Day 9 of GDT

This morning brought traffic today which actually doesn't mean a traffic load of people or heavy car traffic. In fact it was about how the dog should behave when being asked to cross a road when there is a car coming. I'll begin with explaining that we had a good discussion about why the dogs are trained to disobey your 'forward' command in these circumstances. It's a common question 'How do dogs know when to cross the roads?' when in fact they don't, it's down to you to sound out whether it's safe to cross but, and this is a biggish but, Guide Dogs are trained to have a fail safe. If you do say 'forward' and yet a car is coming the dog should disobey and remain sitting - this is for near traffic where the car is travelling on the side of the road closest to you. If you are doing far traffic you would say 'forward' and the dog would perhaps start setting off but then should stop and sit if it meets a car driving up on the other side of the road. It's up to us at that point to praise the dog for doing the right thing and to wave the driver on before setting off again.

For Odene, who is a bit of a softy this was quite hard work for her but did what she was meant to do. We had an extra set of hands helping as we needed 2 trainers watching us and looking out for traffic and a trainer who volunteered to do the driving, the driver was another trainer called Kelly. To explain about the process my trainer Kelly would signal for driver Kelly to drive towards me and at the same time tap my shoulder to queue in the 'forward' command. At which point the dog should disobey you. It was very interesting and we are doing the same again tomorrow morning to have another practice at it. Once at home we shall need to practice near traffic for which we'll get more info on during our 2 weeks at home.

This afternoon was a shorter walk than normal due to wanting to conserve our energies for the night walk. The rain started at this point and I got to use my waterproofs, I now know that Odene does not like rain! Karen came along who is Kelly and Mike's boss and is ever so nice. I actually met her before as she came along for a work meeting about the upcoming arrival of a Guide Dog and was incredibly helpful with answering their questions. So for me this was a pleasant catch up. So Kelly, Karen, Nikki and myself headed out with Odene and Rita to St Albans with the heading being Morrison's in Fleetville to sit in the cafe there. Kelly took Nikki and Rita first along with Karen where Karen and Nikki sat and had a tea with Kelly coming back for Odene and I. Once I arrived at the cafe we then swapped places with Nikki so I could grab a cuppa. It was a nice afternoon where Karen was very tea'd up and Kelly not at all! The rain had stopped by my walk as well so I was quite cheered up!

After dinner we got to do the night walk, I must admit I was a little bit nervous to begin with but by the end had relaxed into it. Kelly said that Odene was a little more distracted during the walk and that it was probably due to me being not quite so quick to tell her what to do. It could also be that it was also her first time in harness in the dark and it must have felt very different for her! It did feel quite different but actually very comfortable and apparently my positioning improved a lot tonight. What trainers look for is a partnership that is safe and effective which apparently is how we look along with being a 'tidy' partnership, I like to think that's code for looking like the most amazing partnership she has ever seen ;-) It was lovely knowing that I was trusting Odene for real and I realised just how difficult it was to tell the difference of edging into a driveway for a quick sniff and edging round an obstacle. It makes it very hard to know when to praise and when to say 'no'. One of the many lovely things about this walk is that I really got to tell just how amazing she is going to be for me once we're qualified. I would never have walked in the dark like I did tonight without her and with this being our very first night walk there are bound to be improvements as I start to learn how to feel for her mannerisms.