Groovin' by the Beach

After a long hiatus, I was back at my fav holiday destination - Ruby’s Resort at Cherating beach, Kuantan. Miles of endless sandy beach minus the crowd, absolute bliss …

Furbie, the resident cat, was there to greet us in her usual slothful manner … think if she was anymore relaxed, she would go into a coma. Total contrast to us city dogs … we just about went bananas when we caught a glimpse of the long stretch of sand and sea. There aren’t many parks in the city where we can run off leash, so when our owners let us off to runabout, we really RAN about! Milo the GR in particular, pranced around and made haste like an escape convict … lost his bearings and sprinted the opposite direction back to the chalet accommodation, funny GR that.Junior the Silky Terrier was all excited to try out his new dance steps and asked us to join in but we were less than impressed. Put it this way, dancing with a soggy Silky is like grooving to a wet mop. Besides we had better things to do, like:Digging in soft sand. This I like cause you don’t need much effort to dig up the loose sand and if you dig in hard enough, you can hurl a whole chunk of sand onto the person/ dog who is standing behind you, awesome! And after you’ve finished, you have a nice cool burrow on the beach to laze in. Russell the Cocker and I must have spent hours trying to perfect the art of excavating.
Catching frisbees. This is my choice sport at the beach cause nothing looks cooler than an airborne dog snatching a flying disc. Didn’t get to do a lot of this as I had a bodyguard (Angel the Border Collie) and a shadow (Russell the JRT) hovering around me at all times, which hampered my movements.OB exercises by the beach. Not in my list of recommended beach pursuits but I did a few retrieving exercises just to please Mr Owner. He has gotten hooked on the dumbbell retrieving routine, so I desperately need to find him other avenues where he can release his creative juices … help.Posing with best buddies. Russell the Cocker Spaniel made the trip and it was a case of long time no see. Was good to catch up with him. He was his usual independent self, swimming, digging and looking for sticks and stones to retrieve all day long. Best swimmer by a mile.
Surfing the waves. Most radical dog sport ever. Waves were milder this time, so balancing on the board was a walk in the park for regulars like me. Rookies Jr, Russell and Kimi the Terriers had a go. Jr pretty much nailed the balancing act cause he doesn’t fancy getting wet. Kimi got washed out by the waves and Russell decided that walking on water was cooler than surfing. Best Surfer award is mine, ha ha.Beach soccer. This sport was actually for the humans but they must have got confused, as we noticed rugby and heelwork to music moves mixed in as well … chaos ensued and our humans soon degenerated to football hooligans. I tried to step in to bring things to order but they pretty much ignored me, just like in the real matches. While our owners struggled to make a decent pass, Milo the GR decided he had better get in the act. He was fairly good at keeping possession of the ball with his mouth, so he takes the Most Valuable Player award.Releasing baby turtles. Turtle sanctuary was just beside the resort and for a small donation, we got to release baby turtles into the South China Sea, sweet! Was a race from sand to sea as our owners lined up the turtles for the flag off. They were gone within seconds … very fast for newborns.Tug-o-war. Brand new sport pitting dogs in the pulling stakes. Russell the JRT showed his mettle as he dug deep to drag his opponents across the line. He even managed to tug Milo the GR and Angel the Collie over, which goes to show that he is as strong and stubborn as a mule. No surprise really as he has had plenty of practice dragging the trolley around our training grounds. Finally, a sport he can excel in … Tug-o-war champ hands down.Savouring local fare. Come night time, our owners sneaked off to the nearby town of Kemamam to sample the famous stuffed crab and seafood delicacies. Dogs weren’t invited and had to guard the chalets. For the next trip, we will be forming a union with the motto, ‘No work while at the beach”.
Agility and Heelwork to music. In between all that, we also found time to entertain the guests and staff of Ruby’s Resort with Heelwork to music moves and agility runs at the resort grounds … and they enjoyed the show.Hunting for crabs. The JRTs fav past time. Shadow, Russell and Kimi specialised in this and were rather successful in their crab hunt. No photos published as the end result was considered too gory for all crustacean lovers out there.

Heaps of activities with no time to rest must have left me feeling a little drained on the 1st night, but soon bounced back to my usual self the morning after. Just remembered that we missed out on the Quad-biking and kayaking activities, but we have that penned down in our ‘to do’ list for the next trip. Hope it’s sooner than later …