. It gets very hot but often people make a fuss of me - I can understand why.

As you can imagine we've had to visit a lot of brocantes. Catherine's been a little disappointed by them but also relieved that she's not been tempted to buy lots of things we can't fit in the car.

One afternoon we went on a wine tour to Languedoc. We had to walk for two hours in the blazing sun around beautiful vineyards. My coat has grown very long and it was very hot so Catherine kept pouring cold water over me which I hated.

When we got home I decided to customise and try and wear the free wine tour hat.

Here I am relaxing with some friends at a Château.

My human dad, James, visited at half term so we hired a car and I got to travel all around the area.

We also visited Carcassonne and stayed in a beautiful B&B in the countryside. I especially loved the breakfast part!

More old buildings - this time here I am outside of the old walls of Carcassonne.

We visited one of Les Plus Beaux Villages de France - Catherine admired the scenery while my highlight was meeting a sausage-seller.

The evenings are my favourite time of day. It's warm but not too hot and on one evening we went with some new friends Susan and her Rottweiler Soa to a nature reserve just outside of Montpellier.

On other evenings we walk down to the river Lez with Jake and have a beer.

One of my favourite evenings was visiting the beach while James was here. We went at sunset where we met a women who used to have an Airedale like me who'd sadly passed away. She said I made her heart hurt so I tried to cheer her up by running around and giving her arm my friendly love bites. We then went to a lovely beach restaurant and had a meal over-looking the sea.

My evening meal is another highlight.

As the sun goes down, I end the day where I started keeping watch over my football and an eye out for cats and hedgehogs.

I sleep in the sitting room on the hard stone floor or on my bed from home truthfully I cannot wait to get home and have a good nights sleep on my sofa.

If you'd like to see what I get up to when I'm back home in Tunbridge Wells you can take a look here.

I also makek regular appearances on Catherine's Instagram here.